Alignment restrictions?

[Yora]

The standard alignment system for 5th Edition was inofficially announced to only apply to outsiders, dragons, undead, and similar creatures (and possibly paladins, blackguards, and the like). Humanoid characters would always be Unaligned/True Neutral for the purpose of spells and attacks that affect targets of a given alignment differently.

Alignment restrictions make sense in a world in which alignment makes sense. Which unfortunately (for alignment) aren't that many.

 

[Doug McCrae]

If they're going to restrict the behaviour of certain classes, I'd prefer if it was done with a code of conduct rather than alignment. But I don't think they should restrict the behavior of classes.

 

[EmbraCraig]

No to restrictions, and an additional no to any mechanics/class features which use them by default.

The idea that you can reduce anyone's beliefs or behaviours to a 3/5/9 point system seems very odd for me, and it doesn't feature in my games (If anyone directly asks, I'll tell them most of my bad guys are unaligned - they do things which are self serving, and are prepared to do "bad" things to varying degrees to look after their own interests). I'll be ignoring alignments if I run 5th Ed - class restrictions are easy to ignore, but it becomes much harder if any class gets a bonus to hit/extra damage/things which only work against targets that are certain alignments.

 

[Raith5]

If they're going to restrict the behaviour of certain classes, I'd prefer if it was done with a code of conduct rather than alignment. But I don't think they should restrict the behavior of classes.

I agree with this. Alignment is too broad to be a useful guide to inform behaviour of a character or really assist in roleplaying. Indeed, I think roleplaying only really starts when PCs of the same alignment (or religion) have a moral or political disagreement over some form of action!

I think the 3rd ed allegiance system was the most nuanced form of behaviour system because it took alignment (in the D&D sense) as being only one form of allegiance with political and religious oaths and codes of conduct being possible.

 

[howandwhy99]

Alignment restrictions are really more self imposed. What they can do is limit a class's scope of activity and then include benefits which are lost if that scope is ever stepped outside of. How that scope is defined is up to the player in conjunction with the DM.

Alignment itself is more of a descriptor for PCs while it in part defines what the behavior of NPCs will be. However it does carry mechanical weight. I'd love if weight, height, and hair color had defined meaning in the game again. It's not much, but something like a spell could be created that affects "every blonde within half a mile".

Ultimately alignment is really one of the statistics for the cleric like saving throws are for the magic-user. It is part of a system within the game for that class to explore and play.

 

[hemera]

I am in the heck no category. I am also in the no category for things like detect X. I don't think someone's belief system is really something that should be something that magically lights up like a beacon. Alignment to me is just kind of a general descriptor of beliefs. It's more of a guideline for how a pc might act. So if a pc says she is lawful good, she has a baseline of how that character might behave and can extrapolate from there. Definitely not in the rigid descriptor category.

 

[CAFRedblade]

At the very least the older alignment system is in the general geek public consciousness proven by i09.com's Game of Thrones application of traditional DnD Alignment.

What if Game of Thrones characters had Dungeons & Dragons alignments?

 

[jsaving]

It's interesting how people seem to agree that alignment shouldn't be a straitjacket, except in situations where they think it should be.

I think it's a mistake for alignment to have any mechanical impact whatsoever. Many DMs don't like to use alignment; definitions of the various alignments tend to be imprecise; and abilities that only function against certain alignments inevitably create a "favored enemy problem" where builds that were highly useful in one adventure are nigh useless in the next. And while it may be easy to say that people who don't like alignment can simply take it out, it isn't necessarily easy for a novice DM to clearly understand how removing alignment from the game might impact balance.

I also think alignment restrictions are incredibly broad and blunt instruments when applied to classes. Who says a judgmental individual who respects tradition, keeps his word, and likes a relatively big government can't love nature (druid) or channel his anger into a potent weapon (barbarian) or feel wanderlust (bard)? If specific traits like loving nature are integral to a particular class, then it's perfectly fine to require those particular traits without a huge number of extraneous traits that are embedded in each of the traditional alignments.

Paladins are often cited as a unique exception because chivalry is obviously the same thing as lawful goodness, but I'd disagree here as well. My dictionary defines chivalry as courage against the strong, sympathy for the weak, skill with arms, and good manners. And I just don't see why one's view of the proper size and scope of government, or how creative or judgmental one might be, or whether one respects kings and traditions has any bearing on how chivalrous any given person turns out to be. If you want to require chivalry, require it directly and explicitly in the paladin class writeup rather than hoping that any particular alignment restriction can approximate it.

Too often, people create a false dichotomy in which the only alternative to class alignment restrictions is letting everybody do and believe whatever they wish without mechanical consequence. And my only point is that it doesn't have to be this way.

 

[Jack Daniel]

I keep seeing references here to the notion that alignment must somehow reflect, influence, describe, or otherwise involve player character behavior. This unfortunate corruption is due to the twin mistakes of adding to the game the good-evil axis and all the alignment-based sub-classes like the paladin. As a set of "alignments", i.e. factions, Law and Chaos do a fine job of representing allegiance to either the civilized world of men or the barbaric realm of monsters (with Neutrality for nature, animals, demihumans, &c.). But as descriptors for individual characters' private ethoi or moral philosophies, alignments are indeed too reductive, limiting, and altogether problematic. The point I want to make here is that alignment mechanics are not inherently bad. Sometimes you need to invent items or abilities that can only be used by, or will affect differently, the members of a faction within the fantasy world--even a broad faction, like "monsters" or "civilization" or "unaligned". The problem comes whenever a character's alignment status is supposed to say something about individual actions or outlooks.

 

[CleverNickName]

I've never had a problem with alignment, and I have never been frustrated by alignment restrictions when creating a character. I've always regarded it as any other rule for character creation: ability scores range from 3 to 18, fighters roll 1d10 for hit points, paladins are lawful good. (shrug) If you want/need to deviate from a rule, ask your DM.

It makes me chuckle when someone will write "alignment doesn't matter" and "I hate being restricted by alignment" in the same post. I mean, both can't be right, can they? If you think alignment is too restrictive, then it clearly matters to you.