D&D 5E Removing alignments

[Mephista]

Psychology class, not philosophy class. Psychology is considered a science, and I find a scientific definition to be more than suitable here.

Especially when applied and legal ethics are still systematized morals. Ethics, in your case, are still what society defines "right and wrong" and set up a set of formalized rules. They're formally spelled out moral judgements.

According to studies, morals are the rules and methods of right and wrong behavior that we learn and internalize as we grow up. In a very real way, morals are ethics we adopt as personal guidelines growing up. And ethics are morals that we, as humans, write down and formalize as standards of behavior for a group. The two concepts are completely interwoven and inseparable.

So, when you have a paladin who's torn between following authority and showing mercy in this case, its actually a conflict of two morals. Because following authority is actually a moral imperative for the paladin at this point. Both are even part of the Oath of Devotion, making both of them morals and ethics at the same time!


I suppose we could talk about violating social norms, but that doesn't make sense in context of the alignment chart either - everyone, even Chaotic beings, have social norms they work with.

 

[WayneLigon]

After all, whose "law" does a Lawful Good character follow? The King's? The people's law? God's law? You could play Lawful Good Paladin as a servant of the realm, oppressing the common folk for the greater good. Or as a revolutionary, overthrowing the elite at the behest of the people. Or as a zealot, defying everyone in service to a god.

One of the perils of the original system was the assumption that everyone had read the same source material as the people who wrote it (and at the time it was probably a very valid assumption); it would assume you'd read all of Moorcock's stuff and thus understood that Law was not 'laws as written' but the general principal of order and stability, just like Chaos was the principal of disorder.

 

[Nebulous]

It's probably just my old school mentality, but i love alignments. Without the 9 axis system it wouldn't feel as much like D&D. That said, i also don't like it as a straitjacket. I like it as an overarching guideline on how a character or monster behaves. And if said character or monsters breaks from that mold, i don't care. Spells or abilities that Detect Evil should not exist UNLESS it is something like an ability to detect demonic presence or something that is purely, energetically evil.

 

[ruleslawyer]

IMO, alignment really is a sacred cow. The presence of the entirely-pulled-from-Moorcock Law-Chaos axis is only one example of how quirky the system is, as are the original alignment restrictions on classes (I never understood, for instance, why all druids needed to be True Neutral, or why there couldn't be True Neutral clerics, or even why thieves couldn't be Chaotic Good.)

I use a Good-Evil axis because I feel that it has some significance WRT the game mechanics, but I don't even bother with this for my 13th age game (the icon relationships basically subsume any alignment-related mechanics or feel). I'm far happier with some combination of quirks and affiliations than with an overarching alignment mechanic.