For a one shot I expanded the alignment box from 3x3 to 5x5, changed the scale from good to evil to selfless to selfish and changed the scale from lawful to Chaotic to anarchy to authoritarian
Just as roleplay itself can be stereotypical and naively rigid when played by Inexperienced or dogmatic players, so can alignment seem sophomoric. Weird how players that cite this possibility as the absolute that turned them off to alignment never also get turned off to roleplaying in general.
@@CosmicWatermelnI think they mean “Anarchy” as in the political philosophy of Anarchism. Many people make this mistake. Chaos is not Anarchy. Authoritarianism is not lawfulness. Equating Anarchism with chaos is like equating democracy with mob rule. Basically it boils down to “Who makes the rules?”and “Who is society meant to benefit?” Anarchy in which all social divisions are eradicated. It has laws, but they apply to all people and do not grant power to one group over another beyond a given situation.
I think more people should try using alignment how it was originally intended. It was a force in the game world that your character had literally aligned themselves with. It wasn't your personal motivation, personality, or code, all of which you could still have. It was something much more tangible for your character's story.
I think I basically do this anyway when coming up with a backstory/goal/bond. Then I think of what alignment that makes them, and also put that. I've never actually seen someone play an alignment instead of a character. The alignment on your sheet is fun trivia that is sometimes relevant to mention, about the same as the weight/height on your sheet.
The Palladium RP games had a very different take on alignment and they all generally focused on personality types than straight up moral codes. In Revised Recon, a game that takes place in the modern era during the Vietnam war and mercenary actions in that time period, the alignments were: Idealistic -try to stop injustice but sometimes you gotta be cruel to be kind. Idealist-Pacifist - never kill or harm anyone Opportunist - get you and your buddies out alive no matter what Opportunist-Righteous - Advance the cause of good at any cost Opportunist-Karmic - prove yourself in battle Malignant - stay alive and stay ahead Malignant-Psychotic - killing is awesome! This is obviously tailored to a modern combat RP system and they changed the alignments offered in TMNT, Rifts, Robotech and the PRP System as needed.
I was just about to post a reference to Palladium! The pseudo-alignment concept in their games was always very memorable. They did a particularly good job of describing why a "good" character would do bad things and why an "evil" character could do good things.
This is just great. I always found it hard to follow the D&D alignment system. Edicts and Anathemas make more sense and are easy to implement. Thanks for sharing! I now plan to use these for my NPCs as well.
I remember as a kid playing d&d worrying that i would "mess up" trying to play a lawful good plaladin "what if got it wrong?! Would the dice gods smite me?!" I like your idea of not havign strict alignments...because thats true to how it is in real life (in my opinion)...no one is always one way or another.
the problem is each DM is gonna have their version of what LG should be. Some people think LG should make the characters act like modern day liberal Christians at a dinner party. OTOH if you look at what Gary wrote about it , he said a LG paladin could force a bad guy to convert and then dispatch him so he can't backslide. So you have to be able to trust a DM. I know a guy who will only play a CE character until he gets to know the DM.
People may honor alignments more than most people think. It's just that not many are willing to admit the alignment they're representing is some form of Neutral.
One of the biggest issues I find is that most people don't understand the alignment system and it has lead to people just not using it. WotC is to blame for this through 4th and 5th E. In 2nd E they recommended that a Paladin character write down 5-10 items to establish a personal code. This gave them an anchor point for being lawful. One of the biggest things is the differentiation between a code that you follow and the laws of the kingdom that you are currently in. If a LG paladin is in an evil kingdom, they are still lawful when they break unjust laws. Everything that you are describing when talking about edicts and anathemas is in the lawful category if you are following them. If your code tells you that you have to burn down 1 out of every 10 buildings, that does not make you chaotic, it makes you LE because you are following your code. I am glad that you are talking about this subject and giving people alternatives that hopefully help them. I see too many groups that just don't use it. I have had people that have never used alignment that have come to my table and have struggled because I have alignment based weapons and armor. Also when Paladins, clerics and warlocks fail to follow their gods tenants, they start losing their powers until they start following their gods/patrons will again (or find a new one).
If I'm not mistaken, that's how ethics worked in Vampire the Masquerade, with breaking your code meaning losing humanity (or, if you've abandoned that, progress on your path).
I've also found the D&D alignment system to lack substance, but then it's important to understand what it was first intended to do. In the men and magic system of Chainmail and in OD&D, there were only three alignments--law, neutrality and chaos, largely inspired by the writings of Michael Morcock. And alignment was meant to identify what other forces the units you were commanding would align with on a battlefield. Elves, dwarves, halflings, etc. would be aligned with law. Orcs, goblins and trolls and so on would be aligned with chaos. Forest spirits, treeents etc. would be neutrality. Humans could be aligned with any side. So, in it's earliest context, it was meant to identify what side are you playing in a war game. What factions are you aligned with? The good and evil axis was added because in early play testing, they discovered there was no atrocity teenage boys (who they saw as their primary market) would not commit. And the alignment system in AD&D became almost entirely punitive. If your character changed alignment in the game, you lost a level. Good and evil are necessary concepts in the game as long as there are devils, demons, and celestial, which are abjectly evil or beings of good. But does good mean? How is that defined? That's where D&D's alignment system doesn't work too well. Whether you're using the nine tiered alignment system or edicts and anathemas, these only apply to mortals interacting with other mortals and really doesn't speak to any kind of divine agenda. Since D&D is a heroic game, Joseph Campbell is worth a look. He identified good, in heroic literature, as being that which upholds, supports, and obeys the divine order--in whatever form that takes. This is the first and most important consideration--secondly, good is whatever supports, defends, and advances the interests of the hero's home community--whether it's a village, a city state or a kingdom, etc. And if the two are in conflict, the divine order always supersedes any mortal concerns. And yes, sometimes the gods seem cruel and uncaring from a mortal perspective--say when an angered god of the seas sends a tidal wave to wipe out an entire coastal region. But often, gods aren't especially moved by the suffering of mortals--they have bigger considerations and agendas. And they can be fickle. This means evil is whatever seeks to topple, pervert, corrupt and undermine the divine order. And secondly, that which seeks to attack, upend, corrupt, and destroy the hero's home community. For the purposes of D&D, I think this is actually a pretty satisfactory definition of good and evil. So the first thing to take on is what compromises the divine order in a world with many gods? Using the Greek pantheon for instance, all the gods are a part of the divine order and worthy of worship. Without Apollo, the sun doesn't come up. Without Poseidon, the seas and oceans would be completely unregulated and wild and so on. Without Hades, there's no place for the dead to go or to keep them from wandering the earth and haunting the living. Devils, demons and the like would be powerful spirit beings who exist outside and in opposition to the divine order. The system of having a patron deity is a more henotheistic approach to religions--which acknowledges the existence of other gods, but only one is worthy of my worship. But in such approaches, that god has to be fairly all encompassing. If not, then your character has significant gaps when it comes to daily living. For example, if you worship of god of justice as the sole deity who is worthy of worship, who do you pray to for things that are out of that god's wheelhouse? When it comes to needs like fertile fields and bountiful harvests, who does your character make offerings to? And who do you pray to for keeping the dead in their restful sleep? Neither of these would be the concern of a god of justice? So in most D&D settings, priests would worship all the gods, not just picking the aspects of one.
As you've highlighted in your comment, it's vitally important to look at the books that inspired Gygax et al when they created D&D. The game you play at your table is heavily influenced by the entertainment media the players had consumed before they got there. This is why I'm convinced OD&D is more about classical heroes and 5e is so much more influenced by Marvel/DC superheroes and anime.
@@DaehpoI don't understand how your observation is at all connected. I'm talking about the stories surrounding figures like Perseus, the heroes of the Iliad & Odyssey, Gilgamesh, legends of King Scorpion, Beowulf, the Song of Roland and Arthurian legends, and all the cultures from all over the world that Joseph Campbell studied when he wrote, "A Hero with a Thousand Faces." and developed the monomyth of the Hero's Journey. It's a mind blowing work. This has nothing to do with post-modern politics--that's it's own thing and belongs in a completely different forum. This is about the tradition of heroic literature and it's influence on D&D and how that relates to alignment on a mortal level and a cosmic one.
@@mr.pavone9719 I tend to agree with you. In fact, I would say that from OD&D all the way up through 2nd Edition, the influences were heroic lit from antiquity up through the Three Musketeers, classic sword and sorcery--Conan, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, Elric sagas, etc, Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, hammer horror films, and real history. And for monks--the TV show kung-fu had it's influence as well. After WOTC and Hasbro bought the IP, it became much more video game and anime inspired, where all the characters are expected to survive to see the epic narrative to it's conclusion.
It isn't etymologically correct, but you can remember it with "ana" (without or off) "thema" (theme or genre), so like off-script or out-of-bounds. I think originally it means curse or sacrificial offering.
