D&D 5E WotC's Jeremy Crawford Talks D&D Alignment Changes

Jeremy Crawford has spoken about changes to the way alignment will be referred to in future D&D books. It starts with a reminder that no rule in D&D dictates your alignment.

Data from D&D Beyond in June 2019​

(Note that in the transcript below, the questions in quotes were his own words but presumably refer to questions he's seen asked previously).

Friendly reminder: no rule in D&D mandates your character's alignment, and no class is restricted to certain alignments. You determine your character's moral compass. I see discussions that refer to such rules, yet they don't exist in 5th edition D&D.

Your character's alignment in D&D doesn't prescribe their behavior. Alignment describes inclinations. It's a roleplaying tool, like flaws, bonds, and ideals. If any of those tools don't serve your group's bliss, don't use them. The game's system doesn't rely on those tools.

D&D has general rules and exceptions to those rules. For example, you choose whatever alignment you want for your character at creation (general rule). There are a few magic items and other transformative effects that might affect a character's alignment (exceptions).

Want a benevolent green dragon in your D&D campaign or a sweet werewolf candlemaker? Do it. The rule in the Monster Manual is that the DM determines a monster's alignment. The DM plays that monster. The DM decides who that monster is in play.

Regarding a D&D monster's alignment, here's the general rule from the Monster Manual: "The alignment specified in a monster's stat block is the default. Feel free to depart from it and change a monster's alignment to suit the needs of your campaign."

"What about the Oathbreaker? It says you have to be evil." The Oathbreaker is a paladin subclass (not a class) designed for NPCs. If your DM lets you use it, you're already being experimental, so if you want to play a kindhearted Oathbreaker, follow your bliss!

"Why are player characters punished for changing their alignment?" There is no general system in 5th-edition D&D for changing your alignment and there are no punishments or rewards in the core rules for changing it. You can just change it. Older editions had such rules.

Even though the rules of 5th-edition D&D state that players and DMs determine alignment, the suggested alignments in our books have undeniably caused confusion. That's why future books will ditch such suggestions for player characters and reframe such things for the DM.

"What about the werewolf's curse of lycanthropy? It makes you evil like the werewolf." The DM determines the alignment of the werewolf. For example, the werewolf you face might be a sweetheart. The alignment in a stat block is a suggestion to the DM, nothing more.

"What about demons, devils, and angels in D&D? Their alignments can't change." They can change. The default story makes the mythological assumptions we expect, but the Monster Manual tells the DM to change any monster's alignment without hesitation to serve the campaign.

"You've reminded us that alignment is a suggestion. Does that mean you're not changing anything about D&D peoples after all?" We are working to remove racist tropes from D&D. Alignment is only one part of that work, and alignment will be treated differently in the future.

"Why are you telling us to ignore the alignment rules in D&D?" I'm not. I'm sharing what the alignment rules have been in the Player's Handbook & Monster Manual since 2014. We know that those rules are insufficient and have changes coming in future products.

 

[Hussar]

Just a few stray thoughts...

One problem with "factionalizing" Orcs... humanoids (to use the old term for Orcs etc.) and demi-humans (another old term for Elves etc.) are already "factionalized". By race (species or whatever you call them). The various non-human races all fall into niches already. it's one of the reasons there are so many of them in D&D. If you split the Orcs into numerous factions filling different niches in the game are you going to do the same thing with Goblins, Hobgoblins, Gnolls, etc? By the time you're done it's going to get a bit complex. One of my degrees is in cultural anthropology, and the concept of different cultures / societies is fine, but it's starting to hit high levels of complexity for a FRPG.

Another thing, one of the reasons "evil races" (Orcs etc.) are so monolithic in behavior is the relatively limited forms of contact PCs have with them. Namely combat The friendlier races (Dwarf, Elfs, Gnomes, etc.) exhibit somewhat more diversity because PCs are apt to have more contact with them, not just combat.

Drow and Duergar are under dark opposites of their surface dwelling kin. The trope of what is good above is evil underneath. I suppose if you wanted a "good" (non-hostile) version of an "evil" surface race you could pop them into the under dark...

My campaign setting is fairly complex with a deep history and 45 years of development. The monolithically evil (and good) races help keep the complexity down to manageable levels. I've also spent quite a bit of time explaining / rationalizing the quirks of the various groups. I'm probably not going to change any of that

Wouldn't the simpler solution be to have X number of factions, but, the factions are not divided by racial lines? So, you have the "Reaver" faction, which includes members from any species that takes up the sword to go reaving on their neighbors? Or the "Peaceful coexistence faction " (Man I suck at naming stuff) includes anyone who isn't interested in ganking their neighbors. The "Hangs out with demons" factions, again, have members from pretty much any race that might want to summon a demon or three for fun and profit.

In other words, you don't split races into different, exclusive, factions, but, rather, you have a couple of dozen (to start with) factions that cover most of the bigger bases and anyone who fits into that mold for that faction is a member.

