It really doesn't. I think Mistwell actually misunderstood my point, actually.
-2 points to Ravenclaw for two uses of actually in one sentence.
If you want to know how a creature is played, as you just pointed out, the alignments aren't useful (because then a Lawful Good society could engage in child sacrifice[1]). Sure, earlier editions may have had a larger descriptions of what each alignment means--but that's both a greater description (which is what I was talking about) and doesn't really help in describing how this particular character is played. Nuitari is the Lawful Evil god of evil magic, but that doesn't explain what that actual means. Is some magic inherently evil, so that anyone who casts it risks becoming evil? Is it just types of magic that are evil but only because they encourage the user to perform evil acts, like creating zombies or mind controlling others? Is it any magic that has an evil result, so if you heal the serial killer who is nearly dead and send them out to murder again, does that act of healing count as evil magic?
No idea what you're talking about here. If the NPC statblock says LG, then I know that NPC is likely not intended as a combat-first encounter and I need to read the description more carefully. If it says CE then I know the NPC is likely intended as a bad guy. Either way, that's a meaningful shorthand which has some uses in my game. The LG is incredibly likely not someone who engages in child sacrifice, and I know of zero published adventures which would use that alignment to represent something like that in the adventure.
If YOU don't find that as helpful shorthand, that's cool. But those two little letters in the stateblock are helpful for me.
You want to say "the army's soldiers are mostly Neutral Evil" and use that as a shorthand way of saying "they will do their job but probably aren't going to be particularly honorable about it and may or may not take prisoners and may disobey orders if obeying them means their deaths" as opposed to a LE "will follow orders" or a CE "will commit war crimes" thing... OK. Whatever. But for an individual? An actual description of that character does more than an alignment ever could hope to.
Yes, which is why I say it's a broad short hand and not a full replacement for an entire description. It's a guidepost. Which has its uses as an organizational tool. Some people organize their DM prep without it, and some DMs like myself use it in their DM prep. If you don't use it, that doesn't make it not useful to others.
I can tell you with certainty that many professional writers for WOTC use it in THEIR adventure prep, and were none to please when it was wholesale removed from what they had written without notice at the last second. THEY thought it was something with utility.
But comparing alignment to AC is silly because the type of armor being worn doesn't actually mean anything like what alignment is supposed to mean. And also, AC isn't a shorthand for anything, because the number itself is what's important, not the type of armor. D&D doesn't do enough with different types of armor for the type of armor to be more important than the number it produces.
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[1] And if sacrificing a child means the dread demon won't arise from the pit to devour the village, it might actually be a Lawful Good act.
The type of armor being warn is OFTEN more important to the adventuring party than whether than particular now deceased bad guy was sinister or sarcastic or plotting with some other minor NPC. Because it was valuable loot, and also might serve as a disguise to kill the next bad guy they encounter whose personality traits they also don't give a crap about and which fry nicely with a fireball.
Alignment is not a white-room issue. It's a commonly used tool which DMs use. It's far less about theory than utility. How you prep a game, what you do when you glance at a stat-block during a game, these are the things which are relevant to alignment. The theories about the corner cases of alignment can in theory mean are just not important to the practicalities of how it's used in actual games. If some DMs find it useful, then damn dude let them use it. DMing is hard enough as it is. Game prep takes enough time as it is. Adjusting to something the PCs did unexpectedly is hard enough as it is. Don't take away a DM tool because in theory you don't like how some corner cases could work out. Not unless you have a good short hand replacement in mind already.
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