D&D General Which edition handled alignment best?

[Horwath]

I would vote 3E as I liked various spells and items that keyed of alignment, but I have PTSD from various people playing Lawful Stupid paladins, so vote goes to 5E for ability to ignore it 100%.

 

[GreyLord]

I'm old school. I expected the results that are currently in the poll, as this site schews towards the newer the better type of idea. However, I chose 1e rather. Preferences on this site seem to tend to choose 3e and 5e as the top choices.

 

[GrimCo]

PTSD from various people playing Lawful Stupid paladins

And Chaotic Stupid Antipaladins (if we include pf1 with 3.x).

One of the reasons i never liked alignment is tying mechanics to characters personality and moral and ethical code. It pidgeonholes them and punishes people who like to play with complex shades of grey morality characters. Not to mention how many debates on morals and ethics it sprung during the years. It becomes specially grating when player and DM have different opinions on borders between alignments (or morals in general).

 

[Theory of Games]

And Chaotic Stupid Antipaladins (if we include pf1 with 3.x).

One of the reasons i never liked alignment is tying mechanics to characters personality and moral and ethical code. It pidgeonholes them and punishes people who like to play with complex shades of grey morality characters.

Not if you're playing TN characters. IME some players wouldn't stick to their PC's chosen alignment, then blamed the system.

Not to mention how many debates on morals and ethics it sprung during the years. It becomes specially grating when player and DM have different opinions on borders between alignments (or morals in general).

Which is weird since D&D describes how each alignment functions.

 

[Tonguez]

I like 5e making alignment irrelevant and just an optional Ideal if my paladin wanted to bother

 

[GrimCo]

Not if you're playing TN characters. IME some players wouldn't stick to their PC's chosen alignment, then blamed the system.

Sometimes logical thing to do would go contrary to alignment. And then you can get punished by DM. I always viewed TN as someone who "doesn't stink, doesn't smell".

Which is weird since D&D describes how each alignment functions.

Debates revolved around universal vs relativistic morality when dealing with good and evil.

 

[cbwjm]

When I still cared about alignment, I felt 4e did it best with its 5 points, but I don't really think alignment has mattered much since 3e when there were still effects that were impacted by it.

 

[Minigiant]

NG doesn't care about law or chaos, so it can do both as long as it is in pursuit of good. NG is about doing good, however you have to get there. CG is very individualistic and about personal rights and freedoms. They are very different alignments.

My point is that in play that difference isn't oblivious unless your DM or World Builder forces it via a major plot point.

If the king is mostly seen as good, you don't see the NG and CG guys as very different unless you force a niche issue, a special action, or make one of them fanatical. Both say the King Edd is good unless you make the CG guy say "BUT I HATEZ KINGS".

Same with LE and NE. NE is often the mercenaries who mostly honors contracts but doesn't care about from whom or the villains who hide their evil in the darkness or the outskirts until the final stages. So 90% of the time, you can barely tell the difference between LE and NE.

And since most NPCs and monsters are used only once or twice, the difference between LE & NE or NG & CG never show up unless the DM or WB forces it

Therefore you only need LG and CG separations from good and evil as they are most obvious in a single interaction.

 

[CreamCloud0]

Why?

because, in addition to the good point that Deset Gled makes below:

Because "I don't like alignment" is a different answer from "I like how 5e handled alignment." An answer of "none" would show if people actually think 5e hits the sweet spot, or are just contrary to the concept.

i also think that alignment and it's mechanics are very interesting and have a long history of being integral to many of the kinds of stories that DnD tries to embody, the kinds of ideas like 'the blade only a hero pure of heart can wield', with beings that are inherently tied to these fundamental energies and gain power from it, or stuff like slaying a chaos lord with the lance of order, i think there is alot of fun to be gained from having strong alignment mechanics, it's just a matter of not also tying them to a bunch of unfun things too, like penalties for drifting across the grid.

Debates revolved around universal vs relativistic morality when dealing with good and evil.

i think alignment definitions are actually really quite clear in the modern definitions(although i recognize they have not always been quite so), i find the issue was always more that people were trying to 'interpret' the meanings, one way or another.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Meh. As long as it's not attached to mechanics, it's an excellent roleplaying tool for players and DMs. There's no need to get rid of it when it's not attached to mechanics.

No, it is a terrible roleplaying tool and leads to inane debates and simplistic NPCs. It would be better if it did not exist at all. It puts people on the wrong way of thinking from the get go.