D&D 5E RIP alignment

[Maxperson]

And I had outer planes that operated on philosophy and power and political games and magic and faith and belief. Now what?

You played a much different outer planar system than D&D has. It can certainly work that way, but it's not going to be Planescape, which revolved entirely around alignment.

 

[Scribe]

Where you'll have Planescape just fine.

No I wont, because there wont be Alignment.

Difference between a Pit Fiend, and a Balor?

Alignment.

 

[Musing Mage]

Something tells me I may regret tossing my hat into this conversation... but here goes...

I wholeheartedly love the alignment system, use it enthusiastically, and recommend it. That said, I am not oblivious to the many emotional opinions around it.

Personally, I think any iteration of D&D should have it. It's like a condom - better to have it and not need it, than need it and not have it.

Those who violently oppose the system can simply ignore it as they do now. A page devoted to it in a game manual isn't going ruin anyone's day. But it's there for those who do use it.

For my own part, the reason I love it is that:

A) As a DM it provides an instant guide to the moral compass of the character(s) in question which guides me in roleplaying. Add to that personality quirks and you have a character ready for instant interaction.

B) It gives my players the same for their characters. As I explain to them, it's not a hard and fast set of rules that they must always honour or be sent straight to the penalty box (with exceptions, see below) - it's a guide to your moral compass. One of several layers that, with other character traits will flesh out the character and let them grow based on the decisions they make through that filter. People are flawed, and as such will say and do things against their morality... this too is good, as it gives players and the DM something to work off of. A character who violates their own moral compass then works to correct it creates scenarios and leads players down fun paths of adventure and character growth.

The exceptions of course, at least for my 1E game being Paladins, Rangers, and Druids who must adhere to their moral compass or potentially lose their status. But that too is a feature, not a bug, as those are the outliers where players know this is the case going in.

Other descriptors are just that, descriptors... but they can be so vague as to not give any notion as to moral compass. Upthread somewhere the term 'bloodthirsty savages' was used in place of Chaotic Evil. Well, I posit to you that 'bloodthirsty savages' can apply to any alignment depending on your perspective.

Lawful Good Paladin can easily find themselves fighting evil with 'bloodthirsty savagery.'

A Chaotic Good barbarian who values individual valour and strength, lives by his word, and helps people where he can could also be a 'bloodthirsty savage' when he fights.

The Neutral Good Ranger hunting and destroying their favoured enemy (the power of racism, folks) with bloodthirsty savagery is simply being a Ranger.

Those are all good-aligned examples. Adding extra adjectives does not a moral compass make. The two are not mutually exclusive, and ideally you layer each with the other.

As a final point, in my experience (35 years of RPGs next week, damn I'm feeling old now), when I join a game and the DM says they don't use alignments because <insert reason here> it's a big red flag to me that I won't (personally, at least) enjoy the game. Primarily this is because usually the DM in question has historically handled all NPC interactions off the cuff without putting consideration into differing points of view. Every NPC invariably becomes an extension of the DM's own personal values. There is no nuance to morality. And they have naturally believed the opposite - that they are in fact worldly enough to understand many varied perspectives. *sigh. Such never turns out to be the case.

As DM I know full well my own bias will get in the way of interpreting such things, and as such the alignment system is an extremely handy filter for getting out of my own head. With a glance you can immediately get a solid grasp of where a character is coming from and build the personality from there.

That's my two copper pieces.

 

[Scribe]

Those who violently oppose the system can simply ignore it as they do now. A page devoted to it in a game manual isn't going ruin anyone's day. But it's there for those who do use it.

Unfortunately, just like the Tasha's floating ASI option, its not enough to allow us to retain OUR options.

We have to lose them.

 

[darjr]

No I wont, because there wont be Alignment.

Well, I can't help you if you wanna cut of yer own nose. But! I get it too and it's too bad. I just can't agree.

Further I think Planescape and the cosmology might just prove to be better for it.

Still, alignment might still play a big role in all that. Part of my original point early on. No one here knows (OK, maybe a couple few) how 5e Planescape will play out.

 

[Faolyn]

Yes. The outer planes operate on alignment.

Honestly, you can keep the planes as is and focus on their flavor over their alignments. Mechanus is the plane of mathematical precision. Bytopia is the plane of pastoral kindness. The Abyss is the plane of utter selfishness. Limbo is the plane of constant creation. Arcadia is the plane of the Good of the Many. Etc.

