D&D General Rethinking alignment yet again

[Vaalingrade]

Just..............................let go. It can't kill you if you stop touching it.

The game sure intends for it to, what with the fact that it has specific mention as to what happens when it does kill you.

 

[RuinousPowers]

Then you have a "The DM is Satan" problem and you have a more fundamental problem than the Alignment system. Which since this is coming up in multiple threads I should probably write an essay on it at some point.

If you are dealing with a DM that is metagaming against the players and is trying to put them in no win situations, usually the best move is just play evil characters because if the universe you live in is heavily biased to evil and the supreme power of that world is in fact diabolical and perverse, then you really can't fight the system - especially not openly by declaring you are a Paladin or something.

And then we are back to "DM says kill goblin babies or lose paladinhood" because he thinks Gygax's definition of LG is the true one, and you have to go and atone everyone he thinks you are showing mercy.

 

[Vaalingrade]

But then he wouldn't get the foozle!

Believe me I've seen the sort of players that do walk into orphanages and slaughter all the innocents get outraged that the Book of Virtue blasts them when they open it. I've seen so much Cake Eating around the alignment system where the player plays a ruthless murder hobo with nothing but self-interest and then when it's in his self-interest to have a Good alignment, claims he's Good because he's the hero. It took me 25 years to come up with an effective non-confrontational counter to the Chaotic Evil Cake Eaters that wanted to have everything their way with no consequences.

Is constant defamation Good, Lawful, Evil or Chaotic?

 

[Hand of Evil]

Oh boy...


I don't think it is the GMs job to impose their will on the players and judge the moral choices of their characters.

Alignment is an element of the game, there is good and there is evil in the game, the DM manages those. I agree that it is an outdated concept, but the characters are interacting with the setting. It comes down to the how the DM wants to run the game.

 

[Maxperson]

The game sure intends for it to, what with the fact that it has specific mention as to what happens when it does kill you.

It's an artifact. If you're encountering it at any point before the damage will be a mere annoyance, the DM is being an arse. Plus the party just casts revivify on you if you do die and you go on to the next thing.

 

[RuinousPowers]

Back during 1e, the groups I played in decided against level limits And yes, if a group or DM opted not to enforce 1e's teeth, they didn't exist for that game. My point, though, is that 1e's RAW had alignment teeth where 5e's RAW does not. There hasn't been RAW alignment teeth for at least 14 years.

And yet people think alignments like NG or NE are useful descriptors as play aids. "You believe in laws, but you also believe in not following laws at all". Or Neutral, switching sides constantly to maintain balance- as if the decision of whether you would want your neighbors to be good or evil have the same weight. It's like nobody wants to admit that the designers had a few ideas, and the rest of the alignments are just place fillers to complete the chart.

 

[Medic]

If removing alignment changes nothing,

Well, it does. If I slap "Neutral Good" on my character sheet, the DM has a vague expectation that I will be swell guy and will expect that I do swell guy things. If I wear a "Chaotic Evil" hat instead, the DM will think that I'm going to be a jerk and might even veto my character. Nobody agrees on what any alignment exactly entails, but I don't think anyone here would dispute that Lawful Neutral implies "Thinks following the rules is important." It telegraphs a rather broad idea about what your character's behavior is like and saddles players with the expectation of upholding the idea barring the occasional rare exception.

D&D is not alone in this. Plenty of RPGs have a meta system that try to push players toward behaving in a certain way that fits the game. Vampire has Humanity, Shadow of the Demon Lord has Corruption, even Mutants & Masterminds has complications that encourage you to act in accordance with your character's flaws.

Is constant defamation Good, Lawful, Evil or Chaotic?

It depends on how you do it.

 

[Vaalingrade]

It's an artifact. If you're encountering it at any point before the damage will be a mere annoyance, the DM is being an arse. Plus the party just casts revivify on you if you do die and you go on to the next thing.

Um...

They can't revivify when there's nothing of you to revivify. That's why it erases you, in fact.

 

[Celebrim]

May we ask what the solution that you ended up with was?

Sure. I tempt them. And I find that they basically have no resistance to temptation.

I'm fond of giving small XP bonuses for doing good RP and fulfilling alignment goals. Like good aligned PCs get XP for destroying evil magic items and vica versa.

So what tends to happen with my party that leans murder hobo is that after the party does something I feel is evil I'll say something like, "25 XP to everyone who has evil alignment". And the Cake Eaters get this strange look on their face like I offered people cookies and didn't offer them one. Sooner or later I end up with a bargain like, "I'll give you 100 XP if you change your alignment to evil." And I've never had one refuse.

And then everyone is happy. I get players that are actually playing what is on their character sheet, they are the ones making the decisions about what is on their character sheet, and they can't say "Of course I can open up the Book of Righteous Deeds" because they declared in front of the whole group that they agreed their character is Evil.

It's all about giving the player the perception that they are getting the cookie and not the whip. They don't tend to think about they'll miss out on the "25 XP to everyone who has good alignment" bonuses. They start thinking about leaning into their alignment.

 

[Maxperson]

Um...

They can't revivify when there's nothing of you to revivify. That's why it erases you, in fact.

Okay, then you're high teens or 20th level by then, so toss out a true resurrection or just pay for one. Raising is dime a dozen in 5e.