Alignment...uhhh..what is it good for? [Archive] - Wizards Community

Alignment...uhhh..what is it good for? [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Board_Rider
08-18-04, 02:09 PM I was just wondering what everyone's idea on playing alignment is. I mean there is a thread on this board about asking the opinion from everyone about a characters action and the alignment it represents and it brings differing opinions.
What I want to know is how do you "make" your players stay in alignment. Everyone has different ideas on what Lawful Good stands for so invariably the person playing the PC will play what he thinks is Lawful Good, sometimes not coinciding with the PHB definition. I know the PHB are guidelines but I always see players invariably lead their PC's with their own mannerisms and ideals. No care for alignment. I mean good is good and all and evil is evil and all that but players seem to just play how they feel. I hear it happens alot.
Any ideas on how to fix it? Do some of you just avoid alignmentt entirely? XP penalties?
BlaineTog
08-18-04, 02:41 PM What is it good for?

Simple: tone. Core DnD is meant to be Tolkien-ish high fantsy of evil villans and gallant heroes. You are supposed to be able to know for a fact that the enemy is beyond all hope of redemption and is in desperate need of death so that you don't feel guilty cleaving him down. You are good, he is evil. Simple as that. Black and White.

Now, Eberron uses Alighnment much differently. Alighnment isn't absolute in Eberron; its a measure of your personal viewpoint rather than your actions. So you could give to the poor, volunteer at the orphanage, and routinelly save people from ravenous monsters, and still be just Neutral if your only motivation is to get brownie points for the next life. You could kill a hundred people a day and have the PCs pounding on your door with a writ of execution and be Chaotic Good because you hate yourself for doing it.

Alighnment has its upsides and its downsides. The upside is that it can nicely set the tone of the campaign. The downside is that it has a tendency to be misunderstood by people to be a straightjacket.
Insancipitory By Nature
08-18-04, 02:44 PM The PC's are free to play their character as they wish. But alignment does have consequences. Someone *is* watching. It's a vestage of the genre. For a fighter it's inconsequential; aside from which axiomatic spells affect him. For a cleric, would a real live God who works to make their presence known allow one of their clergy to wield Their power in a manner not in keeping with Their will? No. Same with a paladin. Some alignment restrictions don't make much sense (barbarians, monks, etc) so I don't feel particularly beholden to them.
Krelios
08-18-04, 02:47 PM Alignment NEVER determines a character's actions. Their actions determine their alignment.

Don't beat your players over their heads with their character's alignment, and never tell them "You can't do that, you're ____." Instead, tell your players "what you're about to do is an evil action, if you do it anyway, your alignment will shift to ______." If a player then knowingly commits an evil act anyway, they have no recourse to complain when you change their alignment.

Invariably, when you tell a player "that's an evil act" there will be complaints and whining from less experienced/mature players. In the end, it is the DMs decision on what is good and what is evil and you're giving them the benefit of a head's up before switching their alignment so they should be thanking you, not complaining. If you're going to judge Good and Evil differently than the PHB describes them, you owe it to your players to tell them that before hand so there's no surprise when someone's alignment changes.
Brknlf
08-18-04, 03:01 PM What is it good for really depends on the DM. Some games run strictly off alignment, good and evil are real forces in the world, morality is fairly black and white. A player of good alignment will move towards evil as they do things deemed evil in those games. Other games use it as a simple guideline, more for NPCs than players as players are much more diversified on the time the RP their characters. Running an NPC within an alignment will merely help the DM decide how the character may interact with the world around them. Other games will not use alignment or have an alternative system for this concept.
PSchirf
08-18-04, 03:32 PM The urge to quote Edwin Starr's “War” lyrics is tempting... but I disagree with Edwin Starr, feeling he, like so many others, can't see the benefits of something ugly. Likewise, I think there are some benefits to the ugly alignment system.

I'll edit this post to include some shortly.
Magnus029
08-18-04, 03:48 PM Originally posted by Krelios
Alignment NEVER determines a character's actions. Their actions determine their alignment.

Don't beat your players over their heads with their character's alignment, and never tell them "You can't do that, you're ____." Instead, tell your players "what you're about to do is an evil action, if you do it anyway, your alignment will shift to ______." If a player then knowingly commits an evil act anyway, they have no recourse to complain when you change their alignment.

