Goblin Squad Member
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I think it would be interesting if we did not start out with a pre selected alignment, but we all start out Neutral.
If you think that's interesting, then you should definitely do that.
For those of us who would prefer to start out Lawful Good, don't you think we should be able to do that? If not, why is it bad for us to do so?
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Goblin Squad Member
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. Second, we know that evil aligned characters will not be able to enter good aligned cities. I expect this to be not a complete blanket: rogues and bards can have disguises I understand..Are we sure about this? Honestly I've not seen where its been plainly stated that NPC guards will automatically detect alignment and attack based on alignment alone. I would be very interested in seeing an official word of this if its been discussed.
Personally I would rather the NPCs only respond to an action. But I plan on playing a rogue type character so that feeling isn't surprising :p
No, it is a fair illustration. But still: where is the problem?
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Goblin Squad Member
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I think it would be interesting if we did not start out with a pre selected alignment, but we all start out Neutral. Then over the course of a few tutorial or early quest lines we develope an alignment.
I agree.
Of course you could over ride what the result was, but only once
With this I disagree. The alignment should shift based on the pplayer character's in-game actions.
Frankly I would go, and have gone, farther to recommend that player characters should very gradually shift alignment just by being around other aligned characters. Paladins guarding a captured evil relic wrested from a dire Lich should feel uneasy or unclean and have to perform cleansing rituals and devotions to restore their sanctity. Being in a lawful good sanctuary should affect the evil thief lurking there.
But having made this recommendation again and recalling the outcry that resulted I'll just leave that there and look at you severely who disagree.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I think it would be interesting if we did not start out with a pre selected alignment, but we all start out Neutral.If you think that's interesting, then you should definitely do that.
For those of us who would prefer to start out Lawful Good, don't you think we should be able to do that? If not, why is it bad for us to do so?
I don't think it would be bad of you to so choose at all. I think it would make for a better game for everyone were they to earn their lawful goodness, their chaotic evilness, or their true neutrality.
Being a Paladin is supposed to be difficult. Remaining a Paladin should be similarly difficult. And behaving in a manner unfitting a Paladin should deny the powers, esteem, and privileges of being a Paladin.
A Paladin should be a shining exemplar of the Lawful and the Good. When the people see a Paladin they should know he is good and lawful, that he will keep his word or die trying. That they are safe so long as they are not evil. When the child approaches the Paladin that child should be inspired toward goodness himself. When the evil approach a paladin they should suffer in his holy aura.
It should not be an entitlement.
Goblinworks Executive Founder
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Heresy warning!
There's no reason the 'paladin' has to be LG. There can just as easily be a set of abilities themed for every character who is martially devoted to their god. They would, of course, be required to follow their god's alignment more so than other characters.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Heresy warning!
There's no reason the 'paladin' has to be LG. There can just as easily be a set of abilities themed for every character who is martially devoted to their god. They would, of course, be required to follow their god's alignment more so than other characters.
This point does not nullify Beings post...rather just broadens it.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I generaly think that the Alignment system is pretty pointless as people will simply GAME the system to get the alignment that they want to have anyway. There is really no way that you can make an automated system that can't be gamed. So how have you actualy gained anything more then just letting people choose want alignment they want to have.
Example: You have a character who wants to be Good. But they gank someone...clearly an Evil Act. Since they don't want to be "Evil", they go ahead and perform whatever act they know will shift them to "Good", the Alignment they want to be...whether that's killing 50 orcs...or making 50 offerings to Imodae or whatever. Then they can go out and "gank" someone again.
The only thing you've added to the game is a time-sink....or simply the people who can afford to time-sink/grind get to be whatever alignment they want....and everyone else is stuck with whatever logic (probably flawed) the automated system uses to adjudicate shifts. At it's worst case you have players that manipulate/game other players into unintentional alignment shifts that they have to grind/time-sink to get rid of....congrats, a new form of griefing is introduced.
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@Grumpymel
They can think they are gaming the system all they want, but if they have to give to charity to maintain good alignment, but want to be theives, they still have to give more to charity then they ever steal. (Charity and steal being metaphors for good and bad things.)
Thus they might do bad things sometimes but they still have to do lots more good to keep good alignment.
@Nihimon
With the execption of the Anti-paladin, the other Paladins are still called Paladins, just with a suffix, I.E. Paladin of Tyranny (LE), Paladin of Freedom (CG), etc.
Although those paladins are not god centered, but ideal centered. God centered warriors sound more like clerics to me.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I generaly think that the Alignment system is pretty pointless as people will simply GAME the system to get the alignment that they want to have anyway. There is really no way that you can make an automated system that can't be gamed. So how have you actualy gained anything more then just letting people choose want alignment they want to have.