I've been using Ideals/Flaws for a while now instead of alignment. Ideals are what the PC strives for, while Flaws are traits that can tempt or manipulate them away from their Ideals.
I like this better than always/never statements because if we establish that my character would “never” do something, my brain takes that too literally / rigidly. I’d end up without interesting choices related to those statements in all but the most extreme, character/alignment changing scenarios. So just having flaws I *might* give in to or overcome, and ideals I try but might fail to adhere to sounds better to me. That said, maybe it’s nostalgia but I still like the D&D system (I just don’t take it *too* seriously; I think of it mostly as a starting point/ basic moral sketch and for quickly getting an idea for NPCs / monsters).
This is a really good idea for all characters. I never liked the alignment system (and especially how some people interpreted them), but now it's gone in PF2.
I ditched alignment and have used edicts and anathemas for a long time, although I called them aspects, from the Fate rpg. They're much easier for everyone to understand and interpret.
I've never liked alignment and most alternatives are purely mechanical. I think this is great because it is customizable to the player/character and it's more carrot than stick.
I've been playing since the late 1970s and we used the old alignment system up through the late 1980s. After that we just stopped using alignments altogether. I don't really like codifying moral codes. If a Druid or Cleric or Paladin does something drastically against their deity, I'd just homebrew a punishment. But it's never really come up in any of my games since we dropped alignments.
I've learned through the many years, that some groups run great with alignments and others don't. I offer it always, but then allow the players and or the campaign to determine whether or not they will remain relevant. This is another way a session zero would be helpful, to help figure out. I can see some application for your ideas on this, however.
People get way too hung up on PC alignments. They were always mostly to explain how monsters should act and (clumsily) to give paladins and rangers some standards to live up to. I like the natural language of "good" and "evil", which are useful for magic that targets one or the other. And "lawful" just means a rule-based society, and "chaotic" means strongman-based.
Nice insight. I haven't figured edicts and anathemas (fancy names) as something that is an easy pic to add to any other game, but with your input on always/never it feels like I gotta use it right now and everywhere. 😂
This seems like just the normal alignment system with extra steps. Been playing D&D for 20 years now and never had any confusion or problems with the alignment system. It’s not nebulous but it’s not direct either. There’s nuance for everything. That’s the beauty and elegance of it. It covers everything.
I think I've played with something similar to what you laid out for a long time, but the terminology is pretty good and it captures some of the really ambiguous cases like assigning barbarians or elves to be chaotic. The D&D alignment system is pretty baked into the default cosmology, though, but if you're doing your own world you're pretty good.
Isn't that a core system of Burning Wheel, where every character is supposed to have "Always/Nevers" that GM is explicitly asked to try to pull strings of? I don't fully remember how it was mechanized, but BW wasn't a combat heavy system so I wouldn't be surprised if it was even tied to some character progression/exp system.
No yeah, Burning Wheel has an "Instincts" mechanic/character creation aspect. You set up stuff like, "When in danger, I always draw my sword in an instant." It's described as insurance in a way, something your character can be depended on to do.
Instincts, yes, but also Beliefs, which are more like the "Always/Never" or "If, Then" statements that model the characters' creed. Interesting to say BW isn't combat focused, it's like a third of the book. You're not totally wrong, but it's just odd to hear.
I never thought about it as alignment. I just think it's easier to roleplay a character if I have a set of responses they'll take in a kind of circumstance. So it's things I would slot in the "personality" category than alignment. Things like how my character doesn't care about material gain because she doesn't see the value of something being rare or hard to obtain if it doesn't serve a purpose she cares about. She wouldn't say no to gold since it's necessary in that part of the world to live but she doesn't actively seek out loot. So, the lack of marerialism has become a personality trait. Then again, I don't really know what alignment is supposed to be so I don't what I'm arguing for.
totally agree, i tend to leave this up to the players to add to their "role play" as to the character's traits or personal morals. I tend to outline at the beginning of a game that i dont deal with "evil" characters being in a party, but i dont hold them back if they want to do things that seem "bad" or sneaky ish... as long as they are not trying to undermine the party as a whole.
I pretty much ignore alignment in my campaigns. One system that I like is the piety system from Mythic Odysseys of Theros. I have written my own set of deities using this system to reward clerics and paladins (and other believers) for following their gods dictates.
@@Roll4Initiative I like the piety system because it lets you set 3 or 4 things that the players can do to increase their piety. And so as they increase their piety they gain rewards. So it feels like as they're following their deity and their deities dictates that they are rewarded for it, more than just the other characters. All the other characters grow and level as they go through the story as well. This system allows the players to be rewarded for following their deity faithfully.
I like this approach to character creation. It is helpful to have a specific guide to how a character thinks that isn't nebulous like good or evil, or neutral, or lawful or chaotic. I also think different ethics about a thing. Ok so an example we will go with is Truth, when should someone tell the truth? A character with a truth edict would say always, whereas an anathema I wouldn't say never but it's more like that character's truth ethic is something else is more valuable than truth and what is that thing? Maybe power. Ok so this character will tell the truth yes as long as it gets them power, otherwise they will lie. But you could even add a twist like even though this character has a truth ethic they might also have a promise ethic so when they told the person that is hiding "I won't tell them where you are" in a sense that is also truth yes, but like if another person is all "where are they hiding" they can be like "I won't tell you" which again is true but also gets rid of the whole notion that if a character always tells the truth that somehow it means you can ask them anything and they have to tell you the answer. Another idea has to do with purpose beyond oneself or more about self growth, so example I use with this is pacifism because as many will say you cannot be a pacifist in D&D: - the game mechanics are centered on combat - even if a character never uses a weapon and just heals, since they are healing party members enacting violence they are promoting it. I disagree and think this definition is too strict. So higher purpose pacifism looks like this: multiple kingdoms are about to go to war, orchestrated by a rakshasa pulling the strings, so to prevent this war you will fight one of their lieutenants. It isn't about not being violent, it's about preventing war. Higher purpose or greater purpose the moral ethics go beyond just the character feelings if something (like fighting) is ok or not. But the opposite to that could be something like a redemption ethic, that an individual should be given a second chance or benefit of a doubt. Of course there could be something greater than this redemption or maybe it's challenged. How many times can they forgive and what is unforgivable (though check with group and DM what themes are allowed.) This is the pacifist who will try to talk with the Lieutenant that their superior is hurting others and how they don't need to fight. They will give a warning or chance to back out of things. But they can't control actions of others like their allies. They offered a second chance but it was denied so no guilt on their mind. Ok but what about something they couldn't forgive, like person doesn't even deserve that? I mean i feel like if the character can choose their morals whenever then they lose meaning but at same time these ethics should be challenged they should be challenged. Ok so warning ⚠️ let's say the party learns this lieutenant did something absolutely disgusting. for this we will say the DM runs a campaign with mature themes. and although they used fade away black out, there were still implications. that this lieutenant NPC the party would encounter was a perpetrator of SA. won't go into how the party finds out but again imagine this is game with mature themes. which forgot to mention it earlier but yes the players in this hypothetical situation did consent to. Why? Because stories can still be told if everyone can be respectful of subject. Not all games will be. Not all players will be. Not all DMs will be. Don't play a game with those themes if not everyone can be respectful. However this being hypothetical i can just handwave it and say everyone is or was. So in that scenario the pacifist character does not forgive the lieutenant or give them a second chance ⚠️ there is the idea of a moral event horizon that once a character crosses it they have gone too far. Anyway it can be a mess with alignment what a character will or won't do, what things are allowed at the table even if just mentioned in passing or suggested. Also with the actions is it meant to say something or to shock someone? Though that might be losing on alignment and more about table etiquette really. Ok maybe alignment is too stringent for RP so a question could be asking a player what is they want their character to be remembered for, it could be good, bad, whatever, but heros have reknown, they seek glory or want to make the world a better place and like with the restrictive form of pacifism I am going to take altruism and just defenestrate it. The town wants to make a bronze statue of the hero for slaying the dragon, let them, remember the appreciation of others does not diminish the act of service performed. Maybe before this town tells the PC they have nothing to offer them and they are just like "I will do it so you won't need to live in fear", but anyway reknown the player character wants to be remembered for fighting a dragon and there you go DM knows what adventure to make and player can try to RP that. Though maybe keep flexible like the goal is fighting a dragon but player shouldn't be obsessed... Or should they? Maybe they just go full Ahab in this game, ok talk to other players about this...look exploring theme of obsession could be interesting but the player should still be flexible i don't know... Ok so i feel like a problem with these stringent interpretations is one person decided this is the way things should be and challenges anyone who says otherwise. I don't know. Look, ethics shouldn't come down to declaring what a thing is but what a thing shows or demonstrates. Ok still feels vague... Ok so if a player describes their character as being brave it is on no one to define what that means. The player might give an example from backstory how they are brave like "I defended another person's honor" but anyway it's the whole descriptive vs prescriptive, how things are vs how things ought to be. I think i lost my train of thought with this tangent.
