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Message: <blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 8446368" data-attributes="member: 6790260">...how is it circular? Circularity would be presuming alignment is busted, and thus concluding that alignment is busted. I'm not doing that. I'm saying that we can, purely through looking at the fact that frequently, over essentially the entire period of D&D's existence, people have not only disagreed about what alignment is for, but genuinely believed diametrically opposite things about alignment, and believed that the text supported their position and not anyone else's.That's not saying "it's true because people believe it's true." It's saying, "Because of the sustained, dramatic disagreements, some of which actually bled into the way alignment itself is described by the text, it doesn't actually look like alignment has been that consistent in usage, and thus in conception." That's literally just observing the way people really have used the system, and the way people really have discussed it.That's not what I'm saying though. I'm not saying "oh, some people use it for different purposes." I'm saying different people use it in diametrically contradictory ways, and will evangelize for their way over all others, complete with actual text citations on both sides.So...when you said "I think the core concept of alignment has been pretty stable throughout the history of D&D since the 70s," were you not intending me to consider how alignment has been used over the course of that 50 year span? It's a bit weird that you're allowed to make a claim that spans across that time, but when I actually bring up problems across that span of time, I'm only allowed to discuss things that are recent. My whole point was that your claim--about the 50-year lifespan of D&D and the alleged consistency and stability of "the core concept of alignment"--doesn't hold water. If we restrict things to only the last two editions, sure, it gets better, but given how BITTERLY people complained about 4e's methods (even the addition of Unaligned, despite it being very useful), I don't even know if it's been actually all that consistent across just 4e vs 5e!Okay...but...doesn't that imply a (positive) lack of consistency...? If things change, they're not the same.</blockquote>

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