Example: You have a character who wants to be Good. But they gank someone...clearly an Evil Act. Since they don't want to be "Evil", they go ahead and perform whatever act they know will shift them to "Good", the Alignment they want to be...whether that's killing 50 orcs...or making 50 offerings to Imodae or whatever. Then they can go out and "gank" someone again.
The only thing you've added to the game is a time-sink....or simply the people who can afford to time-sink/grind get to be whatever alignment they want....and everyone else is stuck with whatever logic (probably flawed) the automated system uses to adjudicate shifts. At it's worst case you have players that manipulate/game other players into unintentional alignment shifts that they have to grind/time-sink to get rid of....congrats, a new form of griefing is introduced.
The crucial difference in your example is that the character you mention can't go and repeatedly gank people without consequence. The grind or time sink to continually adjust their alignment to where they want it is a deterrent to ganking. The time investment necessary in this scenario encourages the person to play an alignment that matches their play style. It does not make it impossible to have a character who is good who occasionally murders innocent people, but nobody ever said the alignment system would do that.
I think there are a lot of possibilities that exist in the space between "perfect" and "pretty pointless" (to use your words), and I am fine with a system that fits in there somewhere reasonable.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Heresy warning!
There's no reason the 'paladin' has to be LG. There can just as easily be a set of abilities themed for every character who is martially devoted to their god. They would, of course, be required to follow their god's alignment more so than other characters.
I wouldn't mind Antipaladins, or even the LE/CG variants.
However, just militant warriors of their religion can be done if you just focus on a militant cleric, or cleric/fighter. I've certainly done it myself, and in a free form system it couldn't be too hard.|
Goblin Squad Member
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I generaly think that the Alignment system is pretty pointless as people will simply GAME the system to get the alignment that they want to have anyway. There is really no way that you can make an automated system that can't be gamed. So how have you actualy gained anything more then just letting people choose want alignment they want to have.
Example: You have a character who wants to be Good. But they gank someone...clearly an Evil Act. Since they don't want to be "Evil", they go ahead and perform whatever act they know will shift them to "Good", the Alignment they want to be...whether that's killing 50 orcs...or making 50 offerings to Imodae or whatever. Then they can go out and "gank" someone again.
The only thing you've added to the game is a time-sink....or simply the people who can afford to time-sink/grind get to be whatever alignment they want....and everyone else is stuck with whatever logic (probably flawed) the automated system uses to adjudicate shifts. At it's worst case you have players that manipulate/game other players into unintentional alignment shifts that they have to grind/time-sink to get rid of....congrats, a new form of griefing is introduced.
...and why? Because the cards have been stacked against the evil alignment. It is very advantageous now to be nominally Lawful Good because of all the perks, and all the negatives that accrue to players roleplaying Evil. Because of this imbalance being demanded, the ranks of the good will be filled with people whose only motive is power and advantage. The worst people in the game will be found in the Sanctuary of the Paladins, and all because we imbalanced the benefits into an artificial skin that looks like goodness.
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Goblin Squad Member
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This point does not nullify Beings post...rather just broadens it.Heresy warning!
There's no reason the 'paladin' has to be LG. There can just as easily be a set of abilities themed for every character who is martially devoted to their god. They would, of course, be required to follow their god's alignment more so than other characters.
An interesting idea . Perhaps the alignment would dictate whether you had access to Paladin, Anti-Paladin, or somewhere in between archetype skills.
From what I have read that would be more than what GW wants to institute by early enrollment. Seems viable though.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I would propose something different. Remove all the artifice that renders it unfairly difficult to honestly role play an evil character so you can have villians worthy of that name and it will elevate your heroes to the stature of heroes.
Instead increase the murderer's aggro radius significantly versus NPCs, wild animals, and monsters. The criminal flag also removes the possibiity of fast travel. The criminals will be terminated by the game itself removing the elements of vengeance and vendetta. Give the criminal an additional modifier that turns timid animals rabid towards them.
The criminal will have nowhere to turn but the wild, and there they will be torn to shreds by rabbits as well as every predator, every orc, troll, giant, and dragon in their new and vastly 'improved' aggro radius.
Then, once they die, they respawn with a clean slate... until they repeat their folly. When they do the same pattern repeats: they are torn apart by the wild animals they have chosen to emulate.
Eventually they may figure out that murder is neither profitable nor fun, or if they enjoy it then nobody else has to be consumed by violent emotions like vengeance and hatred.
Those emotions are unhealthy for people.
The bounty system is probably a good mechanism, but not for revenge. The escrow system for posting a bounty will be needed for contracts as well. The reputation system is a sound pro-business investment.
But don't drive every real criminal into the ranks of the Lawful Good by giving that alignment more advantages than just improved industry/trade.
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Goblin Squad Member
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What if PO just...doesn't have alignments?