Invariably, when you tell a player "that's an evil act" there will be complaints and whining from less experienced/mature players. In the end, it is the DMs decision on what is good and what is evil and you're giving them the benefit of a head's up before switching their alignment so they should be thanking you, not complaining. If you're going to judge Good and Evil differently than the PHB describes them, you owe it to your players to tell them that before hand so there's no surprise when someone's alignment changes.

Why should you tell them when they are committing good/evil acts, they should know good and evil, law and chaos. We are not talking about earth shattering revelations here. When a character is playing out of alignment I say the DM make a note of it give them a couple of sessions, if it continues then let them know there new alignment. If they are a class that is alignment based (cleric, Paladin, etc.) then give them to the next session before hittting them with penalties, denied spells, loss of powers etc.

If the actions are to the extreme then deal with it right there, no single act though should move someone more than 1 step in my opinion though.
Board_Rider
08-18-04, 04:20 PM First...Kudos to PSchirf for citing the referrence!

Secondly, I should clarify my meaning of the thread. I know that alignment is good for spells, against spells, dietys, certain feats, classes etc... What I mean is what do you all do when the PC plays an alignment to suit his ideals. My opinion of a Chaotic Good character differs from others almost certainly. Who would be correct? IMO I think sometimes the alignment should be used only for those things as mentioned above, kind of like a guideline not a determinate of actions. What I am reading is that it's up to the Dm. But that may not be good because, as I said, what I think is evil someone else may not. I could go off of my opinion and say "That would be evil..." but is that fair to the character?

I hope that clears it up. Keep the opinions going please!
Drachasor
08-18-04, 05:50 PM Originally posted by Magnus029
Why should you tell them when they are committing good/evil acts, they should know good and evil, law and chaos. We are not talking about earth shattering revelations here.

You'd be surprised what some people think of things. What the player thinks of the action and how it relates to the world, what they perceive the alignment system as, can make a big difference in their mind. The DM could even be wrong about something, when he finds out what the character expects to have happen (how he thinks the world works) or the player makes a good case for an action.

So, it is best to let the players know so that they have an idea of what is going on. Now, if they repeat an action you have already told them is evil and they have agreed, *then* you don't need to tell them again. (at least not every time). Anyhow, there is also the fact that the player should be satisfied with their character...if you suddenly spring on the CG fighter that they are now NE, they are not going to be happy. Work with players, not against them.

-Drachasor
Mike the DM
08-19-04, 10:41 AM Alignment to me was always something of a supernatural, divine energy - a change in alignment was like changing channels and receiving a different signal, which was tied into magic effects based on alignment. Alignment to some degree did dictate action.

But after getting sick to death of the endless, pointless, and in many cases ignorant semantic debates about alignment, I trashed it and decided to use the Allegiances rules from d20 Modern instead. Now only the deities and selected outsiders have alignments - PCs may have allegiance to a deity or a principle such as Law or Good, and if they fail to adhere to the deity or principle, they lose the advantage of that allegiance.

Problem solved.
Naeron
08-19-04, 10:58 AM Originally posted by Magnus029
Why should you tell them when they are committing good/evil acts, they should know good and evil, law and chaos. We are not talking about earth shattering revelations here. When a character is playing out of alignment I say the DM make a note of it give them a couple of sessions, if it continues then let them know there new alignment. If they are a class that is alignment based (cleric, Paladin, etc.) then give them to the next session before hittting them with penalties, denied spells, loss of powers etc.

If the actions are to the extreme then deal with it right there, no single act though should move someone more than 1 step in my opinion though.

You should tell them because everyones interpretation of exactly what crosses the lines on the Good-Neutral-Evil gradient differs. As this is not written down it is your duty as a DM to inform them of what is basically a house ruling in cases on the borderlines.

