Alignment in D&DN...

[Dausuul]

I think they should be used to determine how certain classes are played.

I would really like for the druid, ranger, and rogue to return to their former alignment requirements and suffer tangible penalties if the player moves away from the tenets of their ethical and moral choices.

NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO

*deep breath, happy place, deep breath*

I'm strongly against "alignment straitjacket" mechanics, where you're punished for straying from your alignment. If they exist at all, they should exist only for classes where there is a definite reason within the game world to have such a requirement--and where the nature of that requirement can be laid out clearly for players to follow.

The paladin has to follow a code and never commit an evil act; okay, I can work with that, and it makes sense for the concept. Clerics have to follow the precepts of their gods; again, okay. But druidic neutrality, which effectively means "you have to balance out your good deeds by doing evil stuff for no reason," is silly. And alignment restrictions on rogues are preposterous. What, you forget how to sneak around dungeons because you're a law-abiding citizen when you get back to civilization?

 

[Mattachine]

Can you break down the difference between "unaligned" and "neutral" in your view?

Neutral, in the 9 alignment system, had at least two different interpretations (described in the books): Balance and Undecided. No other alignment had two really different options like this. In addition, Balance had a couple really different interpretations: Nature, and Cosmic Balance. When a character, NPC, or creature was listed as "Neutral", which neutral was it?

In my own AD&D campaigns, I specifically had True Neutral (TN) as an alignment, separate from just Neutral (N). True Neutral was for balance seekers and those that actively avoided the extreme alignments. Neutral was for the rest: most regular folks, animals, and so on. Still, there was confusion.


So, I would prefer the Undecided/Uncomitted/Not Concerned With The Cosmic Struggle to be outside of the 9 alignment system: Unaligned.

 

[FireLance]

I'm of the view that if alignment is going to be in 5e, there's going to have to be some tangible mechanical effects. If it's only going to affect role-playing, you might as well write down personality traits, beliefs, allegiences or whatever.

I am also of the view that alignment is better left to more experienced DMs and groups. You are, after all, attempting to translate the way a character is roleplayed into mechanical bonuses and penalties. Add to that the possibility that different people have different ideas about what the alignments mean and you get the potential for real-life arguments and bad feelings. The DM and players should be at least mature enough to handle that.

For everyone else, "unaligned" is all the alignment you need. You don't need to judge the PCs through the lens of what the players have written on their character sheets; you can simply judge them by what they do.

 

[I'm A Banana]

This is a ridiculous argument. Clearly the failure or success of 4e was not predicated on whether it had 5, 9, 3, or 0 alignment

Right, but I think there is something a little deeper going on.

Why did 4e decide to present alignments like it did? Did its presentation achieve the goals it had in mind? Why or why not? What were its positive and negative effects? Are the reasons for that presentation things that can be looked at in a different way?

I think in the way that the 4e alignment system got rid of the way alignment interfaced with the rules, it was mildly successful -- not everyone wants to bugger about with cosmic whatevers to become a barbarian or a druid or a monk. This did come at a cost, but it was a cost that those who didn't want to bother with alignment were very willing to pay.

For 5e, I think there can be multiple versions of alignment. The basic rules shouldn't interface with alignment, but alignment can easily be laid over the top of the basic rules, in various ways (only law and chaos? only good and evil? All nine/ten?). You can then add alignment requirements for classes if you want, in the same way you can add alignment-based effects.

 

[SensoryThought]

I'm torn on whether paladins, rangers, bards, rogues, druids and assassins should have alignment restrictions. From a flavor and iconic perspective I definitely like the limits. But from the capacity to make an evil ranger or pure good (not LG) paladin 4e was a step forward.

One think I've got from 4e was a sense of player empowerment - less of the rule 0 DM fiat mindset. Removing alignment restrictions does get rid of a source of DM-player conflict, stemming from differences of opinion regarding good and evil.

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[Ramen]

Well hopefully the alignment system will have rules for omitting, modifying, or leaving the alignment system. Alignment should be a campaign option not an absolute.

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[variant]

The alignment systems should probably be in the DMG instead of the PHB.

 

[FireLance]

To follow up somewhat on my last post (I was a little rushed) you don't need alignment to encourage PCs to behave in particular ways. You can just reward (or punish) the acts themselves without reference to the PCs' alignment.

Even for PCs who have a supernatural requirement for acting in particular ways or who have a patron or source of power who demands particular standards of behaviour (e.g. clerics, paladins and maybe certain warlocks), it might be better for the player and DM to work out a code of expected conduct than to use the standard alignments.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

If 4E was healthy and a great system, it wouldn't be going away after 4 years.
Paizo is eating their lunch.

Not everything is bad about it, but it's by no means a good system. If you want to take bits and pieces, sure, but it should be the absolute last system considered for any sort of basis of a new edition.

It's pretty rare that I hear anyone say that 4E is a bad system. I really dislike it, but even I will admit that it's a good, well written, fun system. My only complaint is that it doesn't feel like D&D to me.

Given that D&DN's goal is to feel like D&D to as many people as possible, I'd say it's pretty important to have the 9 alignment system.

The only question is whether it should be an optional module or a core system. I'd vote core system, since I want alignment to have real mechanical effects. A system designed to be easy to ignore will probably have minimal real effects on play.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

I actually think the opposite. Good/Evil is purely subjective, and a matter of perspective. Noone sane actually considers themselves Evil.

I disagree. To me, Good/Evil has always seemed dead simple to objectively define: Someone who will act for the best interests of others even when it's not in his own best interest is Good. Someone who will act for his own interest even when it hurts others is Evil. Then everyone falls on a scale between total Good and total Evil.

You may be right on the point of evil and sanity, but the point is that the person playing the character knows the character is Evil, not that the character knows the he is Evil.