I like the idea of an alignment chart. The standard one is awful in pretty much every possible way, but it's possible to make new more specialized versions that have some actual practical use. But realistically, trying to rehabilitate the concept is way more effort than it's worth, and it's probably better to switch wholesale to something different. Edicts and Anathemas are a good solution to the mechanical side, and TBIFs are perfectly serviceable as a personality description. I'm sure there's even better stuff out there, and I'll definitely keep my eyes open for it, but these are good enough that I don't need to actively look for something better anymore.
That sounds neat though it can get difficukt juggl8ng and keeping track of the differring moral rules around all the characters and npcs. Where as alignment having 9 options narrows it for easier/faster operation. I use alignment roughly half the tine. As an alternative to Dnzd(or Palladium) alignmebt I like the Vampire(White Wolf) Virtue abd Vice system. You only have 14 fundanental principles to remember but can combine them in a myriad of ways to create different foundational moral points for characters abd NPCs.
Sometimes i don't need a system. Sometimes i use the alignment system, sometimes i need a strict system. I usually don't do "Always and never" because sometimes it is not feasible to be completely rigid.
💯I stopped using "alignment" decades ago - but I've always believed that any system that helps a player embody their character for role-playing is useful, as long as it works for them. I like TOON RPG Goals & Beliefs. I've used Fortes & Foibles or Gimmicks & Flaws in my own TTRPG designs. Find the thing that helps make your characters unique and use that. These systems should always be up to the player, never imposed. But I have given away rewards when players enact their character's flaws in gameplay.
I'm in the minority it seems as someone that actually does like alignment and enjoy its use in games, but this is a neat alternative I would be excited to try at some point.
Alignment's problems are really overblown I think. It's not meant to measure the whole character, just bits and pieces. Are your motives altruistic and you try to minimize harm to innocent people? You're probably good. Are your motives selfish and you don't care to minimize harm to innocent people? You're probably evil. If you're selfish but not harmful, or altruistic but not impactful, you're probably neutral. Do you think your goals can be better achieved by working within a social heirarchy? You're probably lawful. Do you think a social heirarchy is actively detrimental to your goals? You're probably chaotic. Any way the wind blows, doesn't really matter to me? Neutral.
dnd and its settings are a bit more self consistent with the normal alignment system. DMs are free to give leeway to characters when it comes to role playing alignment, but gods, spells, planes, damage resistances, ... everything assumes the good/evil and law/chaos axis. This is the model provided by dnd and it has been fun to play for decades. There are other roleplaying games with different models.
I explain it to my players: Good: Prosocial, favores others Evil: Antisocial, favores themself Lawful: Organizational. Works in systems with hierarchy . Top-down. Chaotic: Individualist. Works in unions or horizontal hierarchies. Bottom-up.
I don't think it has to be yes/no. D&D is a grand story that deals with the fundamental nature of universe. Edicts and Anathema seem more like a smaller thing. There are plenty of systems out there: 5th Age used Nature and Demeanor just like the White Wolf games, and Modern d20 had Allegiances. And if we go a little further out the Passions and Personality Traits of Pendragon are another. You can use all of them in the same game, if players like defining what their characters are alike. Also Adam at WeLoveTTRPGs had some pretty good thoughts on Alignment that I enjoy: ruclips.net/video/6RXhczIGwh8/видео.html&ab_channel=WeLoveTTRPGs%21
Back in 1E I told players to give me a good character first and worry about alignment about fourth or fifth thing on how you play. And the alignment chart devolved into what you stated lawful good occasionally chaotic. Always and Never is a good idea. Especially if the class should have a code. And it up to player and DM to come with a code, and the penalties for not following it. Ex paladin’s war horse will not allow you to ride until you make amends for being naughty. Question are you associated with brand role 4 initiative dry erase dungeon tiles.
I think the alignment in DND is okay. It is a cool idea. However it can be made better if it is more nuanced. It should also be seperated from class mechanics completely. Alignment works best for role playing only. It can apply to characters and factions. Classes, speacies and races shouldn't have one specific alignment. That leads to sterotyping way too much. That has unfortunate implications. The video gives a cool new spin to allignments. There are specific things a character would do and would avoid. That brings in a lot of nusnce, without becoming much more complicated. I came up with other ways to add nuance. I like to call the lawful and chaotic pair the order and freedom pair respectivly. I think chaotic has too much of a negative connotation. It is better to call it freedom or liberty. I prefer to take out good and evil entirely. Instead I would like to replace it with conservative and liberal. That is so much more interesting and realistic. The whole good vs. evil thing is done to death. I would much prefer to divide characters in a way that resembles real world politics. There is nuance in different sides have different values. There is also plenty of conflict to make stories work. There are more ways to provide nuance. There can be soectrums instead of using two or three catagories for every pair of opposites. In more recent times, I figured that there can even be four spectrums. There is economics, government, society and warfare. Each can have an order side and freedom side. Order is about rules, authority and hierchy. Freedom is about liberty, equality and fewer rules. In economics, order has capitalism and distinct class structure. Freedom supports the worker class and reduces class differences. In government, order has the government be bigger, more nationalized, more authoritarian and have more laws. Freedom has the government be smaller, more localized, more democratic hand have fewer laws. In society, order is about having certain kinds of people at a higher rank than others. It is based on things like race, gender nationality and religion. This is also more nationalistic. Freedom has equality of different types. They are into political correctness and globalism. They also prefer a secular government. In warefare, order has more war and violence. There is gaining order through brute force and violent dominance. Freedom is mainly pacifist. It is also indo diplomamy and gun control. The differences between conservate and liberal can get complicated. There are also wierd cases where someone can be conservative in one thing and liberal in another. More nuance can be added with more spectrums. Conservatives are on the side of order for all four spectums, except government. Liberals are on the side of freedom. Maybe that is why the word liberal is similar to the word liberty. Liberal can be difficult to define, and that opeans up a can of worms. I think people count as liberals if they are innovative for thier time. I thought of the four spectrums recently. It make take more time to figure out the details of how that works. Maybe it can help guide character and faction development.
Towards the end of the video, there was a mention about chaotic characters being jerks. What the heck? I didn't know that was a thing in DND. Maybe it is a misunderstanding stemming from an unfortunate label. I am a free spirited person in real life. I don't like to clean and organize all the time. I also prefer freedom in all four spectrums. I never thought of chaotic as bad. It is a rather neutral thing since it is on an entirely separate axis from good and evil. I even find that freedom is more moral in a lot of situations than order. Order works best in small to moderate doses. There should just be some to prevent people from hurting each other. That is about it. Oftentimes there is too much order in one form or another. It prevents people from doing what they want for no good reason. This is tyrannical and wrong. I get the impression that too much order is actually selfish. People become hungry for power. Then they dominate people because it makes them feel good. That is really messed up. This can come across as barbaric at worst. In that case, those that advocate for freedom are more moral. They can even protest against an unjust authority, and that is justified as a moral action. There are trend that modern society gets more freedom over time. There are things like democracy, political correctness and the phasing out of capitalism. If someone wants to figure out how a chaotic good or chaotic neutral character would work, I recommend checking out real world liberals. I especially recommend the ones that focus on labor unions and small government.
They already have this system in D&D 5e. It's called; Bonds Ideals Flaws Personality Traits And yes. It is the best addition 5e has made to the game and is infinitely better than the terrible alignment system. I don't use alignment. I instead use the color pie from magic the gathering. Much better system. It never stops gameplay because two idiots at the table have diametrically opposed, mutually exclusive, and equally wrong personal definitions for the words good, evil, and lawful.
I believe this is all just word salad. While in real life everyone has shades of gray, RPG's are games and need game mechanics to represent Law, Chaos, Good and Evil. Pathfinder 1e Gamemastery even has a Alignment Scale which you can use to more define these mechanics or reduce their effect [the aforementioned shades of gray areas]. This, to me, is the biggest problem with newer RPG's everything is gray or allowable. There should be consequences to your actions, and while you say edict and anathemas, you're just redressing the same issues in a different format. The standard alignment system is black and white because it needs to be, it's a game mechanic. Another important note is that in most campaigns, that I have witnessed or been a part of, DM's who allow players any alignment usually don't have much of a campaign for very long. Paladin's and Assassins don't mix for long. While it can be fun for 1 shots, not so much in campaigns.
Yeah, rather than stating what your morals are on your character sheet, maybe your character’s choices throughout the game should be what determines their morality. Cypher System doesn’t have a morality stat. I like that system better.
This is an absolutely trash take. Completely ignores actual evil. Ya know, the majority of fiendish creatures who derive physical pleasure from causing suffering to others. There's people and even players like this. Just because you cannot fathom true evil doesn't excuse ignoring it in favor of a reinvented political wheel.
