I got 99 problems, but alignment ain't one...

[Tindragon]

So, not looking for technical debate, but many moons ago, a friend and fellow DM and I had a conversation about alignment. It didn't deteriorate in any way, cause we're good like that.

Then we talked about, what if we ran campaigns more like, at PC creation, they could pick an alignment, they could write it down, whatever. But the DM, based on his campaign, kept track of the alignment in secret. So, they wouldn't even need to declare one, just play the game, and through the game, the DM just kept the alignment secret.

After all, instead of debating, what is good, evil, etc... that whole mess, the DM really has final call. Really, how often does it come up? Not super often for us. but from time to time, some caster, or some PC will have some mechanical issue that needs to be utilized based of his or her alignment, and if the DM feels the PC hasn't properly acted to support written alignment, then said mechanics can't be used or enacted upon.

So, not looking for alignment debate, just wondering if anyone has played, or DM'd with this, or similar method of alignment. How did you (as DM) track such (point system, graphing, willy seat pants flyer?, based of bribes etc....)

I've got a good group of players, not thinking I will be implementing. But thinking maybe, down the road to try it.

We came up with the frame work to attempt a graph/point system. Over simplified, if the PC declares an alignment, they start there, if not, they start in the N/N. Points would be given (positive/negative for good/evil and law/chaos) and graphed simply, with gradients outside of certain numbers. The scale could be 50 or 100 or 10000 pts as the DM wants to track, and score. I'd use a 100. So you'd have a graph with 100+ and 100 - in GvE and LvC NN on my 100 pt graph would be 20 pts in any direction.

If someone started a pally for me, I'd start them at +50G +50L and go from there. For any declared actually, +50 to each declared portion. After that, keep it secret. Scoring points for actions taken, spells cast with alignment descriptors, .. Anywho, not gonna go on and on on how'd I score it, it'd depend on PCs, campaign type, and how they presented they wished to be.

Again, just curious if anyone has been apart of anything like this, and how it worked out?

[Flickerdart]

Given how subjective the difference between Chaos and Law, or Good and Evil (well, Neutral and Evil) can be, this seems like it's bound to fail as soon as a PC who thought he was being a perfectly nice guy gets trampled by a host of Paladins. Such a system needs direct feedback, where a player can connect specific actions to specific creeping changes in alignment, and either contest the characterization of the change or knowing that the DM thinks he's erred, balance out the act at a later time.

[OldTrees1]

How I view alignment at my table (and how I think it is viewed by my players).

I start with some introductory information about the personality of each character as a byproduct of character generation. Then the characters interact with each other during the introduction to the campaign. This interaction gives me more information about each character's personality. The players also get information about the other characters' personalities during this phase. As a result all of us Players and DMs have partial mental models of each character. We can characterize what alignment best fits with each mental model. This is the initial position.

As play continues we get more information about the personality of each character (even if that more might be a consistent pattern of old data). This allows us to increase the accuracy of the mental models over time (even if an increase in resolution is not guaranteed). We can characterize what alignment best fits with each mental model.

Alignment only comes up OOC (alignment brought up IC is roleplay and subject to the characters' misconceptions/delusions) when there is a mechanical interaction or when there is disagreement in what alignment to assign to a character (either from differences in the mental models or in differences in alignment interpretations). Mechanical interactions are resolved based on the alignment I, as DM, would assign based on my mental model of the character*. Disagreements are resolved by an open discussion followed by me, the DM, reevaluating my mental model and what alignment best fits it. Then we run with my reevaluated assignment.

*Unless I disagree with the mechanic RAW and decide to rule 0 it for a better game (See the Paladin's Code of Conduct). In those cases I refer to the new mechanics.

In summary: Mental Model subspecies of the willy seat pants flyer

Results: Inconclusive. I have very good players and thus lack of problems at my table could be a False Negative when applied to a general table.

[Zweisteine]

Secret alignments aren't a great idea for PCs.

In a good roleplaying group, the characters may be unaware of their alignment, and act according to their personality, while the player knows exactly how the character drifts.