They're already not constraining characters to classes. Why constrain us to the definitions of a location on an alignment chart?
People don't walk around in real life wearing a sign with their alignment or intentions printed on it, how would you know in a game either? Until you witness them doing acts of questionable integrity....
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Goblin Squad Member
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Paladin = Defender of a particular cause. That cause being a deity of any alignment. Thus, paladins of all colours.
For those saying that an alignment or reputation system would be useless, as people would game it or bypass it in some manner, think of this. A bank has fraud detection mechanics and capabilities which stops a heap of fraud...but there are still bad guys that willingly bypass these systems. Having fraud detection capabilities is still a good thing though...as is having an alignment/reputation system.
Well GW has stated that PFO will have an alignment system and it won't be just a fluff name on your character screen. It'll be hard as hel to get it to work IMO, but talking about doing away with the alignment system won't change the fact that it will be included with the game.
We can however try to come up with effective ways the game can recognize character actions and assign alignment shift to those actions. Will it stop people from gaming the system? No, but it'll help the Devs make a better game.
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Goblin Squad Member
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One thing I would rather like to see about alignment is the "slippery slope effect" much like you have seen in KotOR and other Star Wars games. Take on a quest with multiple endings and how you complete it gives you advancement either on the chaos/law axis and/or the good/evil axis.
Say your quest is to stop a band of goblins raid a town. You go in and kill a few and the chief surrenders. If you kill him you get evil points, if you accept his surrender you get chaos points.
Then you add to it the social aspect. If you are hard core Good and in an Evil town, merchants will jack up prices and NPC won't offer quests or decent ones where as in a Good settlement they will give you a small break and be more inclined to offer you work.
Being Neutral would be tricky... it would mean balancing Good and Evil with Law and Chaos on a very fine line.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Being neutral, in my estimation, isn't terribly tricky, really, and it isn't like juggling evil with good and law and chaos. It is nurturing life, promoting nature, and striving to help the four powers folks align with to find their natural harmony.
But we create our own quests here, or make them for one another. One of the more interesting tasks the developer is doing, I believe, is making for us the tools we will need to do so.
One thing I would rather like to see about alignment is the "slippery slope effect" much like you have seen in KotOR and other Star Wars games. Take on a quest with multiple endings and how you complete it gives you advancement either on the chaos/law axis and/or the good/evil axis.
Say your quest is to stop a band of goblins raid a town. You go in and kill a few and the chief surrenders. If you kill him you get evil points, if you accept his surrender you get chaos points.
Then you add to it the social aspect. If you are hard core Good and in an Evil town, merchants will jack up prices and NPC won't offer quests or decent ones where as in a Good settlement they will give you a small break and be more inclined to offer you work.
Being Neutral would be tricky... it would mean balancing Good and Evil with Law and Chaos on a very fine line.
Mark actually talked about this during his interview on Fear the Boot. So apparently they intend on allowing us to interact in different ways with mobs, not just kill every one we come across. Of course a CG group wouldn't ally with Orcs, but a NE group might. I think things like this will really set this game apart from other MMOs, plus it'll make for excellent opportunities to shift the alignment around.
Sounds encyclopedic, Val. As in comprehensive. If you are intent on doing this recommend chunking it into manageably broad categories and break it down as necessary.
Yes, I agree. It won't be simple nor quick.
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Why wouldn't good guys deal with orcs? If some measure of peaceable trade was possible, even if tenuous, wouldn't good guys go for it?
As for neutrality, in reality 90% or more of people are neutral, the extremes are just that, extremes, people are no more inherently good then they are evil, whatever they would like to believe of themselves. Therefore, neutrality shouldn't even come close to being a fine line, though I do think the PnP sees the extreme alignments as more common then reality, so that may be passed into PFO.
Why wouldn't good guys deal with orcs? If some measure of peaceable trade was possible, even if tenuous, wouldn't good guys go for it?
I assumed the difference in alignment would make the Orcs "shoot first and ask questions later".
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You assumed there would be a difference of alignment as well.
I am firmly in two camps,
A, that because someone is your enemy doesn't make them evil or even bad,
B, that "monsters" are in general not inherently evil (with the possible exceptions of devils, angels, and other "aligned" outsiders, though only possible on those) and that often times are enemies with the "civilized" races for the same reasons the Americans and the Native Americans didn't get along, vastly different views on too many basic concepts. I.E. Land ownership vs land belongs to no one, warrior culture vs merchantile culture, etc
You assumed there would be a difference of alignment as well.