Just one of the things that comes with being a person with dyslexia. If I’ve read a word and rarely heard it spoken, I tend to accidentally add or subtract letters
I like the alignment system, but I think it's use lies in a descriptive manner. I interpret the axis of Good VS Evil to me that of altruism, compassion, valuing dignity and kindness opposed to selfishness, greed and not valuing life. That's pretty close to the books Meanwhile my interpretation of Law VS Chaos is a bit different. It's more about personal codes. I like comparing it to Fred's Model of the "it" , "ego" and "superego" , where "the it" is a force in your mind that strives for your own desires, the "superego" is the force of your moral code and understanding of consequences and the "ego" is the part that decides what to follow more. That's how I see Lawful VS Chaotic. Lawful beings tend to listen more to the "superego" with their personal moral code being a bigger factor. If they believe stealing is wrong, they wouldn't steal even when they are starving. They would honor deals and promises they made. More Chaotic inclined beings meanwhile focus more on their own desires and needs. Creatures of whim. However, humans and humanlikes don't really follow that alignment completely. That's more for the beings that are literally embodiment of those traits, like those originating from other planes. So it would be better to have an alignment Chart be gradual. A more refined chart would be a circle (because if you're 100% CG you're probably less Chaotic than a 100% CN) with Neutral in the middle and the others more as zones, like done in the Pathfinder 1e video games. And your position on that scale is more gradual. Though that may be too precise for a system that is meant to be more of a vague moral and ethical description of your character. That all being said, Pathfinders edicts and anathemas and those general Always/Never statements are also great as tools for building character and moral code. I just wouldn't see that as a replacement.
I really like your use of Freud's Superego, Ego, and Id as analogies for Lawful, Neutral, and Chaotic! Personally I *love* alignments! Of course they can be misunderstood and played incorrectly. But then doing so is as ignorant of roleplaying as punching everyone you meet in the face first thing 'because I'm a Fighter!'. I don't understand the aversion to alignment any more than I do the aversion to 'math' when said math is single-digit addition or subtraction. Alignment does get interesting when you dig into it. The Good/Evil as Altruistic/Selfish is pretty common but then what about Evil as an actual Superpower-like force to support and Good its antithesis? And is Neutral philosophical Meh, or an active pursuit to maintain a balance? The use of the term Neutral as a midpoint for both axes leads to semantic confusion at times too. For me Alignment provides a palate of fractal color with which to paint characters, with new dimensions and distinctions arising upon each deeper, more refined glance. It's hard to think people would prefer to just call their neon light chartreusse lace bodice a simple green shirt, but them do them eh?
No matter what people claim their alignment is, people always play alignment based on themselves. I think I would start everyone as neutral and modify their alignment according to their actions.
I have actually had a different experience. My first group enjoyed playing characters that had very different morals than themselves. In game they would cold heartedly murder human shields and not even bat an eye if they were infants, while in real life they were really empathetic people who consider this kind of behavior an absolutely despicable war crime. I also wouldn't say that all those murder hobos would enjoy going around and killing people for the fun of it irl, if we didn't have laws against that. But overall I think people do have a tendency to default to their own moral framework when it comes to roleplay. So far I agree with you. I have just seen some evidence that it's not always the case.
Honestly I think ill be using both this and the standard alignment chart in my next campaign that I run, I can really see this helping with character creation and establishing some interesting places for the players to start roleplaying their characters from.
I threw out alignment when i was running D&D. It doesn't make sense to try and rigidly contain a character and how they act inside simplistic restrictive rules. I gave my players traits they can pick ( or make their own ) a really popular trait was fearless. As for morality, that's subjective and the alignment system is antithetical to that. The only exception would be powers given to a PC through a deity/deity like source. Deities in my game are characters that can interact with PCs directly or indirectly and even speak to / meet in person etc. So displeasing one of these characters is the rule of law, since that is their domain. * The only exception to that exception would be 5e paladins, since they get their powers from the universe or some thing. Though i don't run or play D&D anymore, my jam is Carin. I love the Armour and HP system its more akin to dark souls and rogue like games. I love homebrew and Carin is much better suited for that than D&D, since D&D has so much baggage and its very difficult to get players new or old to read the rules both official and homebrew. D&D is rules bloat hell!
Alignment is one of the "mechanics" that reliably turn me off from choosing DnD as a system. It lends itself perfectly to portraying cartoonish goody-two-shoes and mustache-twirling villains with personified golden mean fallacies in between and provides nuance-free judgment about a character's modus operandi without saying anything meaningful about the character's values that govern their actions. I mean, it doesn't necessarily have to, but that begs the question why it is even a thing people should care about when the information content is so ill-defined. Just ignoring alignment is already an improvement, but even better is replacing it with something that actually conveys what alignment _should_ convey but doesn't. I use something quite similar to what you describe here and have players write down some priorities or moral principles of their character, so basically things they would always or never do. So, when they e.g. do something selfless I actually have an inkling if they are driven by their principles and what the principle is that made them do that specific thing or if they are just being compulsive people-pleasers.
I don't like the traditional 3x3 alignment grid. I much prefer your system. At the best of times alignment can be contentions. And if a player and the GM disagree, it's a recipe for frustration. Like consider the case of killing fleeing enemies. There's a solid case to be made that doing so is a war crime. Not everyone is going to agree. What happens if the DM and a player disagree? It could lead to a situation where either the DM forces an alignment shift on a player, or a situation where a player feels frustrated about how the world seems bend around itself to narritively justify their party members' bloodthirst. Neither of which is great.
I personally prefer something akin to Pendragon 5.2 where your character has a list of dual virtues they have to weigh themselves on. Also Alignment is a lot easier to grok when you realize that Law-Chaos is how much your character will respect laws/traditions/order as a baseline and Good-Evil was historically just added to the game to represent Selflessness vs Selfishness and how those interact with the already existing Law-Chaos axis.
I was planning to object to this. My view of moral philosophy is that it is an argument over values rather than codes. In my youth I made two commitments. The first was intentional. I went to a christian school and was uncomfortable with their faith. My attitude towards Christianity has mellowed as I got older. You can do your nonsense, so long as we have values in common. I have codified this to myself as a commitment to go through my life with my eyes open. The second was experimental. I decided to give up eating meat. I was uncertain before I made the change, but have been certain I had made the right choice ever since.
This system seems like a very good system I will probably bring up with my group. I must admit, I am a very sentimental person and have played since ‘84, so I do feel some loyalty towards the old system. But I like this and plan on implementing it regardless.
I've always wanted to like D&D alignment, but their system is just too fuzzy and vague, while also feeling proscriptive. I love your always/never approach, and think it would really help new players to flesh out their characters' personality and ethical views.
Thanks! I feel like alignment can be confusing for new players and doesn’t give enough guidance to be helpful if your new to any of the aspects of roleplay
I never got past 2nd edition which was firmly based in alignment but apart from Clerics and their god's particular peccadilloes I wasn't overly strict about it. I did keep a rough track though and if someone who 'identified' as one of the good alignments started creeping it was called out. As I recall nobody wanted to risk losing that level for changing alignment. I do like the idea of basically making your own ethics though.
I've never played characters that strictly adhered to the alignment chart but have struggled with maintaining a character due to it. Maybe having simple but meaningful always/never statements like this will help.
In my world I just got rid of the alignment chart and replaced them with a series of gods who each just represent a small cluster of values. My players still use the alignment chart. I think your advice in this video will really help make these gods I made more interesting and more defined for my players! Thank you!
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For a one shot I expanded the alignment box from 3x3 to 5x5, changed the scale from good to evil to selfless to selfish and changed the scale from lawful to Chaotic to anarchy to authoritarian
So you reinvented the political compass /s
that's what the chaos - law scale already is lol
Just as roleplay itself can be stereotypical and naively rigid when played by Inexperienced or dogmatic players, so can alignment seem sophomoric. Weird how players that cite this possibility as the absolute that turned them off to alignment never also get turned off to roleplaying in general.
@@CosmicWatermelnI think they mean “Anarchy” as in the political philosophy of Anarchism. Many people make this mistake. Chaos is not Anarchy. Authoritarianism is not lawfulness. Equating Anarchism with chaos is like equating democracy with mob rule.
Basically it boils down to “Who makes the rules?”and “Who is society meant to benefit?” Anarchy in which all social divisions are eradicated. It has laws, but they apply to all people and do not grant power to one group over another beyond a given situation.
Would be interested in seeing this!
I think more people should try using alignment how it was originally intended. It was a force in the game world that your character had literally aligned themselves with. It wasn't your personal motivation, personality, or code, all of which you could still have. It was something much more tangible for your character's story.
Where is that written?
I think I basically do this anyway when coming up with a backstory/goal/bond. Then I think of what alignment that makes them, and also put that.
I've never actually seen someone play an alignment instead of a character. The alignment on your sheet is fun trivia that is sometimes relevant to mention, about the same as the weight/height on your sheet.
