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My players HATED the new alignments. Mostly their arguments ran along the lines that they didn't create something new, they just chopped apart the old system and tossed half the parts--and switched around what was left into a new configuration.
Once I explained the ideas behind it and what the new system meant they were still surly...and wished if their idea was to do something new that the designers could have at least used different names to explain their ideas--lawful good was, after all lawful good, and saying that it meant something new now was pretty unsatisfying.
I agreed. So what we did was crack open the 3.0 PHB and convert the names of the alignments (more or less) back into the more colorful titles that book gives them. It really worked wonders.
Crusader
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Benefactor
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Unaligned
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Dominator
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Destroyer
Suddenly we weren't arguing definitions anymore. Now we were discussing the new alignment system on its own merits, with colorful names that really feel like what they mean (frankly I've always liked the more "in setting" feel of the titles rather than the more obviously metagamey sound of the axial names anyhow).
It was pretty great. The idea that a character holds an alignment until at some point they have to make a hard choice, they face a point of tension where they have to make the decision. Do I just do good to people that need it or do I actively take the fight to the enemy--even if that makes me a bit judgemental? Do I ultimately care enough about the world to still want worldly power and respect, or has my hate become so strong I just want to tear it all down? We took different characters from different games we've run, novels we've read, or shows we've watched and charted out the process of character development through these stages with each of them. It was a fun (and really long) talk.
I'm really starting to really like this new alignment model.
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Well, on reading the book and description of the alignments, it is pretty clear that "Evil" is really Lawful Evil and "Good" is really Chaotic Good. I personally was unimpressed with the alignment names but was fairly happy once I got it into context. What has acually disappeared is Neutral Evil, Neutral Good, Chaotic Neutral and Lawful Neutral. There's an element of loss of nuance, but I guess the new system is more streamlined and you can have the "lost" alignments as sub-examples of the existing new ones with little trouble. I just wish they had come up with more original names, like GC suggests above, rather than sticking with "Lawful Good" and so leaving the 3e players to wonder what the hell happened to Chaotic Good or Lawful Evil without having the read the books in detail.
Very clever, Grimcleaver. The new alignments seemed like the least inspired aspect of 4e but your "rebranding" gives it a whole new life. Kudos!
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Congrats, Grimcleaver. I can appreciate your efforts. Among the many things 4e is teaching some folks is that you're better off just being creative on your own! (To your point, it astounds me that professionals in this industry could not anticipate your players frustrations, and give some attention to the concept names in advance.)
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Congrats, Grimcleaver. I can appreciate your efforts. Among the many things 4e is teaching some folks is that you're better off just being creative on your own! (To your point, it astounds me that professionals in this industry could not anticipate your players frustrations, and give some attention to the concept names in advance.)
It was probably a toss-up between going with something new and sticking with something reasonably familiar for those from previous editions. I suspect they argued over it for hours and so we ended up with an unsatisfactory compromise.
Quite so - I would worry if there was no imaginative work left for me to do. Nice work, Grimcleaver - I might well use this!
I like this as well, and have now included it in my players handout for 4th edition.
Wow, Moorcock is really underappreciated.
History lession time :) When Moorcock came out with the concept of Law and Chaos all those years ago (from which Gygax) cribbed the D&D alighnment from, the initial presentation was that
Law was Good and Chaos was evil.
Later on, he wrote stories trying to show that Chaos wasn't inherently evil and neither was Law inherently good.
The problem is, IIRC, is that the opposite of an oppressive authoritan government is NOT anarchy but to change the laws whereas the opposite of anarchy WAS structure. Even Moorcock himself couldn't write decent storiss disproving his earlier point.
...
Actually the whole core of the Eternal Champion series by Moorcock is that the Balance must be served. Having the balance tip in favor of either Chaos or Law was not good. Moorcock wrote in The Dreamthief's Daughter about Gaynor the Damned, and how he had been an agent of Law .. of course the Law in this case was the Nazi party (Law brought to its more horrible iteration). Extremism is always portrayed in Moorcock's writings as the true evil, whether Law or Chaos.
Well done Grimcleaver. This is one of 4E's failings for me as well. Another poster here suggested another set of alternate names, only changing the two edges:
Exalted
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Good
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Unaligned
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Evil
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Diabolical
I suggested these to my group and several thought it would have been a better naming scheme ...
Cheers! :)
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I like the idea of titles for each alignment (this was used in Neverwinter Nights in a similar way). I was thinking the other day, in regards to differentiating the alignments, here is a scenario:
STORY TIME!
There is a burning office building in a downtown neighbourhood, inside are trapped more than fifty people. The fire department arrives and in desperation starts asking people on the street for help.
Lawful Good Citizen:
Neutral Good Citizen:
Chaotic Good Citizen:
Lawful Neutral Citizen:
Neutral Citizen:
Chaotic Neutral Citizen:
Lawful Evil Citizen:
Neutral Evil Citizen:
Chaotic Evil Citizen:
so far, from what i read, i like the alignment system.
i have always felt that the alignment system was put in as a way for gygax(may he rest in peace) to punish players for violating the system. i have never given the alignmnet system much creedance anyway.
good work with the renames. the alignment names have always been a little hokey.
Alignment has always been clunky as hell. The more you think about it the worse it gets, so I stopped thinking about it.
I honestly might just pare it down to good neither evil.
I think most people can get that, once i ram it down their throats that their opinions doesn't change the matter...
Logos
~<3's being a philosopher sometimes...