 

[Charlaquin]

The point I was making is that they didn't need to over react the way that they did. WotC has a long history of going too far. Bonuses are out of control, let's bound accuracy(good). Let's bound it to +6 over 20 levels(bad). +10 would have been perfect. As it is, progression on that front is too slow. 4e was itself an over reaction to the issues with 3e. 5e was a re-correction where you see a lot of 4e things at more reasonable levels.

Those are all opinions - and valid ones, though I disagree with... well, all of them. But, regardless, removing alignment from PC races and NPC stat blocks seems to be what the market is demanding right now. I don’t think meeting that demand is an over-reaction at all, it’s just good business in a free market system.

I have opinions on whether or not that system produces good outcomes, but that’s not really Germaine to the discussion right now. What matters is, I think they’re making the decision that makes the most sense to them for the market they’re working in.

 

[Scribe]

Honestly, you can keep the planes as is and focus on their flavor over their alignments. Mechanus is the plane of mathematical precision. Bytopia is the plane of pastoral kindness. The Abyss is the plane of utter selfishness. Limbo is the plane of constant creation. Arcadia is the plane of the Good of the Many. Etc.

Yes, we can.

Doesnt mean we dont lose something, by tossing out Alignment because some people cannot get over their incorrect perceptions.

 

[Justice and Rule]

Right. Stores should stop selling vanilla ice cream because you don't find it useful.

Have a good one.

No, this comparison is just wrong. No is saying you can never use alignment again, it just shouldn't be part of the base game. If you want to include alignment and alignment-based spells, they are better off as a a variant. It's the perfect thing for the DMG.

The more accurate comparison here would be if you were to buy anything at this grocery store, you also had to buy a gallon of vanilla ice cream. And if people complained, a bunch of people would barge in and say "Well, you can just throw out the vanilla if you don't want it!"

Thank you. This was where I was going. A shift from stopping external Evil forces toward exploring internal struggles and personal relationships.

Yeah, the focus has shifted a decent amount towards a more immersive sort of roleplaying compared to what it used to be.

For a particular GM, alignment can be a useful shorthand.

For discussion or understanding of matters between GMs, or across the player base more broadly, however, it has amply demonstrated its weaknesses. The fact this thread even exists is solid evidence of that.

Alignment, then, is a local, per-table phenomenon, not really a larger one. Discussion that ignores this very basic empirical point are unlikely to be constructive.

I mean, is alignment even a useful shorthand anymore? How many debates are there as to what exactly constitutes "Lawful" and "Chaotic": if you have a personal code but don't follow the laws of the land, are you lawful or chaotic? I know I've heard both sides of that argument more times than I care to think about.

Similarly what the hell "Neutral" means to certain people. It got so bad that they had to distinguish between "Neutral" and "True Neutral" because some people are indifferent and some people uphold balance. And let's not even get into the wildness of how "Chaotic Neutral" ends up working at the table.

Now, imagine the same guy being introduced as Aqarys Batlabay (human, law-abiding, "please, leave me alone"). Or Aqarys Baltabay (human, good cop, no-nonsense attitude). Now you don't have to put any work, you pretty much have all the answers.

Now, in alternate reality version of this adventure it instead starts as "There is a bitter rivalry between the Fiends gang (mostly humans, drug-crazed, violent, numerous) and the Red Tigers gang (mostly humans, disowned war criminals, sadists, close-knit)". Even if the moron who wrote it never elaborates further, it's still something substantial to work with.

So Delta Green does this and it's really nice because it actually gives personality and motivation to what things are. Basically you can find them underneath the character's name, just before their stats, as a little description. Here are a few examples:

Gas station owner and placid keeper of secrets
A good officer out of his depth
Too big for his britches
Local pothead and gas station attendant
A Delta Green Veteran with a liquid crutch

Those descriptions give me a helluva lot more to go on than "Lawful Neutral" or "Neutral Good", and define the characters in a way that is actually useful to the GM.

Yes. The outer planes operate on alignment.

Alternatively, they operate on ethics and we use the shorthand of alignment, which turns out really isn't as necessary as we think.

 

[turnip_farmer]

The thing is, there are almost no effects in 5e that care what your character’s alignment is, so I don’t see anything of value being lost by removing alignment altogether. Either make alignment matter, or ditch it, but trying to have it both ways isn’t working.

I agree entirely. I don't bother with alignment in DnD because it seems pointless. But everyone has to pick an alignment when I'm running DCC, because in that game the cosmic battle between Law and Chaos is baked into the rules and nosy, interfering deities have a direct impact on play.