Goblin Squad Member
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... All you do is fill these forums with garbage and it's time Paizo took out the trash.Thinking through a complex system we should be willing to seek out diverse opinions. I don't want to speak Qallz' point of view. I don't want to say the things he says. But if we bar everyone who makes things uncomfortable we will lose diversity in the community. Same for the other few who are loud and make us uncomfortable.
For the sake of the game we need diverse viewpoints examining it.
Diverse viewpoints good. Purposely snide, abrasive and baiting comments to illicit a negative reaction from other posters is not productive. His post history is filled with baiting and dismissive comments to numerous posters.
Diverse viewpoints good. Purposely snide, abrasive and baiting comments to illicit a negative reaction from other posters is not productive. His post history is filled with baiting and dismissive comments to numerous posters.... All you do is fill these forums with garbage and it's time Paizo took out the trash.Thinking through a complex system we should be willing to seek out diverse opinions. I don't want to speak Qallz' point of view. I don't want to say the things he says. But if we bar everyone who makes things uncomfortable we will lose diversity in the community. Same for the other few who are loud and make us uncomfortable.
For the sake of the game we need diverse viewpoints examining it.
Who's baiting and illiciting abusive comments now? I was trying to bring us back on topic, if you remember, but it seems you refuse to do so.
I'd like us to be productive here JDNYC, can you help us to do that, please?
To be fair Qallz, this is where you asked for animosity.This game is called PATHFINDER online and yes alignment shifts with benefits as well as drawbacks are pivotal in the IP.Entitlement.
Silly Bringslite. That's called Crowdforging, I was helping him to understand what might be considered the definition of Entitlement, so that he might be able to recognize it when he goes to do it in the future. No animosity there.
Edit: And again, I think it's time we move on.
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Goblin Squad Member
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To be fair Qallz, this is where you asked for animosity.This game is called PATHFINDER online and yes alignment shifts with benefits as well as drawbacks are pivotal in the IP.Entitlement.
Silly Bringslite. That's called Crowdforging, I was helping him to understand what might be considered the definition of Entitlement, so that he might be able to recognize it when he goes to do it in the future. No animosity there.
Edit: And again, I think it's time we move on.
Yeah. That is a cute response but doesn't do anything to recognize what you posted that started your little exchange this time.
I can only conclude that you start these things sometimes and then revert to "I'd like us to be productive here JDNYC, can you help us to do that, please? because you enjoy it.
So you go Guy! Have all of the fun that you like.
I'll stick around and try, because I like some of your ideas and points, not always the way that you debate them, and I think it would be a loss if you were perma banned.
To be clear, there are a lot of people around here that get away with intentionally insulting posts too. Not just you.
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I'll stick around and try, because I like some of your ideas and points, not always the way that you debate them, and I think it would be a loss if you were perma banned.
This is the part of your post which I'll choose to focus on, and, I feel the same way about you.
And when I say let's get productive again, I think it's time to get back on track. Some threads are more productive than others, and I'm not opposed to some threads just being pointless fun.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'll stick around and try, because I like some of your ideas and points, not always the way that you debate them, and I think it would be a loss if you were perma banned.This is the part of your post which I'll choose to focus on, and, I feel the same way about you.
And when I say let's get productive again, I think it's time to get back on track. Some threads are more productive than others, and I'm not opposed to some threads just being pointless fun.
Fair enough.
@ GW
You have made it clear that player alignment (average) is not what can or will change a settlement's alignment. Also that other things are up in the air as far as the whole thing goes.
Could you give us a hint as to whether you are thinking that "average settlement alignment" compared to declared alignment will have any affect on overall productivity or some factor in it, mechanically?
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Goblin Squad Member
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You have made it clear that player alignment (average) is not what can or will change a settlement's alignment.I thought we made it clear that was TBD. If not: that's TBD
It's, indeed, a departure. The current thinking is that your alignment changes don't impact your settlement. Your settlement sets an alignment range for members and only changes if the leadership changes it deliberately.
Some of the things Tork mentioned a couple months ago were mid-discussion. We identified some particular ways the "member alignment drives settlement alignment" would result in some things we didn't want, and also that the way we'd planned on tracking it would have been technically cumbersome for minimal benefit anyway.
That said, it's one of those things where we may revisit it if we have a bright idea or see that's it's necessary once players are using it. It's just a lot of technical work and potential unintended behaviors for a benefit that seems relatively small due to those concerns.
