Metallic Dragons: Unaligned!?

[Flipguarder]

Whatever. Obviously you've made your decision about their motivation.

 

[Nail]

I'm not sure why evidence is important, though; people seem fairly entrenched on this subject, and whether the prevalence of unaligned monsters is a good thing seems to be largely a matter of opinion.

Dn't get too jaded, PC!

I - for one - might be changing my P.O.V. due to the discussion in this thread.

 

[Obryn]

People are up in arms because of something that doesn't seem to affect the game, from where I sit. Kobolds are evil, but Meepo can still be adopted by PCs. Red Dragons are evil, but a player in one of my games still has one as a follower and a different party still made a deal with one, when it helped them complete their mission. Did the 'evil' tags somehow make it easier for these actions to happen? Might the evil tag have hindered those actions in some games? What does alignment actually offer to the game? I'm pretty sure I've played D&D variants that didn't have alignment and things worked fine. I'm pretty sure I've played D&D while ignoring alignment and things worked fine.

This is pretty much where I sit. Even if I liked the alignment system, it wouldn't bother me. I just don't see where it makes a difference - especially when we're talking about dragons, who (in modern D&D) are usually more like powerful NPCs than randomly-encountered monsters.

-O

 

[Obryn]

Not so hard that celestial chargers could not be good.
Now why are celestial chargers more good than gold dragons?
Oh wait, they are mounts. Guess its acceptable to not kill them then....

I'm confused. What horse do you have in this race, again?

I mean really, Derren, you made it pretty clear that you don't like anything about 4e, aren't playing it, and won't play it - so what does a dragon's alignment in 4e matter to you, anyway?

Each edition of D&D is a different game. Why are you concerned about a game you're not playing?

-O

 

[Derren]

Could it be that celestial chargers are beings created/bred by servants of celestial beings, ie gods of good? I haven't ever read their fluff. Perhaps "astral chargers" would be unaligned, and "infernal chargers" evil? The name "celestial charger" seems to imply a good nature. The only thing that might imply gold dragons as being good is fluff from previous editions.

Now, a "celestial gold dragon" should probably be good.

They still have good celestials?

I'm confused. What horse do you have in this race, again?

I mean really, Derren, you made it pretty clear that you don't like anything about 4e, aren't playing it, and won't play it - so what does a dragon's alignment in 4e matter to you, anyway?

Each edition of D&D is a different game. Why are you concerned about a game you're not playing?

-O

Dodging again, eh?

My horse is that I want to like teh actual edition of D&D, but whenever I reach a point where I say "OK, I can cope with 4E" and "Maybe I can work with what they did" WotC makes another, in my mind, completely stupid decision. This time its unaligned gold dragons (which is just the latest example of 4Es practice of not having creatures PCs are not justified to kill).

 

[chaotix42]

They still have good celestials?

Dodging again, eh?

Angels have Any as an alignment. You can consider good gods celestial too.

 

[Nail]

<chuckle>

 

[chaotix42]

<chortle>

 

[Piratecat]

Dodging again, eh?

This sort of personal taunt is what gets threads closed or people threadbanned. Avoid them.

 

[Obryn]

My horse is that I want to like teh actual edition of D&D, but whenever I reach a point where I say "OK, I can cope with 4E" and "Maybe I can work with what they did" WotC makes another, in my mind, completely stupid decision.

So what you're saying is that you can cope with everything about 4e - the mechanics, the powers, the classes and so on, and apparently many other things... but you can't change a word in a stat block which has absolutely zero game effects for the benefit of your campaign?

This time its unaligned gold dragons (which is just the latest example of 4Es practice of not having creatures PCs are not justified to kill).

But here's the thing - none of this stuff about "only here for PCs to kill" is inherent to the system. Nothing kept me from using dragons however I pleased in 3e, regardless of their alignments, and nothing will now. It's a campaign-based decision, made by each individual DM. Certainly if, as a DM, you present gold dragons as just another bag of XP, they will be. But, as a DM, if you present a gold dragon as a complex NPC who could be friend or foe, they aren't just there to kill.

And since when is it morally okay and justifiable to randomly slaughter Unaligned or Neutral, non-aggressive creatures, anyway? How does making them Unaligned make them more slaughter-ready?

I simply don't understand where you're coming from here.

-O