I am firmly in two camps,
A, that because someone is your enemy doesn't make them evil or even bad,
B, that "monsters" are in general not inherently evil (with the possible exceptions of devils, angels, and other "aligned" outsiders, though only possible on those) and that often times are enemies with the "civilized" races for the same reasons the Americans and the Native Americans didn't get along, vastly different views on too many basic concepts. I.E. Land ownership vs land belongs to no one, warrior culture vs merchantile culture, etc
Ah, I see now. Having never played PFTT I was going by the typical alignment of Orcs from D&D, which is CE (at least it was in 2ed edition). Pathfinder however leaves their alignment open apparently. So your correct, the CG group could parley with the Orcs.
Orcs have deities that are evil and promote such in their followers. Would that put them beyond redemption in the eyes of a LG Paladin or other 'good' character? Would it thus be evil to trad e or interact with them?
Good question. One I'm not sure of the answer to. It would certainly effect the parties alignment in some way though.
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Goblin Squad Member
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...and why? Because the cards have been stacked against the evil alignment. It is very advantageous now to be nominally Lawful Good because of all the perks, and all the negatives that accrue to players roleplaying Evil. Because of this imbalance being demanded, the ranks of the good will be filled with people whose only motive is power and advantage. The worst people in the game will be found in the Sanctuary of the Paladins, and all because we imbalanced the benefits into an artificial skin that looks like goodness.I generaly think that the Alignment system is pretty pointless as people will simply GAME the system to get the alignment that they want to have anyway. There is really no way that you can make an automated system that can't be gamed. So how have you actualy gained anything more then just letting people choose want alignment they want to have.
Example: You have a character who wants to be Good. But they gank someone...clearly an Evil Act. Since they don't want to be "Evil", they go ahead and perform whatever act they know will shift them to "Good", the Alignment they want to be...whether that's killing 50 orcs...or making 50 offerings to Imodae or whatever. Then they can go out and "gank" someone again.
The only thing you've added to the game is a time-sink....or simply the people who can afford to time-sink/grind get to be whatever alignment they want....and everyone else is stuck with whatever logic (probably flawed) the automated system uses to adjudicate shifts. At it's worst case you have players that manipulate/game other players into unintentional alignment shifts that they have to grind/time-sink to get rid of....congrats, a new form of griefing is introduced.
I wholeheartedly agree with this. Using Alignment as a method to punish specific behaviors that detract from the play experience is a poor design decision, IMO. One can simply punish those behaviors directly and avoid the complications of punishing individuals who want to role-play a specific alignment but don't engage in such behaviors.
For example, if you want to deter excess RPK, simply punish RPK. That way people who just want to role-play "CE" but don't harm others play experience by engaging in excess RPK don't get punished as well.
As it is, mechanicaly you'll end up with "LG" griefers who simply utilize methods that the game mechanics don't account for in order to grief. You'll end up with characters who are "CE" and actualy ADD to the enjoyment of people playing the game by creating fun antagonists being mechanicaly punished for doing so....thus less FUN "villians" around to play with. You'll end up with lots of alignment shifts that simply make no intuitive sense because the automated systems simply aren't sophisticated to enough to handle those situations in an accurate fashion.....and everyone will just end up mechanicaly grinding to get whatever alignment they want anyway.
I also think Ryan has made one key mistake at a high-level....that "griefers" somehow make fun game content to beat up on. If that assumption were true then it might make some sense to make the "griefers" the "bad guys" and provide them with a mechanical disadvantage in play so the "good guys" can have fun beating up on them. However for most people that simply (IMO) is NOT the case. A "greifer" is no fun to be around, PERIOD...whether you are beating up on them or getting beaten up by them. Furthermore, smart "griefers" will simply find ways to "greif" in which they don't suffer the mechanical disadvantage.
As a player who is planning on playing a LG character what I really want as antagonists is nice, fun, respectfull players who just happen to want to ROLE-PLAY Evil characters....that way we can all have fun playing against each other in a game.... not trying to annoy each other in RL.
I'd much rather a "griefer" simply be booted from the game then act as some sort of content for me to defeat.
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Goblin Squad Member
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You assumed there would be a difference of alignment as well.
I am firmly in two camps,
A, that because someone is your enemy doesn't make them evil or even bad,
B, that "monsters" are in general not inherently evil (with the possible exceptions of devils, angels, and other "aligned" outsiders, though only possible on those) and that often times are enemies with the "civilized" races for the same reasons the Americans and the Native Americans didn't get along, vastly different views on too many basic concepts. I.E. Land ownership vs land belongs to no one, warrior culture vs merchantile culture, etc
In regards (B) it depends upon the cosmological model that Pathfinder or the particular campaign were using for the monster. For example, if it were the Tolkien universe, orcs would not just be "uncivilized" but they would be truely "Evil"...or more accurately tainted by the "Shadow"...it's an inherint part of thier make-up, part of thier DNA that renders them incapable of acting in anything other then a thoroughly "Evil" fashion. They are quite litteraly compelled to act in a certain manner. If it's more the Warcraft universe, yeah then orcs are not neccesarly "evil", they are just "different/alien".