Very true, if I had read the bolded part there and taken it to a level of proper comprehension.
Is there anything (mechanical) that might be set in stone that we can look at?
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Goblin Squad Member
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Hey guys, I personaly loathe alignment systems both in PnP and in Online Games. I'm not a big fan of it for PFO.
However, that's largely an academic discussion. Certain things are kinda central to a games core design concept....and GW has already made it pretty clear that an alignment system is part of it. Our time would probably be better served by forwarding some thoughts, ideas and feedback on details of implimentation.
My understanding of CrowdForging is that we get to offer feedback, suggestions and ideas that fit within the broad design concept of the game.
I personaly would love to see a remake of Battlefield 1942....but I'm not going to expect GW to decide to turn PFO into one just because I want it.....regardless of whether it would make an awesome game... it just doesn't fit within the type of game GW intends to make here.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@GrumpMel: My academic understanding of alignment/reputation is systems that make the game more socially responsible of players to how they interact with other players. If there is a system that achieves or helps achieve that then I think it makes Goblinworks richer and players enjoy the game many times more than normal.
The implementation towards that goal, is a big unknown but if the above holds then I think it's the right area of the game to be thinking how players are going to interact with each other, when you hand them many tools of death and destruction atst!
I've always thought that mmorpg's biggest achillies heel is the demand for high volume of players at any cost to quality of interaction / development of community. If PFO with a smaller budget and smaller starter community and slower rise in numbers can also design social systems to aid that growth and establishment then I think it could be a the number one area of the game to innovate in. And I've always thought if there was some way to screen (increase selectiveness) players to join a game it would theoretically be the golden ticket for online games involving a lot of players.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Some scribbles on the above...
One idea on how to be selective for players:
When you rent a house or roomshare in RL, you usually have to put down a bond eg (bond = x months upfront payment that is held before you vacate successfully as well as paying the first month before moving in and collecting keys).
Obviously buying the box price (which should equal the first month of game time) in normal sub games may help here. But noticing these early founders packs, where some players are dumping $99 on the game upfront, it seems a legitimate way of pre-selecting players who are putting up a bond (or in other parlance chipping in their equity into the game) before playing and seems reasonable prediction to consider such players are positively motivated (certainly higher percentage).
Maybe there is some room for discussion on this. No doubt as characters increase in value over time (skill-training) that certainly has an effect. But how about that value can be moderated by their social impact/rating in the game that tracks from day 1 (t=o) to the present?
/doodling
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Goblin Squad Member
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AvenaOats,
not sure that willingness to put up money correlates with positive social motivations. It maybe tells you about commitment I guess, although that's contextual, right? Kind of like the Widow's mite, $35 from one person is more of a commitment than $500 from another.
Anyways, a willingness to put down a deposit doesn't tell us jack about how good a roommate you're going to be ;)
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Goblin Squad Member
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The alignment system originally grew out of the trope that The Good Guys are good and heroic and that The Bad Guys are evil and dastardly. The game and its audience have matured to accommodate and even expect more nuance in character design and motivation, but the alignment system remains the way to as AvenaOats put it, keep the players more socially responsible. There are reasons, after all, that most organized play restricts players from selecting an evil alignment.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The alignment system originally grew out of the trope that The Good Guys are good and heroic and that The Bad Guys are evil and dastardly. The game and its audience have matured to accommodate and even expect more nuance in character design and motivation, but the alignment system remains the way to as AvenaOats put it, keep the players more socially responsible. There are reasons, after all, that most organized play restricts players from selecting an evil alignment.
For me that is more a reflection of those particular "organized play" groups' inability to adjust to more nuanced character designs and motivations.
Sure it would be a tough sell to have a Paladin (LG) and an evil character in the same group, but Margret Wies and Tracy Hickman pulled it off in Dragonlance.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The alignment system originally grew out of the trope that The Good Guys are good and heroic and that The Bad Guys are evil and dastardly. The game and its audience have matured to accommodate and even expect more nuance in character design and motivation, but the alignment system remains the way to as AvenaOats put it, keep the players more socially responsible. There are reasons, after all, that most organized play restricts players from selecting an evil alignment.For me that is more a reflection of those particular "organized play" groups' inability to adjust to more nuanced character designs and motivations.
Sure it would be a tough sell to have a Paladin (LG) and an evil character in the same group, but Margret Wies and Tracy Hickman pulled it off in Dragonlance.