The Palladium RP games had a very different take on alignment and they all generally focused on personality types than straight up moral codes. In Revised Recon, a game that takes place in the modern era during the Vietnam war and mercenary actions in that time period, the alignments were:
Idealistic -try to stop injustice but sometimes you gotta be cruel to be kind.
Idealist-Pacifist - never kill or harm anyone
Opportunist - get you and your buddies out alive no matter what
Opportunist-Righteous - Advance the cause of good at any cost
Opportunist-Karmic - prove yourself in battle
Malignant - stay alive and stay ahead
Malignant-Psychotic - killing is awesome!
This is obviously tailored to a modern combat RP system and they changed the alignments offered in TMNT, Rifts, Robotech and the PRP System as needed.
I was just about to post a reference to Palladium! The pseudo-alignment concept in their games was always very memorable. They did a particularly good job of describing why a "good" character would do bad things and why an "evil" character could do good things.
This is just great. I always found it hard to follow the D&D alignment system. Edicts and Anathemas make more sense and are easy to implement. Thanks for sharing! I now plan to use these for my NPCs as well.
I remember as a kid playing d&d worrying that i would "mess up" trying to play a lawful good plaladin "what if got it wrong?! Would the dice gods smite me?!" I like your idea of not havign strict alignments...because thats true to how it is in real life (in my opinion)...no one is always one way or another.
the problem is each DM is gonna have their version of what LG should be. Some people think LG should make the characters act like modern day liberal Christians at a dinner party. OTOH if you look at what Gary wrote about it , he said a LG paladin could force a bad guy to convert and then dispatch him so he can't backslide. So you have to be able to trust a DM. I know a guy who will only play a CE character until he gets to know the DM.
People may honor alignments more than most people think. It's just that not many are willing to admit the alignment they're representing is some form of Neutral.
For me, the fact that alignment can be interpreted differently by different people was one of the things that made it confusing
@@Roll4Initiative Alignment was ALWAYS a session 0 discussion. Trouble was we didn't know about session zero.
One of the biggest issues I find is that most people don't understand the alignment system and it has lead to people just not using it. WotC is to blame for this through 4th and 5th E. In 2nd E they recommended that a Paladin character write down 5-10 items to establish a personal code. This gave them an anchor point for being lawful. One of the biggest things is the differentiation between a code that you follow and the laws of the kingdom that you are currently in. If a LG paladin is in an evil kingdom, they are still lawful when they break unjust laws. Everything that you are describing when talking about edicts and anathemas is in the lawful category if you are following them. If your code tells you that you have to burn down 1 out of every 10 buildings, that does not make you chaotic, it makes you LE because you are following your code. I am glad that you are talking about this subject and giving people alternatives that hopefully help them. I see too many groups that just don't use it. I have had people that have never used alignment that have come to my table and have struggled because I have alignment based weapons and armor. Also when Paladins, clerics and warlocks fail to follow their gods tenants, they start losing their powers until they start following their gods/patrons will again (or find a new one).
If I'm not mistaken, that's how ethics worked in Vampire the Masquerade, with breaking your code meaning losing humanity (or, if you've abandoned that, progress on your path).
Its cool’s seeing how similar mechanics are used across very different systems 😊
I've also found the D&D alignment system to lack substance, but then it's important to understand what it was first intended to do. In the men and magic system of Chainmail and in OD&D, there were only three alignments--law, neutrality and chaos, largely inspired by the writings of Michael Morcock. And alignment was meant to identify what other forces the units you were commanding would align with on a battlefield. Elves, dwarves, halflings, etc. would be aligned with law. Orcs, goblins and trolls and so on would be aligned with chaos. Forest spirits, treeents etc. would be neutrality. Humans could be aligned with any side. So, in it's earliest context, it was meant to identify what side are you playing in a war game. What factions are you aligned with?
The good and evil axis was added because in early play testing, they discovered there was no atrocity teenage boys (who they saw as their primary market) would not commit. And the alignment system in AD&D became almost entirely punitive. If your character changed alignment in the game, you lost a level.
Good and evil are necessary concepts in the game as long as there are devils, demons, and celestial, which are abjectly evil or beings of good. But does good mean? How is that defined? That's where D&D's alignment system doesn't work too well. Whether you're using the nine tiered alignment system or edicts and anathemas, these only apply to mortals interacting with other mortals and really doesn't speak to any kind of divine agenda.
Since D&D is a heroic game, Joseph Campbell is worth a look. He identified good, in heroic literature, as being that which upholds, supports, and obeys the divine order--in whatever form that takes. This is the first and most important consideration--secondly, good is whatever supports, defends, and advances the interests of the hero's home community--whether it's a village, a city state or a kingdom, etc. And if the two are in conflict, the divine order always supersedes any mortal concerns.
And yes, sometimes the gods seem cruel and uncaring from a mortal perspective--say when an angered god of the seas sends a tidal wave to wipe out an entire coastal region. But often, gods aren't especially moved by the suffering of mortals--they have bigger considerations and agendas. And they can be fickle.
This means evil is whatever seeks to topple, pervert, corrupt and undermine the divine order. And secondly, that which seeks to attack, upend, corrupt, and destroy the hero's home community.
For the purposes of D&D, I think this is actually a pretty satisfactory definition of good and evil.
So the first thing to take on is what compromises the divine order in a world with many gods? Using the Greek pantheon for instance, all the gods are a part of the divine order and worthy of worship. Without Apollo, the sun doesn't come up. Without Poseidon, the seas and oceans would be completely unregulated and wild and so on. Without Hades, there's no place for the dead to go or to keep them from wandering the earth and haunting the living. Devils, demons and the like would be powerful spirit beings who exist outside and in opposition to the divine order.
The system of having a patron deity is a more henotheistic approach to religions--which acknowledges the existence of other gods, but only one is worthy of my worship. But in such approaches, that god has to be fairly all encompassing. If not, then your character has significant gaps when it comes to daily living. For example, if you worship of god of justice as the sole deity who is worthy of worship, who do you pray to for things that are out of that god's wheelhouse? When it comes to needs like fertile fields and bountiful harvests, who does your character make offerings to? And who do you pray to for keeping the dead in their restful sleep? Neither of these would be the concern of a god of justice? So in most D&D settings, priests would worship all the gods, not just picking the aspects of one.
Cool
So "Good = Conservatism" and "Evil = Iconoclasm"? I can see why modern sensibilities has led to many tables rejecting alignment.
As you've highlighted in your comment, it's vitally important to look at the books that inspired Gygax et al when they created D&D. The game you play at your table is heavily influenced by the entertainment media the players had consumed before they got there. This is why I'm convinced OD&D is more about classical heroes and 5e is so much more influenced by Marvel/DC superheroes and anime.
@@DaehpoI don't understand how your observation is at all connected.
I'm talking about the stories surrounding figures like Perseus, the heroes of the Iliad & Odyssey, Gilgamesh, legends of King Scorpion, Beowulf, the Song of Roland and Arthurian legends, and all the cultures from all over the world that Joseph Campbell studied when he wrote, "A Hero with a Thousand Faces." and developed the monomyth of the Hero's Journey. It's a mind blowing work.
This has nothing to do with post-modern politics--that's it's own thing and belongs in a completely different forum.
This is about the tradition of heroic literature and it's influence on D&D and how that relates to alignment on a mortal level and a cosmic one.
@@mr.pavone9719 I tend to agree with you. In fact, I would say that from OD&D all the way up through 2nd Edition, the influences were heroic lit from antiquity up through the Three Musketeers, classic sword and sorcery--Conan, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, Elric sagas, etc, Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, hammer horror films, and real history. And for monks--the TV show kung-fu had it's influence as well.
After WOTC and Hasbro bought the IP, it became much more video game and anime inspired, where all the characters are expected to survive to see the epic narrative to it's conclusion.
I love this. I have been doing something similar with my own characters for the past couple years, but codifying it like this is really helpful
Good video but you really like adding that second N in anathema.
It isn't etymologically correct, but you can remember it with "ana" (without or off) "thema" (theme or genre), so like off-script or out-of-bounds. I think originally it means curse or sacrificial offering.
Unfortunate dyslexia moment with that word
@@Roll4InitiativeLawful N
I love all Roll 4 Initiative videos!
I've been using Ideals/Flaws for a while now instead of alignment. Ideals are what the PC strives for, while Flaws are traits that can tempt or manipulate them away from their Ideals.
I like this better than always/never statements because if we establish that my character would “never” do something, my brain takes that too literally / rigidly.
I’d end up without interesting choices related to those statements in all but the most extreme, character/alignment changing scenarios.
So just having flaws I *might* give in to or overcome, and ideals I try but might fail to adhere to sounds better to me.
That said, maybe it’s nostalgia but I still like the D&D system (I just don’t take it *too* seriously; I think of it mostly as a starting point/ basic moral sketch and for quickly getting an idea for NPCs / monsters).