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I don't think alignment is intended to punish anyone, but rather to promote a consistancy between a player's actions and their desired alignment.
Many of you have said that they will just game the system, but I think you misunderstand how it all works. The only way to get a good alignment is to do good things all the time. So doing good things all the time just so you can do the periodic bad thing, isn't really gaming the system. Gaming the system would be finding a way to have good alignment without actually doing anything good, and if they design it right, that won't be possible.
I also don't think itt is punishing to really have evil as an alignment, not anymore then reality anyway, if you want to be evil certain things come with that, you can't be open about being evil in the middle of town because every paladin in sight will swoop down to kill you, there is nothing wrong with making the NPCs do the same. If you want to play evil then you get to play the whole evil shebang, including the need to live in the shadows and disguise yourself out in public. These are part of being evil.
Those who want alignment to be nothing and do nothing, fail to grasp that, meaningless alignment just equates to players being evil while being treated like good, which isn't right in any sense of the word.
I do agree that it will not be easy to pull off correctly, but I certainly see nothing wrong in attempting it. You just need to grasp the true consequences and not just the superficially obvious ones (which are not always correct)
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Goblin Squad Member
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-SNIP-
The only way to get a good alignment is to do good things all the time. So doing good things all the time just so you can do the periodic bad thing, isn't really gaming the system.
-SNIP-
I don't agree with this particular statement. The LG Paladin doesn't periodicaly burn down the orphanage. The CG Ranger doesn't periodically sell a few peasants into slavery. These things are anathema to them. However if there is some tangible in-game benefit to doing it surely some gamers will try to do those things, even if they are good aligned. If the system is so ill-devised that it allows them to do so then it's broken.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I don't agree with this particular statement. The LG Paladin doesn't periodicaly burn down the orphanage. The CG Ranger doesn't periodically sell a few peasants into slavery. These things are anathema to them. However if there is some tangible in-game benefit to doing it surely some gamers will try to do those things, even if they are good aligned. If the system is so ill-devised that it allows them to do so then it's broken.-SNIP-
The only way to get a good alignment is to do good things all the time. So doing good things all the time just so you can do the periodic bad thing, isn't really gaming the system.
-SNIP-
Does that mean, in your constellation of values, that it is not worthy of the effort to try?
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Goblin Squad Member
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Does that mean, in your constellation of values, that it is not worthy of the effort to try?I don't agree with this particular statement. The LG Paladin doesn't periodicaly burn down the orphanage. The CG Ranger doesn't periodically sell a few peasants into slavery. These things are anathema to them. However if there is some tangible in-game benefit to doing it surely some gamers will try to do those things, even if they are good aligned. If the system is so ill-devised that it allows them to do so then it's broken.-SNIP-
The only way to get a good alignment is to do good things all the time. So doing good things all the time just so you can do the periodic bad thing, isn't really gaming the system.
-SNIP-
Oh no, I would love to see a beautifully working alignment system. I just see what a tremendous effort it will be as possibly one of the most important systems in the game. Designing it will be fraught with pitfalls but I do want them to try.
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I don't agree with this particular statement. The LG Paladin doesn't periodicaly burn down the orphanage. The CG Ranger doesn't periodically sell a few peasants into slavery. These things are anathema to them. However if there is some tangible in-game benefit to doing it surely some gamers will try to do those things, even if they are good aligned. If the system is so ill-devised that it allows them to do so then it's broken.-SNIP-
The only way to get a good alignment is to do good things all the time. So doing good things all the time just so you can do the periodic bad thing, isn't really gaming the system.
-SNIP-
This is why I came up with my Codes of Conduct idea, codes of conduct isn't really enough to handle complete alignment, but it does prevent Paladins from burning down random orphanages.
I do see something with people who randomly do periodic bad things, however, it should be made that evil and chaotic actions have a heavier weight to them that someone wanting to stay good aligned can very rarely actually do those bad things. So it isn't really gaming the system, because the system gives the imppression that an hour or two fixes all your alignment problems, and I highly doubt anyone here or at Goblinworks is foolish enough to implement a system with such quick turnaround.
The system isn't there to prevent players from taking actions, it's there to simply provide consequences for doing so.
I'm sure you consider yourself as something other then evil, yet you have the capacity to burn down orphanages, but do you do burn them down? If you don't, it's because you want to avoid the consequences, either the consequence of dead kids or the loss of the time taken to do it or the consequence of having people catch you and kill you for it, either way, consequences are the only thing that stand between you and any action.
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At risk of going over something that was already discussed, I read through 3 pages before giving up on reading the rest as there's a lot to read.
