Rule of Three: 20/3/12

[MatthewJHanson]

One concern, if the new minions are just lower level standard monsters, will the new solos just be higher level standards? There's even more that goes into a good solo than just having a lot of hit points.

 

[Fanaelialae]

Or unaligned could just as easily be, "I refuse to align myself with law or chaos, good or evil, I care naught but for the balance."

What if you want a character who says, "I refuse to align myself with law or chaos, good or evil, or neutrality, I care naught for these abstract philosophies"?

If you're aligning yourself with keeping the balance (neutrality) then you're still aligned. You're taking part in the neverending contest of philosophies, except that instead of trying to ensure that your side wins, you're trying to ensure that no side ever triumphs.

If you're unaligned, then you're choosing not to pick a side. You don't have any interest in participating in the contest, except perhaps in individual instances where you happen to have a personal stake in the matter.

 

[gweinel]

You say "gamey", but minions were always more of a storytelling tool than anything else. The DM decides if this creature is gonna be one of those orcs mooks from LotR, which got killed by the droves, or if this creature is gonna be Lurtz, which gave Aragorn a run for his money.

Or maybe that Olympic torchbearer orc that Legolas couldn't kill, even though later he takes out a mumakil with just as many arrows.

One of the problems that i had with minions was that damn 1 hit point they had. You could see a lvl 27 titan minion with 1 hit point. That titan could die with one at will power that didn't even target him! Also the +30 to attack that this titan might had also didn't contribute to be a believable monster to me.

I can see your point and that is the reason i only had minions at low levels. Yes, some orcs, goblins and skeletons could be so weak and die with one hit. But at higher levels i can hardly envisage 1hp creatures with absurb attack bonuses and defenses.

 

[I'm A Banana]

What if you want a character who says, "I refuse to align myself with law or chaos, good or evil, or neutrality, I care naught for these abstract philosophies"?

It's honestly a subtle philosophical point: is the absence of allegiance to a morality an allegiance in and of itself? Is nothing a thing independent of its concept as not-a-thing? Can one be amoral without being immoral? Is "neutrality" a cosmological power in and of itself, or is it simply what exists when one does not choose one or the other? Can one choose to be neutral without also choosing to be unaligned?

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ussCHoQttyQ&feature=related]Neutral Response - YouTube[/ame]

That's why they probably should be rolled together. Let individual players futz with whether "unaligned" means no alignment or means a refusal to be aligned or means simple neutrality. The term is strong enough to encompass all of those things and more. Alignments have never meant just one thing (lawful != "obeys the laws," except when it does)

 

[avin]

Unaligned would be more like, "You crazy aligned guys do whatever you're gonna do, just leave me out of it". It's effectively self-interested, but not to the point of evil. An unaligned person isn't likely to screw someone else over to get what they want, but they also aren't going to run into a burning orphanage, or act to preserve the cosmic balance without a good reason to do so. They're unaligned.

As [MENTION=6675228]Hassassin[/MENTION] said, this sounds CN, not unaligned. I would compromise on unaligned and removed old notions of "true neutral" from the game, with maybe a sidebar explaining how TN could replace unaligned if wanted.

 

[Starbuck_II]

A simple fix to "5e minions" would be to give them a theme that does nothing but boost damage and have a rule that allows players to automatical deal average damage against monsters that are a certain level below them instead of rolling.

Or Houserule in 4E minions.
Because 4E Minions are good because have good AC/save defense and a good attack bonus.
This is why Minions didn't work in 3.5 (using weaker guys) because there is little way to keep make them level appropriate hit/defenses without too much treasure.

I will need to see how good they flatten the math though.
The low hp wasn't the reason Minions were loved.

 

[Klaus]

One of the problems that i had with minions was that damn 1 hit point they had. You could see a lvl 27 titan minion with 1 hit point. That titan could die with one at will power that didn't even target him! Also the +30 to attack that this titan might had also didn't contribute to be a believable monster to me.

I can see your point and that is the reason i only had minions at low levels. Yes, some orcs, goblins and skeletons could be so weak and die with one hit. But at higher levels i can hardly envisage 1hp creatures with absurb attack bonuses and defenses.

Sure, but by the time you're fighting Level 27 giant minions, you are probably something akin to Thor, bashing giants left and right with your hammer. Or John Carter, cutting down Warhoons by the dozen to protect Dejah Thoris.

 

[Fanaelialae]

Mm. To me, this gets at the core disconnect within the alignment system: Is it about how you behave, or is it about what you believe?

