Metagame role of PoL compared to alignment

[pemerton]

I think I got your point mixed, so sorry.

No worries.

'Adversity makes the strangest of allies' type thing.

I guess so, yeah, but I'd add: and PoL explains why those allies spend their time going into ancient caverns killing and looting. It's rationalising this second bit that has always been tricky for D&D (and which I think was what alignment intended to do, at least in early editions of the game).

With all that said, there is one motivation tactic that has worked better than any other from the time I started to play D&D: "You guys are adventurers, and you like adventure." When I DM, my players WANT to adventure. That's why we're sitting down at the table with dice and character sheets. Sure, I'll throw in some good vs evil or whatever from time to time, but all I NEED to do is provide something exciting for the players to do. The fact that it is exciting is its own motivation.

Agreed that the excitement is the motivation for the players. What I am saying alingment did was allow us to identify an ingame motivation (so as to preserve verisimilitude and thereby change the game from a pure miniatures game to an RPG).

Now (I am contending) PoL does the same thing, but better.

Off course most players will have their PCs work together and "go adventuring". But it's nice if their is actually a valid in-game reason for PCs of different areas, cultures and background to work together instead of constantly distrusting each other.

Exactly.

In 28 years of playing D&D, alignment has never done this for me.

<snip>

I have played in games where the PCs adventure together to thwart evil, but they didn't run around checking alignments to see if they were doing so, they did it the way that it works in the real world, by perceiving the behavior of their opponents.

I've also played in those sorts of games, both in D&D and in other systems. What I've always found difficult is to find ways, in such a game, to stop loyalties to other groups getting in the way of adventuring. These could be loyalties to mentors, to organisations, to cultures, or whatever, and they tend to be exaggerated by the pseudo-historical-feudal character of the typical fantasy gameworld.

I think that alignment was intended to stop this happening by setting up an overarching system of loyalties and obligations (complete with secret languages like secret societies). Without being too presumptuous (I hope), I will posit it didn't do this for you because (among other things) you seem to have backgrounded it as an ingame phenomenon. This is a IMO a good thing to do, because IMO alignment is an unhappy mechanic for all sorts of reasons (both philosophical and to do with gameplay). But then the problem of clashing loyalties still rears its head. In my experience the most common reconciliation of those loyalties with adventuring, absent alignment, is simply to make those political/social connections the focus of the adventure - thus giving rise to a political/social game. (Actually, perhaps a more common way is for the mentor/Elminster figure to give instructions to the PCs - but as a plot device this is really casting verisimilitude to the four winds.)

I like PoL as an idea because it sidelines alignment without generating pressure towards a political/social game. Now maybe you'd already worked this out - I don't know. Maybe I could have worked it out if I'd thought harder about it, but I never tried. Whatever the case, PoL struck me as pretty clever. Perhaps I'm just easily impressed!

Sure, the DM can make the world anyway he wants to. But, assuming that humans are actually human, competition, not cooperation, is the basis of most low tech human endeavor.

<snip what is, in my view, somewhat controversial anthropology>

This, of course, assumes the DM wants to make the world plausible instead of unusual.

Not wanting to be too repetitive, but canonical PoL is prepared to diverge from history to make the game more interesting: W&M p 15.

Which brings me to your second point:

A game where each PoL is friends with every other PoL is not only unusual, but a bit boring. The PCs come into a strange town. No worries. They are welcomed with open arms. Hmmm.

Now I agree with you that in Runequest or The Dying Earth that would be boring. But in (what I am calling) classic D&D it is a plus. Strange towns are places where you go to rest. Adventures happen out in the darkness (unless you actually look for trouble in the safe places: W&M sidebar p 20).

Not only does this facilitate dungeoneering as the principal focus of D&D play, I think it can also help with rules for the passage of time in a campaign. I'll try to explain why.

For reasons of verisimilitude, it is bad if a PC goes from 1st to 30th in 1 month of life. But given the mechanics of combat and other challenges, XP etc it probably only requires 1 day of adventuring for a PC to gain one level. The reconciliation of this mechanical fact with the verisimilitude constraint requires that a lot of time pass between adventures. This in turn requires that PCs can easily make there way to places where this will happen, that is, places which are not adventuring locations and thus in which players are happy to agree that time passes without having to play out that time. The points of light are these places: you don't have to worry about adventuring there unless you go looking for it.