 

[Panda-s1]

Turning factions into biological "races" turns D&D into a game for "racists". Literally.

Wouldn't the simpler solution be to have X number of factions, but, the factions are not divided by racial lines? So, you have the "Reaver" faction, which includes members from any species that takes up the sword to go reaving on their neighbors? Or the "Peaceful coexistence faction " (Man I suck at naming stuff) includes anyone who isn't interested in ganking their neighbors. The "Hangs out with demons" factions, again, have members from pretty much any race that might want to summon a demon or three for fun and profit.

In other words, you don't split races into different, exclusive, factions, but, rather, you have a couple of dozen (to start with) factions that cover most of the bigger bases and anyone who fits into that mold for that faction is a member.

but but but M O N O L I T H I C E V I L

honestly idk if even factions are necessary? orcs can mostly live in tribes and occasionally kingdoms, and if that means living with other races with similar situations that's cool, too. I don't think it's bad if they live alone, but I'd also expect a city to have at least some orcs and gnolls and goblins.

maybe regionalism might be better? it works for the "civilized" races. like orcs might be everywhere, but gnolls can mostly be found in grassy plains, hobgoblins live in hills and mountains, you get the idea.

 

[Hussar]

Well, there's no reason you couldn't have territorial factions. Pomarj orcs, for example, from Greyhawk, probably have different goals and whatnot from, say, Iuz orcs or Amedio Jungle orcs.

Humanoids in the Pomarj might be extremely territorial and xenophobic - constantly fighting with pretty much anything to try to carve out a Pomarj state. Whereas Iuz humanoids live under the thumb of Iuz and may have different strata (from slave forces to those who serve willingly) where the notion of Gruumsh isn't even a thing. OTOH, Amedio humanoids would likely be somewhat technologically backward, preyed upon by Scarlet Brotherhood and Sea Prince slavers.

For example, the lizardfolk, locathah, and possibly goblins and orcs around Saltmarsh, and that area, could easily belong to a faction of "Fairly peaceable, not terribly xenophobic, isolationist".

Sorry, been playing a LOT of Stellaris of late, and that's generally how they describe various species in the game. It works rather well.

 

[Maxperson]

Turning factions into biological "races" turns D&D into a game for "racists". Literally.

No it doesn't. To be "racist" requires a belief in inferiority/superiority of race, which isn't inherently present in race as faction. It's probably "bigoted," but it's not automatically "racist." Hating imaginary race X because of different factions is "bigotry", not "racism", but since individuals don't have to hate another faction, it's not inherently "bigoted", either.

I used "" around those words since you can't actually be racist, bigoted or anything else against a piece of game imagination. The issue here is what to do about people who find some in game things offensive based on similarities with out of game things.

 

[Remathilis]

Factions seems to be a solution.

One faction is aggressive raiders relating to the cult of Gruumsh. The ideology of this Faction is Evil.
An other faction is ManyArrows, allying many Orc communities, even former members of the Gruumsh faction. Neutral.
There can be other factions too, that are peaceful, gentle giants.

Admittedly, the Orc tends toward tropes of low-Intelligence brutes. Are some Orc factions high Intelligence? A faction originating from Half-Orcs might be. Perhaps, the Gruumsh faction intentionally killed off Orcs with high Intelligence, to intensify animalistic fury.

Eberron has Intelligent Orcs that are part of urban multicultural life.

It seems ok for one faction to continue the familiar D&D tropes. At the same time, it is unnecessary to predetermine the entire human species to only this.

Orcs are less central to my campaigns and I dont have a strong feeling about them, and am open to suggestions for how to diversify them in interesting ways. Factions seem to help.

The only concern I see with this approach is space. Orcs eat up in their current form four pages of the MM (including art and four stat blocks. Orcs broken into, let's say three, different factions eat up a lot of real estate, unless you're going to be extremely superficial with them. Times that by every humanoid in the Monster Manual (aarakroca, duergar, drow, snirvneblin, orc, goblin, hobgoblin, merfolk, bugbear, gnoll, sahuagin, etc) and you're filling up a large chunk of the MM with repetitive info on the same scant selection of stat blocks. And if you want to at-all expand the notion to non-humanoids like ogres or minotaurs, or vampires, you're filling a HUGE chunk of the book with half-as-many monsters.

 

[Haldrik]

The only concern I see with this approach is space. Orcs eat up in their current form four pages of the MM (including art and four stat blocks. Orcs broken into, let's say three, different factions eat up a lot of real estate, unless you're going to be extremely superficial with them. Times that by every humanoid in the Monster Manual (aarakroca, duergar, drow, snirvneblin, orc, goblin, hobgoblin, merfolk, bugbear, gnoll, sahuagin, etc) and you're filling up a large chunk of the MM with repetitive info on the same scant selection of stat blocks. And if you want to at-all expand the notion to non-humanoids like ogres or minotaurs, or vampires, you're filling a HUGE chunk of the book with half-as-many monsters.