I'm stealing this. =P
This is a really good idea for all characters. I never liked the alignment system (and especially how some people interpreted them), but now it's gone in PF2.
I ditched alignment and have used edicts and anathemas for a long time, although I called them aspects, from the Fate rpg. They're much easier for everyone to understand and interpret.
I've never liked alignment and most alternatives are purely mechanical. I think this is great because it is customizable to the player/character and it's more carrot than stick.
Really good video, love how you phrased the points in a more genre neutral way through the framework of pathfinder!
Thanks!
I've been playing since the late 1970s and we used the old alignment system up through the late 1980s. After that we just stopped using alignments altogether. I don't really like codifying moral codes. If a Druid or Cleric or Paladin does something drastically against their deity, I'd just homebrew a punishment. But it's never really come up in any of my games since we dropped alignments.
I've learned through the many years, that some groups run great with alignments and others don't. I offer it always, but then allow the players and or the campaign to determine whether or not they will remain relevant. This is another way a session zero would be helpful, to help figure out. I can see some application for your ideas on this, however.
I love this idea! -- I'm going to start doing this with my characters as a role-play guide.
People get way too hung up on PC alignments. They were always mostly to explain how monsters should act and (clumsily) to give paladins and rangers some standards to live up to. I like the natural language of "good" and "evil", which are useful for magic that targets one or the other. And "lawful" just means a rule-based society, and "chaotic" means strongman-based.
Nice insight. I haven't figured edicts and anathemas (fancy names) as something that is an easy pic to add to any other game, but with your input on always/never it feels like I gotta use it right now and everywhere. 😂
Glad I could help!
This seems like just the normal alignment system with extra steps. Been playing D&D for 20 years now and never had any confusion or problems with the alignment system. It’s not nebulous but it’s not direct either. There’s nuance for everything. That’s the beauty and elegance of it. It covers everything.
I think I've played with something similar to what you laid out for a long time, but the terminology is pretty good and it captures some of the really ambiguous cases like assigning barbarians or elves to be chaotic. The D&D alignment system is pretty baked into the default cosmology, though, but if you're doing your own world you're pretty good.
Isn't that a core system of Burning Wheel, where every character is supposed to have "Always/Nevers" that GM is explicitly asked to try to pull strings of?
I don't fully remember how it was mechanized, but BW wasn't a combat heavy system so I wouldn't be surprised if it was even tied to some character progression/exp system.
No yeah, Burning Wheel has an "Instincts" mechanic/character creation aspect. You set up stuff like, "When in danger, I always draw my sword in an instant." It's described as insurance in a way, something your character can be depended on to do.
Instincts, yes, but also Beliefs, which are more like the "Always/Never" or "If, Then" statements that model the characters' creed.
Interesting to say BW isn't combat focused, it's like a third of the book. You're not totally wrong, but it's just odd to hear.
@@gillcaz True, but D&D is often wa y more than a third of it being combat haha. I remember Beliefs being a big thing.
I never thought about it as alignment. I just think it's easier to roleplay a character if I have a set of responses they'll take in a kind of circumstance. So it's things I would slot in the "personality" category than alignment. Things like how my character doesn't care about material gain because she doesn't see the value of something being rare or hard to obtain if it doesn't serve a purpose she cares about. She wouldn't say no to gold since it's necessary in that part of the world to live but she doesn't actively seek out loot. So, the lack of marerialism has become a personality trait. Then again, I don't really know what alignment is supposed to be so I don't what I'm arguing for.
totally agree, i tend to leave this up to the players to add to their "role play" as to the character's traits or personal morals. I tend to outline at the beginning of a game that i dont deal with "evil" characters being in a party, but i dont hold them back if they want to do things that seem "bad" or sneaky ish... as long as they are not trying to undermine the party as a whole.
I pretty much ignore alignment in my campaigns. One system that I like is the piety system from Mythic Odysseys of Theros. I have written my own set of deities using this system to reward clerics and paladins (and other believers) for following their gods dictates.
I’ll have to check that system out, haven’t seen it. What about it do you like?
@@Roll4Initiative I like the piety system because it lets you set 3 or 4 things that the players can do to increase their piety. And so as they increase their piety they gain rewards. So it feels like as they're following their deity and their deities dictates that they are rewarded for it, more than just the other characters. All the other characters grow and level as they go through the story as well. This system allows the players to be rewarded for following their deity faithfully.
I really like the edict and anathema system. I think in the future I'll require players to pick at least one of each.
I like this approach to character creation.
It is helpful to have a specific guide to how a character thinks that isn't nebulous like good or evil, or neutral, or lawful or chaotic.
I also think different ethics about a thing. Ok so an example we will go with is Truth, when should someone tell the truth? A character with a truth edict would say always, whereas an anathema I wouldn't say never but it's more like that character's truth ethic is something else is more valuable than truth and what is that thing? Maybe power. Ok so this character will tell the truth yes as long as it gets them power, otherwise they will lie. But you could even add a twist like even though this character has a truth ethic they might also have a promise ethic so when they told the person that is hiding "I won't tell them where you are" in a sense that is also truth yes, but like if another person is all "where are they hiding" they can be like "I won't tell you" which again is true but also gets rid of the whole notion that if a character always tells the truth that somehow it means you can ask them anything and they have to tell you the answer.
Another idea has to do with purpose beyond oneself or more about self growth, so example I use with this is pacifism because as many will say you cannot be a pacifist in D&D:
- the game mechanics are centered on combat
- even if a character never uses a weapon and just heals, since they are healing party members enacting violence they are promoting it.
I disagree and think this definition is too strict.
So higher purpose pacifism looks like this: multiple kingdoms are about to go to war, orchestrated by a rakshasa pulling the strings, so to prevent this war you will fight one of their lieutenants. It isn't about not being violent, it's about preventing war. Higher purpose or greater purpose the moral ethics go beyond just the character feelings if something (like fighting) is ok or not.
But the opposite to that could be something like a redemption ethic, that an individual should be given a second chance or benefit of a doubt. Of course there could be something greater than this redemption or maybe it's challenged. How many times can they forgive and what is unforgivable (though check with group and DM what themes are allowed.) This is the pacifist who will try to talk with the Lieutenant that their superior is hurting others and how they don't need to fight. They will give a warning or chance to back out of things. But they can't control actions of others like their allies. They offered a second chance but it was denied so no guilt on their mind. Ok but what about something they couldn't forgive, like person doesn't even deserve that? I mean i feel like if the character can choose their morals whenever then they lose meaning but at same time these ethics should be challenged they should be challenged. Ok so warning ⚠️ let's say the party learns this lieutenant did something absolutely disgusting. for this we will say the DM runs a campaign with mature themes. and although they used fade away black out, there were still implications. that this lieutenant NPC the party would encounter was a perpetrator of SA. won't go into how the party finds out but again imagine this is game with mature themes. which forgot to mention it earlier but yes the players in this hypothetical situation did consent to. Why? Because stories can still be told if everyone can be respectful of subject. Not all games will be. Not all players will be. Not all DMs will be. Don't play a game with those themes if not everyone can be respectful. However this being hypothetical i can just handwave it and say everyone is or was. So in that scenario the pacifist character does not forgive the lieutenant or give them a second chance ⚠️ there is the idea of a moral event horizon that once a character crosses it they have gone too far.
Anyway it can be a mess with alignment what a character will or won't do, what things are allowed at the table even if just mentioned in passing or suggested. Also with the actions is it meant to say something or to shock someone? Though that might be losing on alignment and more about table etiquette really.
Ok maybe alignment is too stringent for RP so a question could be asking a player what is they want their character to be remembered for, it could be good, bad, whatever, but heros have reknown, they seek glory or want to make the world a better place and like with the restrictive form of pacifism I am going to take altruism and just defenestrate it. The town wants to make a bronze statue of the hero for slaying the dragon, let them, remember the appreciation of others does not diminish the act of service performed. Maybe before this town tells the PC they have nothing to offer them and they are just like "I will do it so you won't need to live in fear", but anyway reknown the player character wants to be remembered for fighting a dragon and there you go DM knows what adventure to make and player can try to RP that. Though maybe keep flexible like the goal is fighting a dragon but player shouldn't be obsessed... Or should they? Maybe they just go full Ahab in this game, ok talk to other players about this...look exploring theme of obsession could be interesting but the player should still be flexible i don't know... Ok so i feel like a problem with these stringent interpretations is one person decided this is the way things should be and challenges anyone who says otherwise. I don't know.
Look, ethics shouldn't come down to declaring what a thing is but what a thing shows or demonstrates. Ok still feels vague... Ok so if a player describes their character as being brave it is on no one to define what that means. The player might give an example from backstory how they are brave like "I defended another person's honor" but anyway it's the whole descriptive vs prescriptive, how things are vs how things ought to be. I think i lost my train of thought with this tangent.