Writing a novel is an entirely different sort of endeavor than assembling random people who do not know each other together at a convention table. And gathering said group of people together is again vastly different between a D20 style game and something like Shadowrun or Savage Worlds.
imho the reputation system is deeply linked with the alignment system since
the same act committed by a lawful good paladin dont have the same weight by one committed by a chaotic evil rogue. The alignment system is not a be all end of all but only a moral compass to make the charactes more believable in my eyes, it adds pepper to the consequences of the acts.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Alignment does not stop evil and good partying together, at least not from the clarification we have gotten thus far.
A lawful evil CC and a lawful good CC can both be members of a LN settlement. What you won't see is people of wildly different alignments like LG and CE working together in the same settlement and equally represented.
Even being mostly a power gamer I can see the sense in that. It segregates powers and removes a vehicle for monopolizing all play styles under a single nation.
I am sure there will be meta game ways of working around those restrictions, but providing those systems outside of game mechanics incurs its own cost. If you are hiring out your dirty work, you have to manage leaks. If you are providing the same service in house you have to manage the possible diplomatic fall out (if applicable and through plausible deniability) or eat the cost.
Then you have the concerns of managing your mechanically supported settlements while maintaining your meta ones.
It adds hurtles to doing absolutely everything the game provides under one banner. I can see that adding to commerce and diplomacy more than subtracting from it.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The alignment system originally grew out of the trope that The Good Guys are good and heroic and that The Bad Guys are evil and dastardly. The game and its audience have matured to accommodate and even expect more nuance in character design and motivation, but the alignment system remains the way to as AvenaOats put it, keep the players more socially responsible. There are reasons, after all, that most organized play restricts players from selecting an evil alignment.
Speaking from a personal viewpoint on PnP gaming in general and not at all what PFO can, will or should do.... I find the alignment system as expressed in Pathfinder too cartoonish and not nuanced enough to represent the sort of gaming that I enjoy. People, even dieties in many mythologies are very rarely as black and white as the alignment system tends to portray them. I tend to use it rather sparingly, if at all in anything I personaly GM or any homebrews I work on.
It's one thing if one is representing very primal supernatural forces but once personalties get involved I think it really starts to break down and especialy so (imo) when you start applying it as restrictions to entirely mundane skill sets or hard and fast rules of who can associate as who.
For example does an Assasin, which is really just a set of trained mundane skills, really need to be "Evil" if those skills are being applied against Demonic Fiends?
Would "Chaotic Good" or "Neutral" dieties not have holy warriors to represent them which were granted similar skill sets and powers equivalent to the Paladin's of "LG" dieties.
Would it truely be "LG" to eschew working with "LE" individuals even if refusing to do so meant the destruction of innocents or would that be a selfish and self-serving act (e.g. "Evil")?
I think even the act of things like detecting alignment starts to remove alot of good RP and gaming opportunities....who's the murderer in the Castle, oh just have the cleric cast Detect Evil...hours of interesting game play and players using thier brains circumvented by a 1 round spell.
Sorry if the above seem's a little rantish. Strict alignment systems are just a personal dislike of mine when running and playing in tabletop games.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Meh, I have never seen alignment as being too restrictive in any PF game I've played. It is not used as a restriction on who can associate with who in tabletop. By the tabletop alignment system a LG character can work with LE characters; I dunno why you think they cannot.
Consider this passage, right at the start of the alignment section in the Core Rulebook: "alignment is a tool for developing your character's identity - it is not a straightjacket for restricting your character. Each alignment represents a broad range of personality types or personal philosophies, so two characters of the same alignment can still be quite different from each other. In addition, few people are completely consistent."
The Core Rulebook itself tells you, alignment is only a small piece of a character which helps you develop personalities and determines the outcome of certain magical effects. There are hard and fast lines where magical effects are concerned, not where allowable actions are concerned.
The exception to all that is paladins; many people don't agree with paladin, and either develop their own alignment neutral option, make paladin less restrictive as a class, or remove it entirely.
However, all of that is pretty much irrelevant when talking about PfO, as this is a different system that does different things. Alignment in PfO, as I understand it, is another restriction which ensures one organization cannot have everything; it forces decisions one way or another for how every player is going to play the game. This alignment is not the same as the TT game; every alignment is not created equal, and it's most important that these things are understood before approaching what GW has planned.