Maybe the Monster Manuals be brief with a light touch, when describing possible factions that a DM might find interesting.

But then, each Setting Guide would go into more detail about any factions that are salient within the setting.

Factions can be territorial, regional, neighborhood, business association, criminal network, political alliance, addiction recovery, gaming activity, arcane society, bardic college, sex club, dating service, exclusive night club, religious community, ethnic cultural organization, social activist party, secret society, or almost any kind of reallife grouping. The Lolth faction is an example of a "racist supremacist" faction.

Anyway, I prefer the core rules to be flavor free, with only a light touch of possible compartmentalized suggestive options, that a DM can opt into or easily ignore. By contrast, the purpose of a setting guide is to weave elaborate narratives together to show how to flesh out these minimalist core rules, to build a functioning world.

Different settings would have different factions and different narratives. The factions that are true for Orcs in one setting would be untrue in an other setting. So there is no point for a Monster Manual to be too elaborate about each faction anyway. A Setting Guide on the other hand would emphasize and elaborate details about each faction as a valuable source for narrative conflicts that make the adventure stories meaningful and exciting.

 

[Remathilis]

Maybe the Monster Manuals be brief with a light touch, if describing possible factions that a DM might find interesting.

But then, each Setting Guide would go into more detail about any factions that are salient within the setting.

Factions can be territorial, regional, neighborhood, business association, criminal network, political alliance, addiction recovery, gaming activity, arcane society, bardic college, sex club, exclusive night club, religious community, ethnic cultural organization, or almost any kind of reallife grouping. The Lolth faction is an example of a "racist supremacist" faction.

Anyway, I prefer the core rules to be flavor free, with only a light touch of possible compartmentalized suggestive options, that a DM can opt into or easily ignore. By contrast, the purpose of a setting guide is too offer an elaborate narratives weaving together to show how to flesh out these minimalist core rules, to build a functioning world.

We had something similar in 4e, the PHB and MM were very fluff-lite (often less than a half a page for some monsters) and it was criticized for being uninspiring and in some cases didn't give enough info to use the monster beyond "this is a foe to defeat". By the time Essentials came out, the MM was far more fluffy and hook oriented in reaction to that.

I don't relish the return to monsters with some assembly required.

 

[Maxperson]

We had something similar in 4e, the PHB and MM were very fluff-lite (often less than a half a page for some monsters) and it was criticized for being uninspiring and in some cases didn't give enough info to use the monster beyond "this is a foe to defeat". By the time Essentials came out, the MM was far more fluffy and hook oriented in reaction to that.

I don't relish the return to monsters with some assembly required.

Not to mention that many people simply don't have time to create fluff for everything. It's far easier for someone to ignore pre-written monster fluff than it is to just come up with it on your own.

 

[Haldrik]

No it doesn't. To be "racist" requires a belief in inferiority/superiority of race, which isn't inherently present in race as faction. It's probably "bigoted," but it's not automatically "racist." Hating imaginary race X because of different factions is "bigotry", not "racism", but since individuals don't have to hate another faction, it's not inherently "bigoted", either.

I used "" around those words since you can't actually be racist, bigoted or anything else against a piece of game imagination. The issue here is what to do about people who find some in game things offensive based on similarities with out of game things.

D&D is "fantasy racism". But the tropes are reallife racist tropes.

The problem with D&D racism is, the racist supremacism is objectively true and correct. The elf race really does have superior Dexterity. The gnome race really does have superior Intelligence. The orc race really is a savage brute. The reallife tropes about racist supremacism are now on steroids in D&D.

The only thing that can solve this problem is an official ability for each player to customize and personal any humanoid race. Customizing ability score improvements, makes racist supremacism less objectively true.

 

[Haldrik]

We had something similar in 4e, the PHB and MM were very fluff-lite (often less than a half a page for some monsters) and it was criticized for being uninspiring and in some cases didn't give enough info to use the monster beyond "this is a foe to defeat". By the time Essentials came out, the MM was far more fluffy and hook oriented in reaction to that.

I don't relish the return to monsters with some assembly required.

I feel the current 5e Monster Manual should have been the "Forgotten Realms Monster Manual", specifically for the Forgotten Realms Setting. Each setting can have its own Monster Manual(s).

The moment a stat block adds elaborate flavor it is, by definition, one specific setting only, and becomes less useful in a different setting.

The core rules work better as an SRD without flavor, for DMs who want to do worldbuilding or want to tweak a specific component of a specific setting. The SRD might suggest flavor boxes, but the DM should be able to easily use a proverbial black marker to blot out any unwanted flavor, and never see the unwanted flavor mentioned anywhere else. For the core rules. Setting rules are a different kind of design space. For DMs who are worldbuilders who want to assemble a new setting more conveniently, and for players who love to customize their characters, access to flavorless core rules is valuable.

If the core rules avoided the racist assumptions of the Forgotten Realms setting, and instead modeled the agnosticism and factionalism of the Eberron setting, the core rules would have less problems now.