Just look at any alignment discussion and you will see varying calls on certain acts because its a subjective decision once you get away from the defined extremes. Yes we all know that act A is good and act B is evil, but act C may be on the border between good and neutral so you as the DM are ruling on it. Therefore you tell the players.
roll8dn
08-19-04, 02:08 PM As a person who has a slight difference of opinion with most of the people I meet on good v. evil, I find that this is a good time to remind people that the DM's job is to interperet the rules and create a story around them. That being said, I think that the rules on alignment need to be a bit looser. Admittedly, that's just the way I game (part of my PC's personality is usually a need to help others without thought to the consequences), but it does seem that it is the DM's job to sit down with the players and say what is what, listening to informed opinions as neccessary. That way, you do not run into trouble with a strict interpretation of the rules. It appears to be a part of 3.x that all the core rules need to be inviolate (maybe that's just me being a cynic, but that seems to be the way that most people look at them). Remember, this all started with houserules; there is no reason that houserules should stop, assuming that you feel the houserule gives more to the game than it takes away. I hope that all of this wasn't too rambling, but, if it was, I apologize...
Luminous Crayon
08-19-04, 04:06 PM Alignment works best as an indicator-- a conveniently invisible game mechanic that gets dragged out into the open when someone casts magic circle against evil or chaos hammer. Its function is to determine who is affected by certain morality-dependant effects, like those I've mentioned above.

The way I run it, alignment is not something that's "out in the world" for players to be aware of. Characters with lots of hit points know they're "fairly tough", not that they can take 87 points of damage before losing consciousness. Characters with a particular alignment may realize that they're conscientious and charitable, or that they're selfish, coldhearted bastards, just as real life people know about their own motivations. They don't think of them in terms of LG or NE-- that's a terminology that doesn't exist.

In all cases, alignment is a result of a character's actions. A character's actions should never be a result of alignment. If a character's alignment changes (something that causes gradually, as a result of a new pattern of behavior, not suddenly, because of a single act,) it happens without XP penalty. I've never understood why some DMs want to penalize a character's skills, knowledge, and general effectiveness because the character has had a change of heart.
Vaalingrade Ashland
08-19-04, 05:18 PM Originally posted by Board Rider
I was just wondering what everyone's idea on playing alignment is. I mean there is a thread on this board about asking the opinion from everyone about a characters action and the alignment it represents and it brings differing opinions.

not that long ago, I did an article (http://www.ledgermaincomics.com/extras/articles/rp_article003.htm) on the problem inherent to the system.
Board_Rider
08-19-04, 07:07 PM Very well done article Vaal. The link was good to. Anyone who reads this should check them out. SEE above.
My question still is this. What have you guys done about the alignment system in regards to characters playing what you believe is not correct alignment playing? Without hurting the character building process.
Brknlf
08-20-04, 09:07 AM My question still is this. What have you guys done about the alignment system in regards to characters playing what you believe is not correct alignment playing?

There is only one thing that can be done and it has already been said. Communication between DM and said players so that the players understand what kind of game the DM is running and how much, if at alll, the alignments are being used and any effects in the game that correspond with the alignments. I don't understand how much more you want. When I'm running and I see any problem with alignment, I'll tell the players (though I have never had any problems, I'm fairly loose in dealing with the ambiguity of alignments and let players make up their own minds). I've been in games where DMs adhered more strictly to the alignments and if they felt players were acting out of alignment as they preceived them, they would tell the player this and talk with them about it. I've seen people say one evil act equals instant alignment change, but I've yet to play in a game where I've seen this happen.
MinusInnocence
08-20-04, 09:31 AM Stuff like this just doesn't happen if you sit down as a group and clarify certain issues. At least set some general boundaries... it may be easier to define what Good ISN'T or what Evil ISN'T than it is to determine what falls into each of those categories. For example, you can throw a rock on these forums and hit twelve people, each with different interpretations of what Chaotic Good is. But if all twelve of them sat down and agreed upon certain things that Chaotic Good is NOT (like performing a Coup de Grace on an opponent who has already effectively been neutralized and has no hope of reentering the conflict)... very little would be left to speculation.

Now, is this going to eliminate any and all disagreements in the future? No. But it will reduce them significantly, and having to negotiate and compromise with the other people in your group allows for some interesting brainstorming, to boot. As for myself, my games follow the Objective/Intentional Alignment system... which means an individual's Alignment is based on what they think and feel, and what the motivations are for their actions more than the actions themselves. However, this doesn't make Good or Evil (or their respective consequences) any less tangible.

