Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
White Dwarf Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Nest
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions, OSR, & D&D Variants
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
EN Publishing
Twitter
BlueSky
Facebook
Instagram
EN World
BlueSky
YouTube
Facebook
Twitter
Twitch
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions, OSR, & D&D Variants
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Alignment - is it any good?
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Aezoc" data-source="post: 3528534" data-attributes="member: 12124"><p>I think alignment is a useful tool for a group that's new to (or just not particularly comfortable with) roleplaying. Putting every intelligent being in the multiverse into one of nine groups is painting with a pretty broad stroke, but it can provide a very high-level view of a character's thoughts, actions, and goals.</p><p></p><p>That said, I don't use it in my games. If I have a new player (new to RPGs in general), I'll sometimes suggest they pick an alignment as a starting point, but just for their own benefit. I think for a group that's comfortable developing characters' personalities and roleplaying as those characters, alignment is stifling rather than helpful.</p><p></p><p>For one thing, alignment is vague - I think you really only have to look at the number of "What alignment is X?" threads and the amount of discussion on them, and it becomes pretty obvious that everyone doesn't see eye-to-eye on the issue. For example, last time I checked the House thread, there were arguments for LN <em>and</em> CN. This becomes a big problem just because alignment is shoehorned into the mechanical aspects of the game by the (IMO very metagame-y) magical effects that discern or depend on alignment, and it can be the source of a lot of headaches if the DM and player don't agree on what alignment the PC is. Personally, I think it's a bad design choice to give characters attributes with mechanical implications, and give only nebulous guidelines for how to determine said attribute's value.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Aezoc, post: 3528534, member: 12124"] I think alignment is a useful tool for a group that's new to (or just not particularly comfortable with) roleplaying. Putting every intelligent being in the multiverse into one of nine groups is painting with a pretty broad stroke, but it can provide a very high-level view of a character's thoughts, actions, and goals. That said, I don't use it in my games. If I have a new player (new to RPGs in general), I'll sometimes suggest they pick an alignment as a starting point, but just for their own benefit. I think for a group that's comfortable developing characters' personalities and roleplaying as those characters, alignment is stifling rather than helpful. For one thing, alignment is vague - I think you really only have to look at the number of "What alignment is X?" threads and the amount of discussion on them, and it becomes pretty obvious that everyone doesn't see eye-to-eye on the issue. For example, last time I checked the House thread, there were arguments for LN [I]and[/I] CN. This becomes a big problem just because alignment is shoehorned into the mechanical aspects of the game by the (IMO very metagame-y) magical effects that discern or depend on alignment, and it can be the source of a lot of headaches if the DM and player don't agree on what alignment the PC is. Personally, I think it's a bad design choice to give characters attributes with mechanical implications, and give only nebulous guidelines for how to determine said attribute's value. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*TTRPGs General
Alignment - is it any good?
Top