Someone brought up the question of, would a Necromancer that casts evil spells be considered evil?
The example given questioned WHY he was summoning the undead. If a necromancer uses evil spells to protect and do good, why is he taking the hit to Evil? In the universe this makes sense, the source of necromancy is indeed Evil as stated, but limiting characters in such a way is actually a pretty foreign concept in videogames and especially the successful MMOs currently on the market. You see this in WoW constantly for instance, allowing players to play with more mechanics is more interesting than tethering these mechanics to a certain style of play, which is why they started to give more classes and specs abilities that were once exclusive to their counterparts.
The question then fairly goes on to what would work mechanically? This IS a computer based videogame, measurements are needed if the system is going to be automated. Well, I'd suggest, as heavy-handed and blunt it may be, to allow an in-game mechanic that a player chooses which represents their ethical reasons. Perhaps a character can choose to carry a holy symbol on their outer appearance, their choice of deity would be a clear indication of their intentions and reasons for acting in certain ways. (I recognize the major problem with this, I'll hopefully be able to address this in a moment)
Or, let's be a little more mortal about it, a character could pledge themselves to an in-game association or belief system. These associations don't necessarily need to be present and powerful and reflect in game, but similar to how Cavaliers have orders, a character can pledge themselves to an association which strives to do good despite their methods.
What would this ultimately do? My idea would be that these systems buffer the smaller alignment changes (such as small deeds or some evil/good spells) and reduce the effect they have on a character's real alignment. A character that pledges themselves to Good, yet casts necromantic spells, will still take steps to becoming evil, but with moderation he can slow or cease the progress while still playing as a necromancer.
Now, this does basically spit in the face of how alignment is measured even when not seen, the divine audience. Obviously a Good deity will note that using evil magic is not Good. Not going to sugar coat it, this will require quite a bit of lore-bending or lore creation to get around, or at least it will if you're going to bring the gods into it at all. Lore-bending and retcons are bad, especially if you're trying to make a world immersive and last I checked that's the goal of a sandbox MMO driven by players. But since we've already tweaked how death works, as all players are marked by Pharasma you could create reasons for why intentions are more important than the opinion of the divine audience.
Now, I would like to talk about this more, bring up other examples and the like, but I'm rambling as it is. So the:
TLDR: Evil/Good Traits and actions COULD be negated by player intention as shown through their choice of in-game mechanics, such as declaring why they are doing something by wearing a certain item or pledging to a group that holds a set of rules and restrictions upon them. Alternatively, as PFO characters are already abnormal from normal characters in Golarion, lore could be expanded upon that allows them to change their allignment based on their intentions and choices rather than their means and methods such as Evil/Good magic.
I'll be back to tweak this and read responses as I'd gladly read any, but I have to wake up so bright and early it isn't bright, just early.
I would love to see something like the following:
At character creation, you select your characters' starting alignment, either arbitrarily as a player, or through a sorting quiz, or perhaps even "starter quests." Each alignment is represented by two measurements, reliability (law vs chaos) and morality (good vs evil). Neutrality on both scales would be considered a balance of both, measured somewhere in the middle. Some races (evil/good outsiders, undead, etc) or classes (paladin, assassin, etc) may provide an additional bonus or penalty to one or both of the scores, providing base alignment scores that become a stat, just like strength or charisma. These scores can be temporarily adjusted by a number of events, including hostile spells or personal actions (see below). After resting (read as: every 24 hours, or reset like spells), a characters' alignment "normalizes" by a set number of points back towards the characters' base alignment score. If a character's alignment shifts away from its base alignment significantly enough to warrant an alignment change more than 3(?) times in a month or remains for 3(?) days straight, alignment normalization ceases and the character gains the Soul Searching debuff for 7 days . At the end of the duration, normalization resumes with the current alignment scores being reassigned as the character's base alignment.
Actions that may impact alignment: breaking contracts (chaotic), unprovoked murder (evil), maintaining good guild standings (law), destroy undead (good). Some personal actions may be intentionally elicited by game mechanics. In example, a band of goblins are attacking rural settlements and you have accepted a contract to destroy the band. When you attack them, they surrender and throw themselves upon your mercy. You are faced with two obvious choices: if you kill them, you move towards evil on the moral scale, but if you spare them, your failure to complete your contract moves you towards chaos on the reliability scale. Or, perhaps, when you attack them, they surrender, claiming to be persecuted by the local settlers, only defending land that is being encroached upon. If you ignore their pleas and complete your contract, you move towards evil on the moral scale. If you take their case back to the settlers in an attempt to broker peace, you move towards neutrality on both scales. If you go back and attack the settlers, you move towards evil AND chaos. Et cetera.
Alignment normalization may effect certain races or classes differently than others. For instance, to reflect the stringent requirements of the paladin order, once you earn your first paladin award/achievement(/thing), you may normalize more slowly, therefore needing to control your actions more carefully than others.
