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Message: <blockquote data-quote="GM Dave" data-source="post: 5777526" data-attributes="member: 6687992">Sorry if the following is long but plenty to discuss here.  Break into smaller posts if you like or keep as a whole if you want to respond.Thank-you.I hope if you don't mind that I will use '...' to condense some of your quotes so I'm not filling up board space.Personally, I am happy with Alignment not having a mechanical connection.  I am happy with Goals and Beliefs being something that if used in a game are part of an award system.The award could be experience, it could be 'recharge' of abilities, it could be a benefit to a future die roll.  I would be fine with no award mechanic and this being a section that directs its usage for strictly role-playing value.Alignment is one of those areas that appeals strongest to the non-crunchy, non-min/max type of players.  This is important to include in play as there are a variety of types of players and providing a mechanic for the actor or specialist player types is a useful rule.  Just as skill and feat systems have become more complex to appeal to the crunchy types of role-players you should have more complex rules that appeal to other types of players.Why do people play other style games and be moan DnD?  I think that it has much to do that DnD still doesn't have something, even if it is a 'cosmetic' rule that has no game mechanics to satisfy them.You seem to be arguing both for and against your self in this paragraph.You state that the current alignment system really doesn't represent beliefs and that beliefs are different from alignment.Let's look at where alignment has a mechanical intersection with the DnD rules.The first main intersection is the cleric with Positive and Negative channeling/turning/commanding.  If you are associated with a particular alignment then you gain the ability to heal or harm living or dead.  I also include in here that clerics of certain alignments can not be priests belonging to a particular God or belief system.The second intersection is that some classes are limited to certain alignment choices.  This can in some versions of the rules result in a player being stripped of their powers or not allowed to further advance in their previous profession because of some deed.  Some versions of DnD had additional rules imposed on various classes of who they could associate with and maintain their class standing.The third intersection is some spells are designed to work in a particular way if you are of a particular alignment.  There are spells that ward certain types of people or detect people because they are of an unwanted ethos.  I will further include that certain items function in a similar way to spells based upon this ethos or alignment.You seem to here be again arguing for the value of both belief and alignment.  The trouble with this is that a belief system can easily include an alignment view but alignment views sometimes prevent beliefs or goals.The way alignments are written and stated to be used in the rules is to prevent certain types of people or characters from doing certain actions.  The consequence is supposed to trigger a change of alignment.  In some editions the change of an alignment can be a serious penalty but in recent editions this rule has been removed beyond some consequences that I will discuss with the mechanics.When I discuss the mechanics of the three intersections, I will show that alignment can be covered by belief and lead to a more open and flexible design.  I think alignment can remain as a 'switch' for people wanting a particular cosmology but I hope to show that it can be a switch that is part of a larger system.Good, Evil, Law, Chaos, Red Dragon, Gold Dragon, Amethyst Dragon, Rainbow Dragon, Greed, Generosity, and many other terms that can have opposites, neutrals, or something not even on the scale are all meaningful.  I just don't think that good, evil, law, and chaos have to be the only way to order a cosmology and if we are looking at improving the rule system and keeping the history then we need to look at the full value of these concepts and their impact on story play.Before discussing rules on beliefs, it is valuable to look at the three intersections that I marked and how the rules have dealt with those intersections to see if we need to design new or different rules.The first intersection was clerics and the channelling/turning/commanding for positive/negative.  The first thing to look at this is that it takes the nine alignments and really divides them into three groups.  Group One does positive, Group Two does negative, and Group Three does which ever they want but lives with the choice.This appears to be a little limiting as the 'good' tends to be positive and the 'evil' tends to be negative.  The real limit is the religion or belief system of the cleric should match or come close to their patron deity.  The practical play application is that there are many extra gods created to cover all these 'required' alignment sections and that meaningfully add to the play of the game.If you want to be channel positive and want to be worshiping a god of madness then you choose to be neutral and the chaotic neutral god allows you to spontaneously heal.  Gods of death, war, pestilance and a dozen other usually 'evil' ideas have clerics with positive healing and the same goes for many negative channeling for 'positive' gods.  If you could not make the fit with your own selection of alignment then you would 'manufacture' a god or an 'ethos' that matches your desire of domains and channeling goal.While alignment and deity should have a mechanical effect, secondary rules, or campaign support (Forgotten Realms with all the gods with dozens of spheres or domains) make any 'barrier' meaningless.Mechanically, it is better to separate alignment, deities, and connection to a power base of positive or negative because it isn't really driving the game for the players.  A GM could use it for story purposes but then a belief statement can cover any story development a GM would want without having to work with mechanical concerns.The second intersection of class choice being limited.  Initially this seems a barrier and if you just play by the basic core books with no optional classes or prestige classes then it is a barrier.  The trouble is that people start making up niche classes that do almost exactly what the class restriction prevents and calls it something else.  These additional prestige classes and alternative classes often come from official books (anti-paladin, other types of paladins, other types of rangers, and many similar things that don't add to the game but 'noise' ~ I mean by noise that they draw attention away from something that adds a real benefit to the game).  The result is a series of extra needles classes because the 'official' class lists a limit based on alignment.  Players in groups tend to look at restrictions on who they can associate with or not associate with by saying they're 'different'.  If the players play by the rule of restriction then it can often cause problems for the GM who may now have one or more players that can not adventure together (most GMs in this situation will ignore the alignment rule rather put up with the head ache of a divided party that quickly dies and requires a reboot of the game).If you create a rule and then proceed to invent ways to get around the rule then the rule is really meaningless.  The rule only serves as a 'switch' that some people will keep and others will move on past.The third intersection is with spells and items.  I think this is actually an easy fix.  Instead of type by a particular alignment then type by something more meaningful.  No Demons.  No Undead.  Only the friends of Floah.  Only someone of noble blood.  Only those that give homage to Thor.  Only those that carry a token of the Blood Brotherhood.Now, you don't have to make sure that there are 4 of every type of spell and continually tell neutrals to 'pick a side'.  The spell or item has the limitation or ward built by the choice of what is the limiter.  You save space in the rules and get to include all those neutral people.Could you bring alignments back in?  Sure, if your game has that cosmology then you could have a Protection from Law instead of a Protection from Demons.The advantage is that mechanically that is an option instead of rule that is hard wired into the rules.</blockquote>

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