Metallic Dragons: Unaligned!?

[Cam Banks]

Why don't you guys arguing against the change just take a sharpie, scribble out "unaligned", and write "good"?

I think because we'd rather people who like them being unaligned be the ones to attack the alignment line with a Sharpie. It makes just as much sense.

Cheers,
Cam

 

[Mad Hamish]

1. In 4e, individuals of a species can be any alignment. A good individual of an evil species is a really interesting hero: an outcast drow

All drow are outcast drow fighting against their evil society.

 

[isd]

No, 'the most people possible' (billions of them) think that most of the dragons in the world are good. Note the gold dragon's snub nose, whiskers, and sinuous shape. He is not supposed to represent the western mythological ideal of dragons, but the eastern.

-- 77IM

Eastern dragons could be and often were evil. There are more good dragon myths in the far east, but there was never a lack of evil or neutral dragons. In fact if I'm not mistaken dragons were often embodiments of natural features, which are neutral in D&D. Taoism's concept of balance might be a good way of describing dragons.

 

[cwhs01]

Except that it destroys much of fluff from previous editions (which is the main source of fluff for 4E)?

Change isn't necessarily the same as destroy. Wotc certainly tried to make sure that the new edition can be played without any knowledge of older editions (good), and that it isn't just a copy-paste edition (also good). Changes were made and presumably not just to piss of grognards.

The old fluff still exists in the old rulebooks. So nothing was destroyed.

Lets turn it around. How it is good for the game?
When a change doesn't make something better, don't change it.

Why not? If the new thing is not objectively worse than what was, changing it with the reboot of the ruleset is okay.
And the change in alignment is not objectively worse, or there wouldn't be any discussion.

 

[KarinsDad]

Why not? If the new thing is not objectively worse than what was, changing it with the reboot of the ruleset is okay.
And the change in alignment is not objectively worse, or there wouldn't be any discussion.

It is for some creatures.

For examples, Angels and Unicorns. If you ask 100 average people on the street if those are good, neutral, or evil, the vast majority will say good.

It flat out is objectively worse for these creatures because new people to the game will scratch their heads on it and wonder "WTF?".

 

[keterys]

Discussions like this really make me wonder why they kept alignment in the system at all.

 

[Piratecat]

Discussions like this really make me wonder why they kept alignment in the system at all.

What would we talk about otherwise?

 

[Usumcasane]

This is backwards logic.

The default should be the traditional approach and the MM should indicate that DMs should feel free to change that (like it does). Historic monsters should not change flavor-wise.

The default should not be a brand new approach that is there solely to remove the concept of good monsters from DND and allow new DMs to auto-set up encounters by having traditionally good monsters fight PCs because the designers want PCs to fight every monster.

Your rationale for why that is preferable is pretty darn weak.

That's my justification. The rationale for why it is that way? Because the designers thought it would be better.

The default should not be the status quo. It should be "what do we think will make the game better?" The status quo already exists in multiple editions on people's bookshelves all over the world. Instead, the designers thought "what will make this book a more useful tool for a majority of players and situations?"

 

[Regicide]

I think some have argued here that the flavor text is all you need - the alignment adds nothing.

The alignment literally adds nothing. You can't detect it, deal extra damage from it or protect from it. The only line that matters is the experience point line. Woo, that monsters is "neutral-enough for my next fricken level!"

 

[KarinsDad]

It should be "what do we think will make the game better?"

This assumes that "better" = "easier justification for good PCs to fight all creatures" and not "better" = "common sense" (e.g. angels and unicorns).

Let me ask you a personal question. Does changing a Unicorn from good to unaligned REALLY make the game better?

Be totally truthful. Don't make the knee jerk response, but sit down and seriously think about it. Do you truly believe that unaligned Unicorns are better for the game than good Unicorns (with their rich history and flavor of virgin/virtuous girls riding them, etc.)? If so, why?


And this leads up to the following questions: Does having a total of two good/lawful good creatures out of nearly a thousand make for a rich varied set of creatures, or a restricted set of creatures? Is variety better for the game, or is a bunch of attackable "without any morality thought put into it" creatures better for the game? In other words, is it more fun to attack and kill any creatures the PCs want better than attacking and killing only creatures that are deserving of death?