In a more optimization-focused group, players generally won't care about their alignment except where they need it to meet prerequisites, and keeping it secret kind of defeats the point.

Actually, the point-based alignment system looks pretty nice, but it might work better in full sight of the players, or at least each player. Maybe after each session, privately tell each player which of their actions have impacted their alignment, and give them the chance to check any flaws in your judgement.

Alternatively, keep track of the alignments privately, and if the players start drifting, warn them that they risk changing alignments if they don't change their ways. This is essentially what the base standard is, but with points to keep track instead of general DM judgement.

Personally, I wouldn't use that last variant, because it makes alignments measurable, which years of internet debate has proved impossible. If I was playing a game with complex morals, I would have to be with a group of good role-players, who would know what alignments their characters should and do hold, and act accordingly, and change accordingly.

[dascarletm]

As long as the players have access to detect evil/good/law/chaos they should be able to find out. (I would allow that spell to give them a point value, estimated or exact.


Perhaps also give hints to actions that are aligned, in particular big ones. In a world like this good/evil and lawful/chaotic energies would be very real in the physical sense.

[Judge_Worm]

As a DM:
I keep a copy of every character sheet, I put things on them that the players don't need or don't care enough to know (diseases, vendor trash, spell components, xp, etc.) What I also keep on the sheet are two alignments, a subjective or temporary alignment and an objective or true alignment. Spells and effects targeting alignment is based off their real alignment. Subjective alignment is based off where they are and who they're interacting with. A tribe of goblins for instance might see the paladin as LE. The only mechanical thing this effects is the smite ability. Occasionally based off their actions their real alignment might change, and unless it's catastrophic for their class (losing class features) (cleric, druid, monk, paladin) I don't tell them. They find out themselves, and either change their course to back to their original alignment or stick with the new one. Barbarians and similar classes I just don't let them level anymore. All divine casters know when they drift in alignment or begin to.

As for a standardized system, I don't have one. If the paladin's stealing candy from babies or the cleric of lolth is rescuing kittens their alignment will change (as long as they keep the behavior up). If the druid just burnt a forest to the ground to snuff out a threat to nature itself, they don't shift at all, except maybe to a guilty conscious. Basically it comes down to a lot of small things rather than one big thing to change their alignment. Because sometimes a paladin can look the other way, they just can't do it all the time (unless they plan on retraining into the fighter without bonus feats class).

[Tindragon]

Actually, the point-based alignment system looks pretty nice, but it might work better in full sight of the players, or at least each player. Maybe after each session, privately tell each player which of their actions have impacted their alignment, and give them the chance to check any flaws in your judgement.



Yep. That's about what the thought behind it is. It doesn't need to be top secret, but just bring it out when detect alignment is used, or end of session if any kind of moderate to major shift happens, or begins... discuss with them why, what, how we (dm) came up with it shifting that route as it applies to the events and character.

Not saying it's perfect, just something else to use vs " I wrote CG on my sheet, and you didn't make me change it when I bashed in the brains of that sheriff when he said I had to return the stolen loot, and couldn't keep it for myself after killing the bandits" <-- that was a real thing once. Sorta prompted the thought process here.

[GreatDane]

I'm currently DMing a campaign in which I determine the characters' alignments based on their actions. As a group, we only really care about alignment if a) there's a paladin/cleric/incarnate/etc. or b) there's an alignment-based spell effect (or smite, etc.). The players are free to strive for a particular alignment, but I have the final call.

Again, though, it only matters if one of the two above things come up.

[jjcrpntr]

I like to use alignments to help direct my PC's. Knowing the players I have if I didn't use alignments or let them use any they wanted I'd get a bunch of CE or NE at best characters that would just walk around murdering people for kicks. By limiting them to good alignments they actually tend to stick towards their alignment in general.

[Hazrond]

...Spells and effects targeting alignment is based off their real alignment. Subjective alignment is based off where they are and who they're interacting with. A tribe of goblins for instance might see the paladin as LE. The only mechanical thing this effects is the smite ability...