I like the idea of an alignment chart. The standard one is awful in pretty much every possible way, but it's possible to make new more specialized versions that have some actual practical use.
But realistically, trying to rehabilitate the concept is way more effort than it's worth, and it's probably better to switch wholesale to something different. Edicts and Anathemas are a good solution to the mechanical side, and TBIFs are perfectly serviceable as a personality description. I'm sure there's even better stuff out there, and I'll definitely keep my eyes open for it, but these are good enough that I don't need to actively look for something better anymore.
Yeah I like this! Thank you for doing a video on it!
That sounds neat though it can get difficukt juggl8ng and keeping track of the differring moral rules around all the characters and npcs.
Where as alignment having 9 options narrows it for easier/faster operation.
I use alignment roughly half the tine.
As an alternative to Dnzd(or Palladium) alignmebt I like the Vampire(White Wolf) Virtue abd Vice system.
You only have 14 fundanental principles to remember but can combine them in a myriad of ways to create different foundational moral points for characters abd NPCs.
sounds easy to implement ;)
Like your method over the grid
Sometimes i don't need a system. Sometimes i use the alignment system, sometimes i need a strict system. I usually don't do "Always and never" because sometimes it is not feasible to be completely rigid.
I never hold anyone to an alignment. Life (even imaginary lives) exists in the grey zone.
If I use the alignment chart, I use it when thinking about broad cultural movements, but even then it's not that good.
💯I stopped using "alignment" decades ago - but I've always believed that any system that helps a player embody their character for role-playing is useful, as long as it works for them. I like TOON RPG Goals & Beliefs. I've used Fortes & Foibles or Gimmicks & Flaws in my own TTRPG designs. Find the thing that helps make your characters unique and use that. These systems should always be up to the player, never imposed. But I have given away rewards when players enact their character's flaws in gameplay.
I'm in the minority it seems as someone that actually does like alignment and enjoy its use in games, but this is a neat alternative I would be excited to try at some point.
Alignment's problems are really overblown I think. It's not meant to measure the whole character, just bits and pieces.
Are your motives altruistic and you try to minimize harm to innocent people? You're probably good.
Are your motives selfish and you don't care to minimize harm to innocent people? You're probably evil.
If you're selfish but not harmful, or altruistic but not impactful, you're probably neutral.
Do you think your goals can be better achieved by working within a social heirarchy? You're probably lawful.
Do you think a social heirarchy is actively detrimental to your goals? You're probably chaotic.
Any way the wind blows, doesn't really matter to me? Neutral.
dnd and its settings are a bit more self consistent with the normal alignment system. DMs are free to give leeway to characters when it comes to role playing alignment, but gods, spells, planes, damage resistances, ... everything assumes the good/evil and law/chaos axis. This is the model provided by dnd and it has been fun to play for decades. There are other roleplaying games with different models.
Comment without watching. Don't bother with alignment at all. Have an idea of your personality and some sort of backstory.
Best alignment system is the Magic colors.
If someone is going to use Alignment, the Palladium Alignment system is way better than D&D's
I explain it to my players:
Good: Prosocial, favores others
Evil: Antisocial, favores themself
Lawful: Organizational. Works in systems with hierarchy . Top-down.
Chaotic: Individualist. Works in unions or horizontal hierarchies. Bottom-up.
Agree. The new Pathfinder system is better in every way to alignment.
I don't think it has to be yes/no. D&D is a grand story that deals with the fundamental nature of universe. Edicts and Anathema seem more like a smaller thing. There are plenty of systems out there: 5th Age used Nature and Demeanor just like the White Wolf games, and Modern d20 had Allegiances. And if we go a little further out the Passions and Personality Traits of Pendragon are another. You can use all of them in the same game, if players like defining what their characters are alike.
Also Adam at WeLoveTTRPGs had some pretty good thoughts on Alignment that I enjoy: ruclips.net/video/6RXhczIGwh8/видео.html&ab_channel=WeLoveTTRPGs%21
Sounds close to a Fate aspect.
Back in 1E I told players to give me a good character first and worry about alignment about fourth or fifth thing on how you play. And the alignment chart devolved into what you stated lawful good occasionally chaotic.
Always and Never is a good idea. Especially if the class should have a code. And it up to player and DM to come with a code, and the penalties for not following it. Ex paladin’s war horse will not allow you to ride until you make amends for being naughty.
Question are you associated with brand role 4 initiative dry erase dungeon tiles.
I think the alignment in DND is okay. It is a cool idea. However it can be made better if it is more nuanced. It should also be seperated from class mechanics completely. Alignment works best for role playing only. It can apply to characters and factions. Classes, speacies and races shouldn't have one specific alignment. That leads to sterotyping way too much. That has unfortunate implications. The video gives a cool new spin to allignments. There are specific things a character would do and would avoid. That brings in a lot of nusnce, without becoming much more complicated.
I came up with other ways to add nuance. I like to call the lawful and chaotic pair the order and freedom pair respectivly. I think chaotic has too much of a negative connotation. It is better to call it freedom or liberty. I prefer to take out good and evil entirely. Instead I would like to replace it with conservative and liberal. That is so much more interesting and realistic. The whole good vs. evil thing is done to death. I would much prefer to divide characters in a way that resembles real world politics. There is nuance in different sides have different values. There is also plenty of conflict to make stories work. There are more ways to provide nuance. There can be soectrums instead of using two or three catagories for every pair of opposites. In more recent times, I figured that there can even be four spectrums. There is economics, government, society and warfare. Each can have an order side and freedom side. Order is about rules, authority and hierchy. Freedom is about liberty, equality and fewer rules. In economics, order has capitalism and distinct class structure. Freedom supports the worker class and reduces class differences. In government, order has the government be bigger, more nationalized, more authoritarian and have more laws. Freedom has the government be smaller, more localized, more democratic hand have fewer laws. In society, order is about having certain kinds of people at a higher rank than others. It is based on things like race, gender nationality and religion. This is also more nationalistic. Freedom has equality of different types. They are into political correctness and globalism. They also prefer a secular government. In warefare, order has more war and violence. There is gaining order through brute force and violent dominance. Freedom is mainly pacifist. It is also indo diplomamy and gun control. The differences between conservate and liberal can get complicated. There are also wierd cases where someone can be conservative in one thing and liberal in another. More nuance can be added with more spectrums. Conservatives are on the side of order for all four spectums, except government. Liberals are on the side of freedom. Maybe that is why the word liberal is similar to the word liberty. Liberal can be difficult to define, and that opeans up a can of worms. I think people count as liberals if they are innovative for thier time. I thought of the four spectrums recently. It make take more time to figure out the details of how that works. Maybe it can help guide character and faction development.
Towards the end of the video, there was a mention about chaotic characters being jerks. What the heck? I didn't know that was a thing in DND. Maybe it is a misunderstanding stemming from an unfortunate label. I am a free spirited person in real life. I don't like to clean and organize all the time. I also prefer freedom in all four spectrums. I never thought of chaotic as bad. It is a rather neutral thing since it is on an entirely separate axis from good and evil. I even find that freedom is more moral in a lot of situations than order. Order works best in small to moderate doses. There should just be some to prevent people from hurting each other. That is about it. Oftentimes there is too much order in one form or another. It prevents people from doing what they want for no good reason. This is tyrannical and wrong. I get the impression that too much order is actually selfish. People become hungry for power. Then they dominate people because it makes them feel good. That is really messed up. This can come across as barbaric at worst. In that case, those that advocate for freedom are more moral. They can even protest against an unjust authority, and that is justified as a moral action. There are trend that modern society gets more freedom over time. There are things like democracy, political correctness and the phasing out of capitalism. If someone wants to figure out how a chaotic good or chaotic neutral character would work, I recommend checking out real world liberals. I especially recommend the ones that focus on labor unions and small government.
I prefer "old school" and hate all the lawyers who grew out of them.
They already have this system in D&D 5e. It's called;
Bonds
Ideals
Flaws
Personality Traits
And yes. It is the best addition 5e has made to the game and is infinitely better than the terrible alignment system.
I don't use alignment. I instead use the color pie from magic the gathering. Much better system. It never stops gameplay because two idiots at the table have diametrically opposed, mutually exclusive, and equally wrong personal definitions for the words good, evil, and lawful.
It kind of sounds like you are a saying "anaNthema"...
I believe this is all just word salad. While in real life everyone has shades of gray, RPG's are games and need game mechanics to represent Law, Chaos, Good and Evil. Pathfinder 1e Gamemastery even has a Alignment Scale which you can use to more define these mechanics or reduce their effect [the aforementioned shades of gray areas]. This, to me, is the biggest problem with newer RPG's everything is gray or allowable. There should be consequences to your actions, and while you say edict and anathemas, you're just redressing the same issues in a different format. The standard alignment system is black and white because it needs to be, it's a game mechanic. Another important note is that in most campaigns, that I have witnessed or been a part of, DM's who allow players any alignment usually don't have much of a campaign for very long. Paladin's and Assassins don't mix for long. While it can be fun for 1 shots, not so much in campaigns.