If the former, then True Neutral and Unaligned are the same thing. You sometimes do good things and sometimes evil things, sometimes lawful and sometimes chaotic. You can have an elaborate philosophical justification for this, or not, but the result is the same either way.

If the latter, then there is a meaningful distinction between True Neutral and Unaligned, but it also implies a hard look at some of the ways in which alignment has traditionally been used. If you believe in the ideals of Good, but constantly fall short, you'd still qualify as Good. If you support a Lawful society, it doesn't matter if you yourself are an untrustworthy rogue. Myself, I like this approach, but it doesn't quite square with what we're used to.

Interesting distinction. I'd give you xp but I have to spread some around. I suppose I favor belief over behavior.

I think intent is quite important. If a paladin is tricked into triggering the apocalypse while trying to prevent it, that paladin is still good despite that his actions may result in profound evil. If a warlord who kills people for fun happens to kill an evil tyrant (making the lives of the tyrant's subjects inadvertently better) that doesn't make him good.

That said, I do think behavior also plays a role. If an orc desperately wants to be good, but can't resist the urge to torture and kill every innocent halfling he meets, then he isn't good even if he serves at the local soup kitchen and helps little old ladies across the street. In all fairness though, that's a bit of an extreme case.

In general, I think belief is what alignment is about. It would be odd for your actions to be regularly in opposition to what you believe, and if they were I think you'd have to reexamine whether you really believe what you proclaim to believe.

 

[Fanaelialae]

It's honestly a subtle philosophical point: is the absence of allegiance to a morality an allegiance in and of itself? Is nothing a thing independent of its concept as not-a-thing? Can one be amoral without being immoral? Is "neutrality" a cosmological power in and of itself, or is it simply what exists when one does not choose one or the other? Can one choose to be neutral without also choosing to be unaligned?

That's why they probably should be rolled together. Let individual players futz with whether "unaligned" means no alignment or means a refusal to be aligned or means simple neutrality. The term is strong enough to encompass all of those things and more. Alignments have never meant just one thing (lawful != "obeys the laws," except when it does)

I'm not advocating True Neutrality as the absence of a morality. I'm advocating True Neutrality as the philosophy that all of the other philosophies are important, and that it is therefore important to maintain balance between them.

Unaligned would then be your absence of a defining moral code.

Someone who would neither run into a burning building to save orphaned children (good), nor ensure his inheritance by ushering his mother to an early grave (evil). Someone who neither considers individual laws very important (lawful), nor considers them shackles upon the true right that is freedom (chaos). Also someone who does not find the esoteric task of maintaining the balance between these philosophies to be appealing.

I'm also of the opinion that, aside from TN, Neutral serves no purpose in the set of alignments beyond needless symmetry. What I'd like to see is 10 alignment choices:

Unaligned

Lawful Good - Good - Chaotic Good

Lawful - Neutral - Chaotic

Lawful Evil - Evil - Chaotic Evil​

I think it might help to clarify alignments a bit.

 

[howandwhy99]

Mm. To me, this gets at the core disconnect within the alignment system: Is it about how you behave, or is it about what you believe?

If the former, then True Neutral and Unaligned are the same thing. You sometimes do good things and sometimes evil things, sometimes lawful and sometimes chaotic. You can have an elaborate philosophical justification for this, or not, but the result is the same either way.

If the latter, then there is a meaningful distinction between True Neutral and Unaligned, but it also implies a hard look at some of the ways in which alignment has traditionally been used. If you believe in the ideals of Good, but constantly fall short, you'd still qualify as Good. If you support a Lawful society, it doesn't matter if you yourself are an untrustworthy rogue. Myself, I like this approach, but it doesn't quite square with what we're used to.

It sucks, but I can't rep you at the moment either.

You make a great distinction and I think it should be highlighted in the game. I also think both sides should be part of the game.

The actions of the characters, PCs or NPCs, are expressions of their alignment. Their own personal justifications can be anything they choose:
-They believe in following the law, they just have trouble doing so;
-They believe deeply in accumulating power for themselves, but end up sharing it with those in need.

The justifications are important and material to be explored in the game. Plus, the actions taken change the creature's (or anything else's) alignment, if we're tracking it. The NPCs are scripted, so that's a little easier to deal with as a DM. The PC's actions are determined by the players. They come to terms with their own understanding of what their choices are, but the actions still have consequences and can shift how the world views them because of it (alignment shift).