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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 5777221" data-attributes="member: 4937">Welcome to the boards.  My that's a lot of deep topics we can launch off from from there.I think every player that creates a character needs to think deeply about what their character believes in and what goals that they have.  I have no problem with that per se.But the problem with codifying beliefs and goals into the game, beyond that its one of the harder challenges in game design, is that if you really do a good job of making that codification meaningful you typically create a game that is centrally about the player/characters beliefs.  An example of doing a good job of this would be 'Dogs in the Vineyard'.  A less well done job was attempted by pretty much every White Wolf game they've ever released, but they have a lot of interesting ideas and mechanical nuggets buried in there.  These games tend to be best when you have a group that can really focus on the low drama and get into the theater games involved in it.  But they really aren't D&D and if D&D went that direction it would probably alienate a lot of fans.  (I'm not saying you can't play D&D as a low drama game, because I've seen it done, it's just not something enforced by the mechanics.)I agree that alignments are a poor representation of what a person believes in, but I also think that that has never been either what they represent or thier in game purpose.  I've discussed what they represent at length elsewhere, but in brief alignments represent not a specific belief but the tendencies in the characters actions when they are subject to stress and must make difficult choices.  I believe that two characters with the same basic beliefs will be very very different in the crucible depending on their alignment, and will express their beliefs very differently.One of the more interesting things you can do with a character is make him an alignment which either is, or superficially is, in contridiction to his basic beliefs.  So, make the evil character belief that Elves need to live in harmony with other races - you know, like goblins, orcs, and Rakshasa.  Make the good character believe that Elves should be supreme and all other races must eventually be - however tragically - elimenated for the sake of the greater good.  Then try to play these characters through the tensions and sometimes contridictions their beliefs and alignment have.Sure, but at key moments in a characters development, alignment can change and grow and develop as well.  And, beliefs can change and grow and shift quite independently of alignment.  Maybe the above good genocidal character comes to realize that at least some other non-elf races are just worthy of life and noble and good as elf-kind.  Or maybe not.  But don't mistake alignment for beliefs.  They don't cover exactly the same territory.You seem to think that 'good' and 'evil' aren't meaningful.Beliefs tend to be far more diverse than alignments.  As such, they are harder to mechanically code into the rules, and if they were so coded and done well, they'd be harder to rip out again.</blockquote>

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