If I played with a group who wanted to play Subjective/Intentional or Objective/Action-based, and simply neglected to talk things out with them before the game started... we would end up fighting about a lot of trivial stuff. Lack of communication is the #1 inspiration for the "Can Paladins eat innocent villagers?" threads.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Board_Rider 08-18-04, 02:09 PM	I was just wondering what everyone's idea on playing alignment is. I mean there is a thread on this board about asking the opinion from everyone about a characters action and the alignment it represents and it brings differing opinions. What I want to know is how do you "make" your players stay in alignment. Everyone has different ideas on what Lawful Good stands for so invariably the person playing the PC will play what he thinks is Lawful Good, sometimes not coinciding with the PHB definition. I know the PHB are guidelines but I always see players invariably lead their PC's with their own mannerisms and ideals. No care for alignment. I mean good is good and all and evil is evil and all that but players seem to just play how they feel. I hear it happens alot. Any ideas on how to fix it? Do some of you just avoid alignmentt entirely? XP penalties?
BlaineTog 08-18-04, 02:41 PM	What is it good for? Simple: tone. Core DnD is meant to be Tolkien-ish high fantsy of evil villans and gallant heroes. You are supposed to be able to know for a fact that the enemy is beyond all hope of redemption and is in desperate need of death so that you don't feel guilty cleaving him down. You are good, he is evil. Simple as that. Black and White. Now, Eberron uses Alighnment much differently. Alighnment isn't absolute in Eberron; its a measure of your personal viewpoint rather than your actions. So you could give to the poor, volunteer at the orphanage, and routinelly save people from ravenous monsters, and still be just Neutral if your only motivation is to get brownie points for the next life. You could kill a hundred people a day and have the PCs pounding on your door with a writ of execution and be Chaotic Good because you hate yourself for doing it. Alighnment has its upsides and its downsides. The upside is that it can nicely set the tone of the campaign. The downside is that it has a tendency to be misunderstood by people to be a straightjacket.
Insancipitory By Nature 08-18-04, 02:44 PM	The PC's are free to play their character as they wish. But alignment does have consequences. Someone is watching. It's a vestage of the genre. For a fighter it's inconsequential; aside from which axiomatic spells affect him. For a cleric, would a real live God who works to make their presence known allow one of their clergy to wield Their power in a manner not in keeping with Their will? No. Same with a paladin. Some alignment restrictions don't make much sense (barbarians, monks, etc) so I don't feel particularly beholden to them.
Krelios 08-18-04, 02:47 PM	Alignment NEVER determines a character's actions. Their actions determine their alignment. Don't beat your players over their heads with their character's alignment, and never tell them "You can't do that, you're ____." Instead, tell your players "what you're about to do is an evil action, if you do it anyway, your alignment will shift to ______." If a player then knowingly commits an evil act anyway, they have no recourse to complain when you change their alignment. Invariably, when you tell a player "that's an evil act" there will be complaints and whining from less experienced/mature players. In the end, it is the DMs decision on what is good and what is evil and you're giving them the benefit of a head's up before switching their alignment so they should be thanking you, not complaining. If you're going to judge Good and Evil differently than the PHB describes them, you owe it to your players to tell them that before hand so there's no surprise when someone's alignment changes.
Brknlf 08-18-04, 03:01 PM	What is it good for really depends on the DM. Some games run strictly off alignment, good and evil are real forces in the world, morality is fairly black and white. A player of good alignment will move towards evil as they do things deemed evil in those games. Other games use it as a simple guideline, more for NPCs than players as players are much more diversified on the time the RP their characters. Running an NPC within an alignment will merely help the DM decide how the character may interact with the world around them. Other games will not use alignment or have an alternative system for this concept.
PSchirf 08-18-04, 03:32 PM	The urge to quote Edwin Starr's “War” lyrics is tempting... but I disagree with Edwin Starr, feeling he, like so many others, can't see the benefits of something ugly. Likewise, I think there are some benefits to the ugly alignment system. I'll edit this post to include some shortly.