This blends the idea of earning your alignment, which I think is a great mechanic, and setting your alignment, which I think makes the game a little more accessible for people. It also allows people to change their alignments fairly quickly and easily (10 days) if they want to change and grow as characters. Thoughts?
Edit: I want to clarify that the "alignment stats" would be a hidden stat, not known to other players--or, perhaps, even to the player themselves. Players could see their own alignments (LG, LN, LE, NG, etc.), but perhaps not their alignment score/stat, and other characters can only see your alignment with the use of appropriate magic or abilities. This is meant to be a guide, not a hard rule, so I don't think advertising the stats would be helpful, personally.
I would love to see something like the following:
At character creation, you select your characters' starting alignment, either arbitrarily as a player, or through a sorting quiz, or perhaps even "starter quests." Each alignment is represented by two measurements, reliability (law vs chaos) and morality (good vs evil). Neutrality on both scales would be considered a balance of both, measured somewhere in the middle. Some races (evil/good outsiders, undead, etc) or classes (paladin, assassin, etc) may provide an additional bonus or penalty to one or both of the scores, providing base alignment scores that become a stat, just like strength or charisma. These scores can be temporarily adjusted by a number of events, including hostile spells or personal actions (see below). After resting (read as: every 24 hours, or reset like spells), a characters' alignment "normalizes" by a set number of points back towards the characters' base alignment score. If a character's alignment shifts away from its base alignment significantly enough to warrant an alignment change more than 3(?) times in a month or remains for 3(?) days straight, alignment normalization ceases and the character gains the Soul Searching debuff for 7 days . At the end of the duration, normalization resumes with the current alignment scores being reassigned as the character's base alignment.
Actions that may impact alignment: breaking contracts (chaotic), unprovoked murder (evil), maintaining good guild standings (law), destroy undead (good). Some personal actions may be intentionally elicited by game mechanics. In example, a band of goblins are attacking rural settlements and you have accepted a contract to destroy the band. When you attack them, they surrender and throw themselves upon your mercy. You are faced with two obvious choices: if you kill them, you move towards evil on the moral scale, but if you spare them, your failure to complete your contract moves you towards chaos on the reliability scale. Or, perhaps, when you attack...
An interesting concept. It seems viable. It's actually similar to something I proposed a while back, I see no real problems with it except in the case of alignment restricted roles like a Paladin or Monk. If for whatever reason their alignment were to slip and they lost their abilities, many would not want to wait for days and days before getting their abilities back. Other then that though I like the concept.
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I have never heard of evil spells making someone evil, and undead are not always seen as evil either, usually it is considered a desecration of the body, which is disrepectful but if done to those willing to have their remains used in such a manner, or used on criminals, such issues could easily be gotten around alignment wise, or even on a cultural basis if you belong to a culture that beleives the body houses a spirit but once the spirit is gone the body is worthless, an unusual culture perhaps, but it would be a culture tthat wouldn't consider undead evil. Many other possibilties exist for non-evil undead.
Issues like this arise, I believe, from the fact that the world is built on old and set as stone traditional concepts, but the players have experienced stories and games that have not only called such traditional concepts into question but sometimes turn them on their head. Dragon On A Pedestal, for example is a book where zombies are a fact of life and are no more evil then anybody else, and they even look better the more they are loved, how can anyone read that story and ever again be used to the idea that all undead are evil?
So frankly, one has to ask, how will this game fare if it rigidly sticks to old traditional concepts with no room for more modern expectations? Even wow players have dealt with good guy undead, we want such players to have fun here too, don't we?
So yeah, PF has a lot of lore, but how much of it is absolute on these concepts? We should be allowed to explore these morally grey concepts, clerics of Pharesma trying to destroy a town of good aligned undead, the paladins thrown in question because they can't smite the undead but they can't allow the undead to remain. The moral issues are wonderful material to explore, and we should be allowed to explore them.
My suggestion is that aligned spells don't effect the alignment of the caster but show up as that alignment on detect spells, so a paladin would realize that the caster over there is casting evil spells, etc. Perhaps opposite aligned spells are cast at a reduced caster level and/or interact with holy/unholy ground in special ways, etc. Maybe the caster glows with the spells alignment for a short time regardless of their actual alignment, and thus may be attacked by paladins or guards with detect alignment just after having cast an evil spell, etc
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@Nikita
You have an interesting system, and a good option, though it's not my cup of tea. It sounds terribly complicated compared to some other systems presented though, and with only minor gains over them. Also your system isn't a comprimise with setting one's alignment, which the initial setting can be added to any system I've read so far, very easily. Actions that effect alignment isn't part of your system either, and so far not much debate has come up about the action list which is a seperate system anyway.
