Why I don't like alignment in fantasy RPGs

[pemerton]

Aus Snow, I can see what you're saying about Pendragon. I'm not sure what the proper response should be (given the overall logic of my position) - my first stab at it would be to say (i) that it's much more grounded in the setting, which has a very rich source material supporting its canons of knightly behaviour, and (ii) it's also much more grounded in a shared understanding of the rules, rather than the GM's interpretation of very abstract and general evaluative concepts (such as good and evil).

On your last sentence, I GM 4e these days and my players have alignments on their character sheets. I'm happy enough with the way 4e uses alignment as a type of shorthand for a morality of heroic fantasy,* and also has dropped the line from earlier editions that alignment is distinct from personality - instead treating it as one aspect of personality. In 4e, alignment isn't a tool the GM can use for controlling PC behaviour by the threat (to the player) of mechanically gutting that PC, so it doesn't fall foul of the critique in my OP.

*Another of my gripes about AD&D/3E alignment is the implied claim that alignment is a more-or-less universal tool for the moral characterisation of human behaviour. I think it's obviously not, and think 4e does a much better job of realising this, and confining and tailoring it to the fantasy genre (in this respect I think 4e is closer to OD&D and Basic - surely no one thought that Law/Chaos was a genrally useful moral scheme, as opposed to one that worked for characters and situations built around particular fantasy tropes). But this aspect of classic D&D alignment doesn't have the same sort of unhappy consequences for gameplay as the points I make in my OP.

 

[pemerton]

I am the DM, so therefore I am the defacto stand in for every "power" that exists within the game I am running.

<snip>

If a player does not like my having the final say so then they have two choices, don't play a PC that serves a "power" since I decide how those powers will react, since they are MY NPC, not the players; or they can just quit playing in my games.

<snip>

Players play their PC's, I play everything else.

This is exactly the position I am objecting to. In practice, it means that a divine PC (at least where that divine power is dependent on the goodwill of the gods - a notion that 4e, for example, expressly abandons, and that is not very prominent in Rolemaster) is partly played by the GM - because the GM plays the gods, and the divine PC has to comport with the gods' (=GM's) wishes to avoid being mechanically hosed.

So in fact it's not a case of the player getting to play his/her PC. S/he has to share with the GM.

 

[frankthedm]

Good Guys.

Bad Guys.

Everyone Else.

All it takes is three.

Why 3? Good and Bad is all that is needed. Even animals can be divided between Noble and Sinister in settings where The Conflict is the main driving force in the world.

 

[Zhaleskra]

Alignments are for cars!

Seriously though, if you're going to use it, I like a simpler version. Yet even with that I like to include the misguided guys who are accidentally doing evil, or the villain who accidentally does something useful (and thus is a hero to a small population).

 

[ExploderWizard]

Step 1: Never have any special abilities that are inherently better than others tied to any kind of behavioral expectations.

Step 2: Let players make the decisions about what they will do and let the consequences of those choices flow naturally.

In this way you can have alignment be more akin to a favored moral/political viewpoint instead of a restriction governing personal behavior.

 

[Alexander123]

I like how Eberron does alignment.

 

[Zhaleskra]

Step 1: Never have any special abilities that are inherently better than others tied to any kind of behavioral expectations.

Step 2: Let players make the decisions about what they will do and let the consequences of those choices flow naturally.

In this way you can have alignment be more akin to a favored moral/political viewpoint instead of a restriction governing personal behavior.

And this is why I like the prestige class "The Chosen" from Forbidden Kingdoms. It's a paladin, in my opinion "done right". They still include the concept of "sinning", but it's by agreement between player and GM of what counts. Also, there is nothing inherently better than another class in this class.

Well, they get to Turn/Command/Rebuke Undead. Also their "Miracles" have chance of failure (which is true of all spellcasters in this setting), or even their god just saying "do it yourself!"

 

[Dungeoneer]

As a DM I sometimes feel the temptation of using alignment.

Sometimes when a player does something that I would deem bad (in other words, something stupid or disruptive) I wish that I could slap it down with "that's not your alignment!" But just because I'm the DM doesn't mean I can stop someone playing their character the way they want to. And if their in game problem starts to become a meta game problem, well, there are other, better ways to address that than telling them how their character is 'supposed' to behave.

 

[Umbran]

Rather, it forces the player to choose between playing his/her own conception of a LG/exalted/self-disciplined/etc PC, and playing the GM's version of the same character. This is because, at least in my experience, alignment is enforced by the GM against players, based on the GM's conception of what is permissible and what not.

If the GM is doing the job properly, the player knew pretty darned well what the GM's take on alignment was before taking the class - so the player agreed to use the GM's conception and take it as their own.

The Universe has it's own standards and rules. Nobody argues that if the character falls 50 feet, they're probably going to get hurt, and that the game's version of being hurt ought to be applied. Game alignment is how we give the game Universe moral rules on top of the physical ones, so that sometimes certain moral actions are more difficult, or will also hurt.

If the players don't understand the moral rules the GM is using, that's kind of like them not knowing how falling damage works. The player should know what the consequences of a moral action will be as well as he'd know about a similarly common physical action.

 

[ExploderWizard]

If the GM is doing the job properly, the player knew pretty darned well what the GM's take on alignment was before taking the class - so the player agreed to use the GM's conception and take it as their own.

The Universe has it's own standards and rules. Nobody argues that if the character falls 50 feet, they're probably going to get hurt, and that the game's version of being hurt ought to be applied. Game alignment is how we give the game Universe moral rules on top of the physical ones, so that sometimes certain moral actions are more difficult, or will also hurt.

If the players don't understand the moral rules the GM is using, that's kind of like them not knowing how falling damage works. The player should know what the consequences of a moral action will be as well as he'd know about a similarly common physical action.

While this can be true up to a point, the very nature of moral dilemmas makes them less cut and dried than the physics that govern falling damage. I guess it really depends on how much grey a given group likes to play with between the extremes of black and white.