If I am right about this time issue, it raises (at least) one difficulty: how does a GM handle revenge/ambush attacks by old foes? In my experience this is a very tricky issue, because if the players think that such attacks are on the cards then they never let their PCs spend un-played-out gametime, as they will spend all their time on alert, preparing defences etc. But this in turn can cause play to slow to the pace of dripping treacle.

I've never really found a good way to solve this in my games short of letting the PCs rest in utterly safe places (the Heavens, in our current game, or Towers of High Sorcery or impenetrable Imperial palaces in earlier games). I'm hoping that 4e will offer me some good advice on how to handle this for a game that doesn't have the sort of narrative control or stakes mechanisms that would let the players put the risk of ambush on the table, or take it off, at the pure metagame level.

 

[pemerton]

Brutal: Harsh; unrelenting
Savage:Ferocious; fierce:

These words could describe a highly regimented (lawful civilization) just as easily as a wild and unstructured social group (chaotic). These words could also describe a benevolent (good) empire or a tyrannical (evil) empire.

The consistency of "harsh" and "benevolent" has to be up for grabs, doesn't it? Many people would put these foward as anonyms.

If these Ogres are CE, it means they will be brutal in an unorganized and sometimes haphazard way even when logic says they should run, work together or surrender. They are Fierce but without advanced strategy or tactics to best utilize that fierceness. The Evl descriptor tells me they have little if any morality to govern their brutality and fierceness, and will probably turn it on anyone they percieve as weaker than them or a threat. And the alignment descriptor does this succinctly and quickly.

As someone else said, this seems to draw on facts of intelligence and wisdom rather than alignment.

In Best of White Dwarf 2 there is an article "Dungeons and Dragoons". It makes Samurai CN, because of their individualism. All canonical presentations of Samurai in D&D rules that I know make them Lawful (often LN) because of their concern with honour and regimen.

Likewise Monks: should they be Lawful (as D&D has them) for the same reasons as Samurai, or Chaotic because Taoism (and the Taoist-inspired North East Asian Buddhism that in turn most fantasy monks draw inspiration from) is an anarchistic and individualist religion?

I won't get into Evil, and ask how your description of it explains how Ogre children even get raised to adulthood (as it seems to rule out even interfamilial love - but once that is allowed in, it is a slippery slope both intellectually and emotionally to all sorts of other moral commitments, as many moral philosophers have argued).

 

[pemerton]

For England! And King George!

I don't know if you know the article "For King and Country" in Dragon 101 (I think). I have always been a big fan ever since I first read it over 20 years ago.

But it does push D&D in the direction of social/political play. PoL doesn't - and that is what I think is clever about it.

 

[pemerton]

Could you quote the relevant sections from W&M?

Canonical points of light:

*Says that there is no distrust across communities: pp 12, 14, 18-20, 24

For example, PoL "are places where people can share shelter from the dangers of wild wide world" (p 14). In a PoL, a traveller "can anticipate a nonhostile welcome without doing anything special to ensure that lack of hostility" (sidebar p 20) and "can expect peaceful relations" (p 12). The general tolerance of all PC races is also mentioned at least twice (pp 14, 19) and explained by reference to the history of past empires. PoL offer "relative safety" (p 20) and "relative stability and peace" (p 24) and are "beacons of safety" (p 19). This last quote is from the same essay that notes that conflict and war is possible beteen PoL.


*Says that there are no organisations of the sort which might command loyalties so as to cause conflict with adventuring: the same pages, but I am being a little more ambitious here in my interpretation.

It is stated clearly that civilisation has collapsed (pp 14, 18, 20), that the law doesn't stretch very far from any one PoL (p 14), and that only adventurers have what it takes to handle the darkness (pp 14, 18 ("truly special individuals"), 19). The regions beyond are "wild [and] uncontrolled" (p 24). To me all this implies that there are no big, strong protective organisations which people can join.

Tied to this is the notion that "adventurers are exceptional" (p 13) and that most NPCs don't have classes but are simply (stat-wise) unclassed monsters (ibid).

what you describe is not really traditional roleplaying PoL. It appears to be a specific form for DND 4E.

Correct. The point of my post was to point out what I regard as a clever part of 4e - especially because many threads in this forum focus on action resolution, character build and monster/npc build mechanics but not as much on other parts of the system (like alignment and PoL) that I think can be just as interesting and just as important to fun gameplay.

by definition, PoL should be a setting where organizations should form (i.e. church groups to protect the flock, thieves guilds to protect against the city watch, the city watch to protect against foreigners and thieves, etc.).