The only difference with your system is that alignment change fades unless it is extreme or lasts a while, which this difference wouldn't even be noticed on the player end as being different from other systems.
Heck my system does almost the exact same thing, with the exception that it becomes increasingly more difficult to change alignment vs your idea that keeps it about the same difficulty to change alignment (I personally see the ever increasing cost to change as a good thing to help prevent gaming the alignment but not everyone seems to agree) and my system takes 2 or 3 really small functions and 4 variables, yours would take many functions (at least 5 and not so small either) to implement.
If people want to set the initial alignment, that's fine and can easily be worked into just about any alignment system, however there isn't much ability to comprimise between any automatic alignment system and people who don't want their alignment to ever change, so we need to know if the latter group is a significant portion of the target group, if not then just implement a simple system, and possibly allow an initial setting to alignment to be chosen.
The only real part that can't be simplified is the part that no one has argued yet, and that's the list actions that affect alignment, and that part will be the same regardless of which alignment system is chosen.
It really comes down to, we need to settle on the desire outcomes of the alignment system.
Do we want alignment to become increasingly difficult to change? Do we want alignment to be quick to change, or so hard that it takes weeks? Somewhere in between? Do we want the alignment shift to take less time for someone trying to shift back to a recently held alignment when they didn't intend to shift alignment? Oh, and what percentage of people do we want to have extreme alignments vs neutral alignment?
We need to agree on these first before we can really work on figuring out how simple or complicated a system we need.
Personally, I vote for a system that makes it increasingly difficult to change alignment, isn't quick to change but isn't a month long process either, and for someone shifting back to a recently held alignment to take less time. And about 30% of players to be non-neutral.
Of course, these are all factors I keep in mind, though if someone has other factors to consider, post them.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@DLH
I see a few problems with the system as I currently understand it...
- They seem to be conflating the alignment system with anti-griefing measures by making certain griefing actions "evil" and then placing real mechanical disadvantages upon "evil" characters. That's problematic, IMO, because we actualy WANT "evil" characters in the game so we can have a of natural conflict between "Evil" and "Good" PC's....antagonists and protagonists.... whereas we don't really want griefers in the game as much as we can avoid.
Therefore we want to deter griefing to the extent we can by mechanicaly punishing said behavior but we DON'T want to mechanicaly punish "Evil" (else there are not quality antagonists) simply give it a DIFFERENT set of advantages and disadvantages then good... therefore people will play "Evil" characters and create "Evil" companies and settlements to keep the game world interesting.
- I frankly doubt they are going to be able to build an automated system that with any real accuracy and intuitiveness adjucate Good/Evil/Law/Chaos well. If this were a Themepark game which imposed a limited set of options for player behavior/choice...then yeah, I could see it doable to come up with said system...but with the openness of choice and actions in a sandbox game, I think there will just be too many variables for such a system to handle. I suspect we are going to have "Good" aligned players doing very, very evil things that they don't get shifted evil for simply because the system doesn't know how to account for it.....even worse I suspect that we will get "Good" players shifted "Evil" or "Evil" players shifted "Good" with rather surprising frequency because the automated system isn't able to accurately interpret the actions that shift them in the intuitive context that it occurs.
- For players to actualy ENJOY playing the game (it is supposed to be fun afterall)....they are going to have to have SOME method of getting thier characters back to whatever they want/percieve thier characters to be in terms of Alignment....which ends up just being a timesink/grind/punishment for players who actualy care about the Alignment system....while those that don't care will just accept whatever the system arbitrary assigns them and merrily continue on thier way.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@GrumpyMel
I agree with your points, they are the same problems I am imagining. I think they are going to get into designing the alignment system and go "Whoa this is WAY harder than we thought it would be!" Then it will be scaled down for time-sake and end up being simplistic and horrible.
I want a dynamic, sophisticated alignment system more than anything but I have serious doubts.
Too gloomy?
@GrumpyMel
I agree with your points, they are the same problems I am imagining. I think they are going to get into designing the alignment system and go "Whoa this is WAY harder than we thought it would be!" Then it will be scaled down for time-sake and end up being simplistic and horrible.
I want a dynamic, sophisticated alignment system more than anything but I have serious doubts.
Too gloomy?
That seems to be the trend that most MMOs slip into. I figure it's the backers pressing for release that makes a lot of games release features totally different then they intended initially. Lisa mentioned this in her blog and said she doesn't like to release unfinished projects even if it pushes them past their deadlines. This gave me a lot of hope for PFO. Plus many of the Devs working on this project have been in the business for quite a while, so hopefully they can create things like their proposed alignment system that actually work the way they intend. Until they prove me wrong I'll put my faith in their abilities and desire to do what they say they are going to do. :)