Magnus029 08-18-04, 03:48 PM	Originally posted by Krelios Alignment NEVER determines a character's actions. Their actions determine their alignment. Don't beat your players over their heads with their character's alignment, and never tell them "You can't do that, you're ____." Instead, tell your players "what you're about to do is an evil action, if you do it anyway, your alignment will shift to ______." If a player then knowingly commits an evil act anyway, they have no recourse to complain when you change their alignment. Invariably, when you tell a player "that's an evil act" there will be complaints and whining from less experienced/mature players. In the end, it is the DMs decision on what is good and what is evil and you're giving them the benefit of a head's up before switching their alignment so they should be thanking you, not complaining. If you're going to judge Good and Evil differently than the PHB describes them, you owe it to your players to tell them that before hand so there's no surprise when someone's alignment changes. Why should you tell them when they are committing good/evil acts, they should know good and evil, law and chaos. We are not talking about earth shattering revelations here. When a character is playing out of alignment I say the DM make a note of it give them a couple of sessions, if it continues then let them know there new alignment. If they are a class that is alignment based (cleric, Paladin, etc.) then give them to the next session before hittting them with penalties, denied spells, loss of powers etc. If the actions are to the extreme then deal with it right there, no single act though should move someone more than 1 step in my opinion though.
Board_Rider 08-18-04, 04:20 PM	First...Kudos to PSchirf for citing the referrence! Secondly, I should clarify my meaning of the thread. I know that alignment is good for spells, against spells, dietys, certain feats, classes etc... What I mean is what do you all do when the PC plays an alignment to suit his ideals. My opinion of a Chaotic Good character differs from others almost certainly. Who would be correct? IMO I think sometimes the alignment should be used only for those things as mentioned above, kind of like a guideline not a determinate of actions. What I am reading is that it's up to the Dm. But that may not be good because, as I said, what I think is evil someone else may not. I could go off of my opinion and say "That would be evil..." but is that fair to the character? I hope that clears it up. Keep the opinions going please!
Drachasor 08-18-04, 05:50 PM	Originally posted by Magnus029 Why should you tell them when they are committing good/evil acts, they should know good and evil, law and chaos. We are not talking about earth shattering revelations here. You'd be surprised what some people think of things. What the player thinks of the action and how it relates to the world, what they perceive the alignment system as, can make a big difference in their mind. The DM could even be wrong about something, when he finds out what the character expects to have happen (how he thinks the world works) or the player makes a good case for an action. So, it is best to let the players know so that they have an idea of what is going on. Now, if they repeat an action you have already told them is evil and they have agreed, then you don't need to tell them again. (at least not every time). Anyhow, there is also the fact that the player should be satisfied with their character...if you suddenly spring on the CG fighter that they are now NE, they are not going to be happy. Work with players, not against them. -Drachasor
Mike the DM 08-19-04, 10:41 AM	Alignment to me was always something of a supernatural, divine energy - a change in alignment was like changing channels and receiving a different signal, which was tied into magic effects based on alignment. Alignment to some degree did dictate action. But after getting sick to death of the endless, pointless, and in many cases ignorant semantic debates about alignment, I trashed it and decided to use the Allegiances rules from d20 Modern instead. Now only the deities and selected outsiders have alignments - PCs may have allegiance to a deity or a principle such as Law or Good, and if they fail to adhere to the deity or principle, they lose the advantage of that allegiance. Problem solved.
Naeron 08-19-04, 10:58 AM	Originally posted by Magnus029 Why should you tell them when they are committing good/evil acts, they should know good and evil, law and chaos. We are not talking about earth shattering revelations here. When a character is playing out of alignment I say the DM make a note of it give them a couple of sessions, if it continues then let them know there new alignment. If they are a class that is alignment based (cleric, Paladin, etc.) then give them to the next session before hittting them with penalties, denied spells, loss of powers etc. If the actions are to the extreme then deal with it right there, no single act though should move someone more than 1 step in my opinion though. You should tell them because everyones interpretation of exactly what crosses the lines on the Good-Neutral-Evil gradient differs. As this is not written down it is your duty as a DM to inform them of what is basically a house ruling in cases on the borderlines. Just look at any alignment discussion and you will see varying calls on certain acts because its a subjective decision once you get away from the defined extremes. Yes we all know that act A is good and act B is evil, but act C may be on the border between good and neutral so you as the DM are ruling on it. Therefore you tell the players.