The point is that those organisations aren't what holds back the darkness - adventurers are. This requires that the world designers make the darkness be a certain sort of darkness, namely, the sort of D&D-ish darkness that adventurers are good at fighting. And this is what they appear to be aiming for.

It sounds a bit metagamey for all "PC races" to be all close friends, just in order to get rid of alignment.

Of course it's metagamey. At least as I'm interpreting it, that's the point.

But it's clever metagame, in the sense that it works well to contribute to verisimilitude both in background and in play.

This PoL definition that you are indicating sounds forced and fake and implausible. IMO.

More forced and fake than the historical use of alignment in the first place.

Obviously we disagree. I think the world is very cleverly thought out - the only other D&D world I know that goes to anything like this much trouble to integrate world and classic D&D gameplay with someting better than alignment is Arcane Unearthed (Eberron might also, but I don't know it well enough and how far it really goes in ditching alignment). But I think PoL is cleverer.

 

[pemerton]

IAs a tool for explaining why a given spell works for or against certain creatures in an area, it works well.

<snip>

I think that Alignment for spells worked a LOT better than the "allies and enemies" Auras of 4E (and some 3E spells like Bless).

In 4E, Elves give a perception bonus to their allies (but not other Elves) within 30 feet. How does this ability distinquish between allies and enemies?

Bardsong also did that, and that was particularly strange, as you'd think an infinitely adaptable tune that fired up the blood and set it to singing in any circumstance would work on the "other side" too.

<snip>

All you need is one line in the magic chapter -- "you are always considered your own ally, and another creature is considered an ally if you so designate them; anyone else is an enemy. You may change your mind about any number of given creatures once per round."

I don't think it's that hard to give an ingame rationale for Bardsong - a rousing chant from my enemy won't inspire me, it will (if done well) intimidate me. There is a reason the All Blacks perform a Haka before a match.

This is also a reason to wonder whether it is sensible to allow the player always to designate their own alliances - sometimes it makes sense that this is determined by the other character's attitude, and it may not always be appropriate to give the player narrative control over that other character's attitude.

As for Elven perception, I assume they are talking or signalling to their friends. What do we do about corner cases (eg a Doppelganger or Wererat has infiltrated the party)? We handle it when it arises - they probably get the Elf benefit (they see the signals or hear the whisper) but don't get the Bard benefit (because they see what their foes are being roused to).

I find alll of this nearly as mechanically straightforward as alignment, and a lot better within the context of the gameworld.

 

[Voss]

Huh. I liked Points of Light as a concept... until this.

The nonhostile, but separate, communities don't make any sense. No distrust? Its so contrary to human nature that it smacks the suspension of disbelief in the back of the head with a two by four. If you have an isolated community in the middle of encroaching (or even just passive) danger, you aren't going to welcome strangers who wander out of it with open arms. Especially in a world with doppelgangers, demons, evil wizards and the entire laundry list of things that want to eat you.

Also, reinforcing dungeoneering as the focus of D&D makes me sad. Haven't we grown beyond inexplicable underground complexes with no apparent purpose? I'd much rather venture boldly into the wilderness with some specific thwarting on my mind then muck about in a stinky old hole full of random monster and treasure tables. Clearing the bandits/gnolls/pirates between Point A and Point B seems much more heroic (and interesting) than spelunking after treasure and then retreating to 'Town' to rest between forays. As does dealing with the local politics and prejudices, and slipping into the Feywild to rescued the captured farmers before the wicked Fey do something unspeakable to them. Like infect them all with lycanthropy and set them loose on the village during the next full moon.

Anyway, back to the point. This PoL concept doesn't seem useful for integrating parties. It comes across more (as presented) as just ripping out any potential conflicts between characters and handwaving it all away in the manner of 'and you meet in a tavern and randomly decide to adventure together. So the next morning...'

As for alignment, I'm perfectly happy to see it go. The designers have never managed a consistent or coherent system, and if it came up at all in party relations, it was a divisive force. If people actually followed their alignment in any meaningful way, someone needed to leave the party. I'm far more comfortable playing in the big muddy bog of moral relativism anyway. I'm also not really familiar with the alignment justified foes, either. We killed orcs and (chromatic) dragons because they were evil, but mostly because they had treasure. At the bottom it really was an amoral mercenary bloodfest, because that was the point (particularly back in the old days when you got XP for GP).