Yeah, rather than stating what your morals are on your character sheet, maybe your character’s choices throughout the game should be what determines their morality.
Cypher System doesn’t have a morality stat. I like that system better.
Get out the political compass and watch the pcs turn on each other.
This is an absolutely trash take. Completely ignores actual evil. Ya know, the majority of fiendish creatures who derive physical pleasure from causing suffering to others. There's people and even players like this. Just because you cannot fathom true evil doesn't excuse ignoring it in favor of a reinvented political wheel.
I enjoy the content, but if I have to hear you say Anathema with an extra N one more time. I'm gonna lose it.
Just one of the things that comes with being a person with dyslexia. If I’ve read a word and rarely heard it spoken, I tend to accidentally add or subtract letters
I like the alignment system, but I think it's use lies in a descriptive manner.
I interpret the axis of Good VS Evil to me that of altruism, compassion, valuing dignity and kindness opposed to selfishness, greed and not valuing life. That's pretty close to the books
Meanwhile my interpretation of Law VS Chaos is a bit different. It's more about personal codes. I like comparing it to Fred's Model of the "it" , "ego" and "superego" , where "the it" is a force in your mind that strives for your own desires, the "superego" is the force of your moral code and understanding of consequences and the "ego" is the part that decides what to follow more.
That's how I see Lawful VS Chaotic. Lawful beings tend to listen more to the "superego" with their personal moral code being a bigger factor. If they believe stealing is wrong, they wouldn't steal even when they are starving. They would honor deals and promises they made.
More Chaotic inclined beings meanwhile focus more on their own desires and needs. Creatures of whim.
However, humans and humanlikes don't really follow that alignment completely. That's more for the beings that are literally embodiment of those traits, like those originating from other planes.
So it would be better to have an alignment Chart be gradual. A more refined chart would be a circle (because if you're 100% CG you're probably less Chaotic than a 100% CN) with Neutral in the middle and the others more as zones, like done in the Pathfinder 1e video games. And your position on that scale is more gradual. Though that may be too precise for a system that is meant to be more of a vague moral and ethical description of your character.
That all being said, Pathfinders edicts and anathemas and those general Always/Never statements are also great as tools for building character and moral code. I just wouldn't see that as a replacement.
I really like your use of Freud's Superego, Ego, and Id as analogies for Lawful, Neutral, and Chaotic!
Personally I *love* alignments! Of course they can be misunderstood and played incorrectly. But then doing so is as ignorant of roleplaying as punching everyone you meet in the face first thing 'because I'm a Fighter!'. I don't understand the aversion to alignment any more than I do the aversion to 'math' when said math is single-digit addition or subtraction.
Alignment does get interesting when you dig into it. The Good/Evil as Altruistic/Selfish is pretty common but then what about Evil as an actual Superpower-like force to support and Good its antithesis? And is Neutral philosophical Meh, or an active pursuit to maintain a balance? The use of the term Neutral as a midpoint for both axes leads to semantic confusion at times too. For me Alignment provides a palate of fractal color with which to paint characters, with new dimensions and distinctions arising upon each deeper, more refined glance. It's hard to think people would prefer to just call their neon light chartreusse lace bodice a simple green shirt, but them do them eh?
No matter what people claim their alignment is, people always play alignment based on themselves. I think I would start everyone as neutral and modify their alignment according to their actions.
I have actually had a different experience. My first group enjoyed playing characters that had very different morals than themselves. In game they would cold heartedly murder human shields and not even bat an eye if they were infants, while in real life they were really empathetic people who consider this kind of behavior an absolutely despicable war crime. I also wouldn't say that all those murder hobos would enjoy going around and killing people for the fun of it irl, if we didn't have laws against that.
But overall I think people do have a tendency to default to their own moral framework when it comes to roleplay. So far I agree with you. I have just seen some evidence that it's not always the case.
sounds good in addition to personality traits and the more planar interpretations of the alignments like being in hell so long you turn evil
Honestly I think ill be using both this and the standard alignment chart in my next campaign that I run, I can really see this helping with character creation and establishing some interesting places for the players to start roleplaying their characters from.
I threw out alignment when i was running D&D. It doesn't make sense to try and rigidly contain a character and how they act inside simplistic restrictive rules. I gave my players traits they can pick ( or make their own ) a really popular trait was fearless.
As for morality, that's subjective and the alignment system is antithetical to that. The only exception would be powers given to a PC through a deity/deity like source. Deities in my game are characters that can interact with PCs directly or indirectly and even speak to / meet in person etc. So displeasing one of these characters is the rule of law, since that is their domain.
* The only exception to that exception would be 5e paladins, since they get their powers from the universe or some thing.
Though i don't run or play D&D anymore, my jam is Carin. I love the Armour and HP system its more akin to dark souls and rogue like games. I love homebrew and Carin is much better suited for that than D&D, since D&D has so much baggage and its very difficult to get players new or old to read the rules both official and homebrew.
D&D is rules bloat hell!
Alignment is one of the "mechanics" that reliably turn me off from choosing DnD as a system. It lends itself perfectly to portraying cartoonish goody-two-shoes and mustache-twirling villains with personified golden mean fallacies in between and provides nuance-free judgment about a character's modus operandi without saying anything meaningful about the character's values that govern their actions. I mean, it doesn't necessarily have to, but that begs the question why it is even a thing people should care about when the information content is so ill-defined.
Just ignoring alignment is already an improvement, but even better is replacing it with something that actually conveys what alignment _should_ convey but doesn't. I use something quite similar to what you describe here and have players write down some priorities or moral principles of their character, so basically things they would always or never do. So, when they e.g. do something selfless I actually have an inkling if they are driven by their principles and what the principle is that made them do that specific thing or if they are just being compulsive people-pleasers.
I don't like the traditional 3x3 alignment grid. I much prefer your system.
At the best of times alignment can be contentions. And if a player and the GM disagree, it's a recipe for frustration.
Like consider the case of killing fleeing enemies. There's a solid case to be made that doing so is a war crime. Not everyone is going to agree. What happens if the DM and a player disagree? It could lead to a situation where either the DM forces an alignment shift on a player, or a situation where a player feels frustrated about how the world seems bend around itself to narritively justify their party members' bloodthirst. Neither of which is great.
I personally prefer something akin to Pendragon 5.2 where your character has a list of dual virtues they have to weigh themselves on.
Also Alignment is a lot easier to grok when you realize that Law-Chaos is how much your character will respect laws/traditions/order as a baseline and Good-Evil was historically just added to the game to represent Selflessness vs Selfishness and how those interact with the already existing Law-Chaos axis.
I was planning to object to this. My view of moral philosophy is that it is an argument over values rather than codes.
In my youth I made two commitments.
The first was intentional. I went to a christian school and was uncomfortable with their faith. My attitude towards Christianity has mellowed as I got older. You can do your nonsense, so long as we have values in common. I have codified this to myself as a commitment to go through my life with my eyes open.
The second was experimental. I decided to give up eating meat. I was uncertain before I made the change, but have been certain I had made the right choice ever since.
Indie RPGs have had this for over a decade. Burning Wheel and Shadows of Yesterday or Lady Blackbird, for instance.
Because it was where you stood on a cosmological scale, not what your morals and ethics were.
The better ethic and moral alignment system is in RIFTs.
the old allegiance system from D20 modern works much better
I love this! Great practical take on alignment.
reputation systems are often better
This system seems like a very good system I will probably bring up with my group. I must admit, I am a very sentimental person and have played since ‘84, so I do feel some loyalty towards the old system. But I like this and plan on implementing it regardless.
I get the sentimental aspect
I've always wanted to like D&D alignment, but their system is just too fuzzy and vague, while also feeling proscriptive. I love your always/never approach, and think it would really help new players to flesh out their characters' personality and ethical views.
Thanks! I feel like alignment can be confusing for new players and doesn’t give enough guidance to be helpful if your new to any of the aspects of roleplay
@@Roll4Initiative I actually like the original 3 alignment system; it can be a nice shorthand without causing confusion or arguments.
I never got past 2nd edition which was firmly based in alignment but apart from Clerics and their god's particular peccadilloes I wasn't overly strict about it. I did keep a rough track though and if someone who 'identified' as one of the good alignments started creeping it was called out. As I recall nobody wanted to risk losing that level for changing alignment. I do like the idea of basically making your own ethics though.
I've never played characters that strictly adhered to the alignment chart but have struggled with maintaining a character due to it. Maybe having simple but meaningful always/never statements like this will help.
You just said it "require a code of ethics"
In my world I just got rid of the alignment chart and replaced them with a series of gods who each just represent a small cluster of values.
My players still use the alignment chart.
I think your advice in this video will really help make these gods I made more interesting and more defined for my players! Thank you!