roll8dn 08-19-04, 02:08 PM	As a person who has a slight difference of opinion with most of the people I meet on good v. evil, I find that this is a good time to remind people that the DM's job is to interperet the rules and create a story around them. That being said, I think that the rules on alignment need to be a bit looser. Admittedly, that's just the way I game (part of my PC's personality is usually a need to help others without thought to the consequences), but it does seem that it is the DM's job to sit down with the players and say what is what, listening to informed opinions as neccessary. That way, you do not run into trouble with a strict interpretation of the rules. It appears to be a part of 3.x that all the core rules need to be inviolate (maybe that's just me being a cynic, but that seems to be the way that most people look at them). Remember, this all started with houserules; there is no reason that houserules should stop, assuming that you feel the houserule gives more to the game than it takes away. I hope that all of this wasn't too rambling, but, if it was, I apologize...
Luminous Crayon 08-19-04, 04:06 PM	Alignment works best as an indicator-- a conveniently invisible game mechanic that gets dragged out into the open when someone casts magic circle against evil or chaos hammer. Its function is to determine who is affected by certain morality-dependant effects, like those I've mentioned above. The way I run it, alignment is not something that's "out in the world" for players to be aware of. Characters with lots of hit points know they're "fairly tough", not that they can take 87 points of damage before losing consciousness. Characters with a particular alignment may realize that they're conscientious and charitable, or that they're selfish, coldhearted bastards, just as real life people know about their own motivations. They don't think of them in terms of LG or NE-- that's a terminology that doesn't exist. In all cases, alignment is a result of a character's actions. A character's actions should never be a result of alignment. If a character's alignment changes (something that causes gradually, as a result of a new pattern of behavior, not suddenly, because of a single act,) it happens without XP penalty. I've never understood why some DMs want to penalize a character's skills, knowledge, and general effectiveness because the character has had a change of heart.
Vaalingrade Ashland 08-19-04, 05:18 PM	Originally posted by Board Rider I was just wondering what everyone's idea on playing alignment is. I mean there is a thread on this board about asking the opinion from everyone about a characters action and the alignment it represents and it brings differing opinions. not that long ago, I did an article (http://www.ledgermaincomics.com/extras/articles/rp_article003.htm) on the problem inherent to the system.
Board_Rider 08-19-04, 07:07 PM	Very well done article Vaal. The link was good to. Anyone who reads this should check them out. SEE above. My question still is this. What have you guys done about the alignment system in regards to characters playing what you believe is not correct alignment playing? Without hurting the character building process.
Brknlf 08-20-04, 09:07 AM	My question still is this. What have you guys done about the alignment system in regards to characters playing what you believe is not correct alignment playing? There is only one thing that can be done and it has already been said. Communication between DM and said players so that the players understand what kind of game the DM is running and how much, if at alll, the alignments are being used and any effects in the game that correspond with the alignments. I don't understand how much more you want. When I'm running and I see any problem with alignment, I'll tell the players (though I have never had any problems, I'm fairly loose in dealing with the ambiguity of alignments and let players make up their own minds). I've been in games where DMs adhered more strictly to the alignments and if they felt players were acting out of alignment as they preceived them, they would tell the player this and talk with them about it. I've seen people say one evil act equals instant alignment change, but I've yet to play in a game where I've seen this happen.
MinusInnocence 08-20-04, 09:31 AM	Stuff like this just doesn't happen if you sit down as a group and clarify certain issues. At least set some general boundaries... it may be easier to define what Good ISN'T or what Evil ISN'T than it is to determine what falls into each of those categories. For example, you can throw a rock on these forums and hit twelve people, each with different interpretations of what Chaotic Good is. But if all twelve of them sat down and agreed upon certain things that Chaotic Good is NOT (like performing a Coup de Grace on an opponent who has already effectively been neutralized and has no hope of reentering the conflict)... very little would be left to speculation. Now, is this going to eliminate any and all disagreements in the future? No. But it will reduce them significantly, and having to negotiate and compromise with the other people in your group allows for some interesting brainstorming, to boot. As for myself, my games follow the Objective/Intentional Alignment system... which means an individual's Alignment is based on what they think and feel, and what the motivations are for their actions more than the actions themselves. However, this doesn't make Good or Evil (or their respective consequences) any less tangible. If I played with a group who wanted to play Subjective/Intentional or Objective/Action-based, and simply neglected to talk things out with them before the game started... we would end up fighting about a lot of trivial stuff. Lack of communication is the #1 inspiration for the "Can Paladins eat innocent villagers?" threads.