D&D General The Birth Of Alignment: The Rise of the Nine-Point System

[Snarf Zagyg]

Not surprised if the memes played a role in keeping meme-meisters away from 4e, though it should be mentioned that those memes were almost always invariably followed by someone posting a meme of "Batman is EVERY Alignment."

And those people were wrong, because Batman was never, ever, Lawful Good.*

Not even campy, Adam West Batman.


*As a fictional character who has existed for almost a century at this point, and has innumerable authors in multiple media, sure, somewhere there might exist a LG Batman; but in all the many incarnations, he has been at best a NG.

PS- No, I am not posting this just to stir up an argument about the best superhero ever.

 

[Marandahir]

But that's a bit my point.

And those people were wrong, because Batman was never, ever, Lawful Good.*

Not even campy, Adam West Batman.


*As a fictional character who has existed for almost a century at this point, and has innumerable authors in multiple media, sure, somewhere there might exist a LG Batman; but in all the many incarnations, he has been at best a NG.

PS- No, I am not posting this just to stir up an argument about the best superhero ever.

That's kinda my point though.

Shared Characters will be written in different ways by different authors in different time periods. Alignment is a useful shorthand, but it's a static one when most characters in fiction go through some sort of an arc - including PCs.

Alignment is best used as a shorthand for that arc and to describe actions, rather than personages. Thank goodness you can't lose spellcaster levels anymore by default for changing your alignment.

 

[Charlaquin]

Batman is Chaotic Lawful, and no one can convince me otherwise.

 

[Kobold Avenger]

The alignment of Batman is mostly up to writer and how they interpret him as, though some of the alignments for him are a bit of a stretch. Though yes some of the Frank Miller depictions might make him evil. I'd put Catwoman, Harley Quinn and Robin (Damian Wayne) as CN, but not him.

 

[TwoSix]

Alignment is best used as a shorthand for that arc and to describe actions, rather than personages. Thank goodness you can't lose spellcaster levels anymore by default for changing your alignment.

Yep. As I've told my players for the past several years, if your character doesn't change alignment at least once by the end of the game, you haven't been roleplaying them hard enough. The idea that playing your character as consistent and unchanging in their moral outlook is "good play" is one of the biggest negatives of early D&D.

 

[Marandahir]

Yep. As I've told my players for the past several years, if your character doesn't change alignment at least once by the end of the game, you haven't been roleplaying them hard enough. The idea that playing your character as consistent and unchanging in their moral outlook is "good play" is one of the biggest negatives of early D&D.

To be fair, there's a role for determinator characters in fantasy fiction and roleplaying games.

For example, Aragorn in the books. He is a character that doesn't change in the context of the novel, but changes the world around him.

The general rule is either the experience of the journey changes the character who has to come around to new ideas and points of view, or the character has to stay resolute and not change in their outlook, but force a flawed world to change to come around to their point of view.

See: almost every Paladin ever.