So to me, the metagame role isn't really coming into play. Alignments metagame role was annoyance, and the PoL doesn't really justify any sort of adventuring to me. It handwaves it all away, and boils it down to a lovely circular argument that adventurers and adventure because they're adventurers. And no one else can, because they aren't.

 

[ZombieRoboNinja]

Huh. I liked Points of Light as a concept... until this.

The nonhostile, but separate, communities don't make any sense. No distrust? Its so contrary to human nature that it smacks the suspension of disbelief in the back of the head with a two by four. If you have an isolated community in the middle of encroaching (or even just passive) danger, you aren't going to welcome strangers who wander out of it with open arms. Especially in a world with doppelgangers, demons, evil wizards and the entire laundry list of things that want to eat you.

The book doesn't say that PoL communities are always friendly, trusting and welcoming. It just says that as long as you play nice you probably won't get stabbed while you're in one. The populace might be taciturn or wary of strangers (the book specifically says), but they'll talk to you and trade with you. Quite possibly with the town guard peering over your shoulder. (Of course, the bigger the point of light, the less they're going to be worried about travelers. A place like FR's Silverymoon, for example, is loaded to the gills with magical protectors, so they can let all sorts of strangers walk the streets.)

Also, reinforcing dungeoneering as the focus of D&D makes me sad. Haven't we grown beyond inexplicable underground complexes with no apparent purpose? I'd much rather venture boldly into the wilderness with some specific thwarting on my mind then muck about in a stinky old hole full of random monster and treasure tables. Clearing the bandits/gnolls/pirates between Point A and Point B seems much more heroic (and interesting) than spelunking after treasure and then retreating to 'Town' to rest between forays. As does dealing with the local politics and prejudices, and slipping into the Feywild to rescued the captured farmers before the wicked Fey do something unspeakable to them. Like infect them all with lycanthropy and set them loose on the village during the next full moon.

Where do you get the dungeoneering focus? W&M mentions that there are lots of collapsed empires that left ruins around, but W&M says LOTS of stuff. They're not skimping on plot hooks. PoL is clearly designed to give the DM a ton of options with as few restrictions as possible - see for example the discussion of death. The wording is pretty subtle, but it basically ends up SOUNDING like it's explaining the cosmology when it's really telling the DM to do whatever the heck he wants.

Anyway, back to the point. This PoL concept doesn't seem useful for integrating parties. It comes across more (as presented) as just ripping out any potential conflicts between characters and handwaving it all away in the manner of 'and you meet in a tavern and randomly decide to adventure together. So the next morning...'

I don't think there's anything about POL specifically designed to be used that way. IMO, "adventurers are special" is descriptively true, but it's up to the players to decide what "drives" their characters to those heights (or depths) of achievement, just as has always been the case.

 

[Voss]

I was going by pemerton's statements up thread. Both on the dungeoneering and the nonhostile nature of the SafeTowns.

 

[Simon Marks]

Look up 'Beyond the Pale' and it's meaning. The parallels with the PoL setting are obvious.

 

[I'm A Banana]

When I read a devil's description, and his methodical nature is explained away by his Lawful alignment, then see a demon with the exact same methodical nature, but a Chaotic alignment... well... that means it isn't the Devil/Demon's Lawful/Chaotic alignment that really means anything about their personality, it means that different monster creators had different enough opinions of what can qualify as Lawful or Chaotic that it becomes effectively meaningless when two creatures of almost opposite alignment are, personality-wise, exactly the same.

A few points.

#1: This points out the complexity of morality in a universe that's still morally absolute. You can be the same kind of person, and the subtleties by which you differ define your alignment.

#2: The alignment may be inaccurate in this case, or the personality type ill-thought-out, but that hardly proves that the rule itself is entirely useless. You're drawing too broad a stroke. The rule itself can still be entirely useful, even if it is applied incorrectly in a few places.

#3: You're arguing from a corner case. Demons and Devils had alignment proscribed for them first, and their personalities derived later. This is the reverse of how alignment is intended to work, and so represents a less reliable case for the dismissal of the rule wholesale.

All this said, I didn't think alignment was ever truly meant to form alliances.

I think it was meant to reinforce the heroic aspect of the game by making Good and Evil (and Order and Entropy) tangible forces that have dramatic, solid, effects in the game world.

Alliances and rivalries may have been a passing effect of this ("hey, we're both Good, we should both fight Evil!"), but I doubt it was the central intention.