I had thought that was going to be the extent of 4E's alignment originally, and was sad it was not.
A much better solution than what we ended up receiving, IMO.
Cheers! :)
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I honestly might just pare it down to good neither evil.
I had thought that was going to be the extent of 4E's alignment originally, and was sad it was not.
Back in the days of 3e replacing 2e, it was said that half of the people complained that 'you changed *everything*!' and the other half complained that 'you didn't change *anything!*'
That's kind of how I feel about the 4e alignment shift. Either get rid of it, or keep it and make sure it's implemented into the rules solidlly (no more neutral Negative Energy plane, for instance, and yet evil negative energy spells).
Getting rid of *some* of it just feels half-done.
I like the idea of titles for each alignment (this was used in Neverwinter Nights in a similar way). I was thinking the other day, in regards to differentiating the alignments, here is a scenario:
STORY TIME!
There is a burning office building in a downtown neighbourhood, inside are trapped more than fifty people. The fire department arrives and in desperation starts asking people on the street for help.
Lawful Good Citizen: ** spoiler omitted **
Neutral Good Citizen: ** spoiler omitted **
Chaotic Good Citizen: ** spoiler omitted **
Lawful Neutral Citizen: [spoiler]"Yes sir, give me some equipment!...
Fun story. Thanks
Well the fun thing, I think, about the names I picked is that they are pulled straight out of the PHB. In the section on alignment they have a little blurb on what each alignment is about.
They're written: Lawful Good "Crusader" or Chaotic Evil "Destroyer".
But totally those names are ones that WotC came up with, not me. I just like how they fit a lot better, and are a lot more flavorful, but are basically what the PHB authors came up with to call the different alignments. I just lifted them. Granted I would have loved to use Malefactor instead of Dominator (the name for NE, rather than the LE) but having Benefactor and Malefactor was just too dry--and the only other option for Good was the CG one, Rebel--which is way too limiting. Not every Good person is gonna' be a Rebel. So I stuck with the NG "Benefactor" and the LE "Dominator".
So yeah. I can't take much credit for the names.
I do like the idea though of taking Exalted and Villain as possible renames too, since that likewise comes up with clever names drawn from existing lore (Book of Exalted Deeds/Vile Evil). I think that works fine too. I think one way or the other the idea is to come up with flavorful fun names that come from D&D lore, but pull away from the old axis names.
I will have to admit, I don't use alignment much when I game or DM. Grimcleaver and I actually have had discussions about this.
I always felt them to be to restrictive, I hate it when a player/DM sais "you can't do that, your Good." or "are you sure your evil character will do that." Disposition accounts for actions in general, but not in the moment. I consider myself to be a good person, but every so often, i still trip a child just for a laugh.
Alignments are used as tools for character creation. They are there to help define the character, no to put him in a box.
I like the idea of titles for each alignment (this was used in Neverwinter Nights in a similar way). I was thinking the other day, in regards to differentiating the alignments, here is a scenario:
STORY TIME!
There is a burning office building in a downtown neighbourhood, inside are trapped more than fifty people. The fire department arrives and in desperation starts asking people on the street for help.
Um....so what you are really saying is that Good people die, and Neutral people survive, and Evil people kill? That's the pattern I'm seeing here.
:)
I always felt them to be to restrictive, I hate it when a player/DM sais "you can't do that, your Good." or "are you sure your evil character will do that." Disposition accounts for actions in general, but not in the moment. I consider myself to be a good person, but every so often, i still trip a child just for a laugh.
This is just bad DMing, IMO. I use alignment, and it can be important in my games, but I never tell a player they can't do something or that their character wouldn't do it. I just keep track of what they do and their alignment may or may not shift somewhat over the course of a campaign.
The reason being, Humans, are inherently lawful creatures...
Brief threadjack: I disagree :)
I think people are inherently chaotic (or selfish -- though we can argue that equivalency). But people have also learned that a lawful society keeps them safe from others' selfish ways.
Somewhat back on-topic: The new alignment system is an improvement -- players could never stop arguing what law vs chaos meant (and a few argued good vs evil). But the names are uninformative bordering on stupid -- this thread has some good fixes :)
The reason being, Humans, are inherently lawful creatures...Brief threadjack: I disagree :)
I think people are inherently chaotic (or selfish -- though we can argue that equivalency). But people have also learned that a lawful society keeps them safe from others' selfish ways.
I will partiallydisagree with both statements.
I would argue that culture is inherentlylawful/chaotic, and the people in them absorb the values that the culture saturates them in.
but we digress. . . .
I always felt them to be to restrictive, I hate it when a player/DM sais "you can't do that, your Good." or "are you sure your evil character will do that." Disposition accounts for actions in general, but not in the moment. I consider myself to be a good person, but every so often, i still trip a child just for a laugh.
And interestingly 4th edition takes much more your point of view nowadays. The premise is that alignment takes effort. Most folks are just regular mostly good (or dumb jerk) folks, which are considered Unaligned. They try to do good, but periodically will trip a little kid and laugh about it. But eventually you come to a point where you have to choose. There's a line. Maybe it's a big conversion experience, or the dying words of your paladin mentor or whatever. You decide to live a stricter code and become Benevolent (aka Good). Then there's the even harsher road, where Good gets a little scary, where it's less just about helping people, but also about punishing the bad and putting swords in the evil people--where you become a Crusader.
But yeah, for most people, alignment is just not a discussion they ever even entertain. It's a field for the hardcore folks.