(PS: Evil alignment is not an actionable offence. If your party detects evil to uncover the villain in a social setting, maybe they have 4 people in the room show as Evil, and the villain has a means of beating Detect Evil so he's none of those people. That would generate a bunch of red herrings and way more enjoyable investigation. Not every Evil person is a murderous sociopath, some are just jerks.)
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Goblin Squad Member
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Meh, I have never seen alignment as being too restrictive in any PF game I've played. It is not used as a restriction on who can associate with who in tabletop. By the tabletop alignment system a LG character can work with LE characters; I dunno why you think they cannot.
Consider this passage, right at the start of the alignment section in the Core Rulebook: "alignment is a tool for developing your character's identity - it is not a straightjacket for restricting your character. Each alignment represents a broad range of personality types or personal philosophies, so two characters of the same alignment can still be quite different from each other. In addition, few people are completely consistent."
The Core Rulebook itself tells you, alignment is only a small piece of a character which helps you develop personalities and determines the outcome of certain magical effects. There are hard and fast lines where magical effects are concerned, not where allowable actions are concerned.
The exception to all that is paladins; many people don't agree with paladin, and either develop their own alignment neutral option, make paladin less restrictive as a class, or remove it entirely.
However, all of that is pretty much irrelevant when talking about PfO, as this is a different system that does different things. Alignment in PfO, as I understand it, is another restriction which ensures one organization cannot have everything; it forces decisions one way or another for how every player is going to play the game. This alignment is not the same as the TT game; every alignment is not created equal, and it's most important that these things are understood before approaching what GW has planned.
(PS: Evil alignment is not an actionable offence. If your party detects evil to uncover the villain in a social setting, maybe they have 4 people in the room show as Evil, and the villain has a means of beating Detect Evil so he's none of those people. That would generate a bunch of red herrings and way more enjoyable...
Speaking in terms of table-top...If it's entirely vague descriptively and therefore not particularly usefull for that purpose and not restrictive mechanicaly (though I would argue that the rules as written tend to use it for quite a few mechanical restrictions) outside of the supernatural then I fail to see it's actual purpose or utility in the ruleset.... and therefore why I choose not to really use it for much outside of the supernatural when GMing.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Speaking from a personal viewpoint on PnP gaming in general and not at all what PFO can, will or should do.... I find the alignment system as expressed in Pathfinder too cartoonish and not nuanced enough to represent the sort of gaming that I enjoy.
This was the point I was attempting to make about the audience expectations being more matured. It has spawned any number of alternatives such as The Color Wheel. The game is designed in the spirit that home games are free to modify, change, and disregard rules to maximize their fun. However, expectations tend to remain in place that the written rules will be expressed and respected in official products related to the license.
I personally enjoy the alignments as an idea and for what they add to the world flavor-wise, though I agree there is room to allow for nuance. The alignments allow for a more fantastical and contrasting atmosphere, much like a cartoon would be as you mentioned. I like that aspect, largely because it aids my escapism and I enjoy the notions of Good vs. Evil and Chaos vs. Law. Of being able to pick a camp and be reasonably sure that the character is able to give all of their support with self-doubt being a rare splash of seasoning instead of a constant theme.
Let's face it, a lot of that real-world nuance very frequently leaves you not really liking or growing attached to any person or group. Of course, I hated Breaking Bad which was some kind of storytelling darling these past couple years. So my opinions are likely too niche to take that seriously.
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Goblin Squad Member
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This was useful to clear up my understanding of the link between character (ethos) and plot (mythos). If going along with Aristotle and not modern preferences of character-driven plot: Then Alignment might fit very well into PFO where "plot/actions drives the nature of character":
Rankles that his work on comedy was lost. Could Pathfinder be more Aristotlean in it's making than our world?
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Goblin Squad Member
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Consider this passage, right at the start of the alignment section in the Core Rulebook: "alignment is a tool for developing your character's identity - it is not a straightjacket for restricting your character. Each alignment represents a broad range of personality types or personal philosophies, so two characters of the same alignment can still be quite different from each other. In addition, few people are completely consistent."
I really agree with this. I was once in a group that consisted of a TN Druid, LG Paladin, and my NE Ranger. The druid and I could not get along at all. We had some epic roleplaying arguments. Yet the Paladin and I became best friends even though I was evil. We stuck together because he thought he could reform me and I though I could get him to lighten up some. It was a lot of fun. Would often spend an entire session with us three just roleplaying in a tavern/inn. If my memory is correct we only had 2 battles in an entire year of playing. I'll repeat it was a lot of fun.