So wait, if there is a goblin paladin in that tribe he can smite the PC paladin because he perceives the paladin as evil, even when all other spells and effects don't? What?

[FocusWolf413]

So wait, if there is a goblin paladin in that tribe he can smite the PC paladin because he perceives the paladin as evil, even when all other spells and effects don't? What?

Instead of smite evil, he would have smite good. He wouldn't know that.

The whole idea of good and evil is rubbish. It's just based on societal norms. For example, for most of human history, slavery was considered to be a fairly good thing and murder has frequently been justified by a difference in ideology (religion, political allegiance, etc). Morality is extremely fluid and anyone who thinks their viewpoint is objectively right, good, and justified is delusional. For that reason, I don't pay too much attention to the good/evil axis.

[WeaselGuy]

The only time my DM (any of them, over the past decade actually) has ever even mentioned my alignment to me, was last year. I was playing a Paladin at that point, and we had just cleared out a swamp of evil... lizardfolk? I don't really remember. What's important is that a guard drake or something got away, and we were all hurting pretty badly, so we just chalked it up to an acceptable margin of error. It was being kept in a cage, after all, why not let it be free? (The druid's input on the subject). Anywho, we get back to Elf-town, and report to them that we helped clear their swamp out, so they would give us support during an upcoming war.
This is where the DM asks "Anything else to report?" and looks expectantly at me. "Uh... no?" was my response. "Oh really? Nobody got away? No survivors?". "Oh yeah. Uh, a drake thing escaped into the swamp. It looked young, and it didn't attack us on it's way out. It shouldn't be a problem to y'all".
OOC, the DM says to me "It's good that you remembered that. It probably would have shifted your alignment to LN, or maybe NG, depending..."

Other than that, I have usually just written an alignment on my character sheet, then tried to make decisions for my character based on the situation at hand, and how I feel they would handle it based on their alignment. If, after a few sessions, I felt my character was being more LE than CN, I would approach my DM and be like "Hey man, I know I wrote CN on my sheet a few weeks ago, but over these sessions, I don't really feel my character is acting that way. He seems to be leaning more towards LE, and honestly, I can make that work for his story." to which the DM would reply "Yeah, I can see that... go ahead and write LN on your paper for now, and we'll see how it goes from there.".

[tadkins]

It's subjective and depends entirely on the game, so I tend to just flow with whatever the DM says.

I have a main character that I've played in a number of games, a gnome necromancer wizard. She's been everything from TN, to NG, and even CE in one game. Her primary focus has always been about knowledge, uncovering secrets and solving the mysteries of the universe, but her means are seen as different things to different DMs. To one DM, animating the skeleton of a fallen enemy to aid us in upcoming battles was no big deal; no different than crafting a golem or summoning an elemental. To another, that was a truly despicable act perpetrated by only the most horrible of monsters.

I've learned to just take it in stride and accept the DM ruling, as I would in an aforementioned system by the OP. I've always seen my character as TN, but if she's CE in a DM's world? Then she's CE.

[illyahr]

I run a sliding scale point system in my campaigns as well. I let the players know their general location on the scale, as well as any actions that make a noticeable impact on the scale.

There was one point that an Evil character survived a Paladin's Smite because he jumped to intercept the attack that was aimed at his IC brother (readied an action to move away if the Paladin attacked him but Paladin went after his brother instead so I allowed him to move in front of the attack). He only had a few HP left so I called it sacrificing himself for his brother. This moved his alignment up just enough to move him into Neutral instead of Evil. He was KO'd, but he survived the attack. Paladin was so impressed with the act that he let them go if they promised no to return to his town.

[General Sajaru]

no different than crafting a golem or summoning an elemental. To another, that was a truly despicable act perpetrated by only the most horrible of monsters.

Per RAW, animate dead is an evil spell. Although if you're in a world/playing with a DM who doesn't think undead are abominations/perversions, that might change.

As for player alignment, I've found that it's generally not a problem with my players; if I'm feeling like they aren't playing to their alignment as written, I'll either nudge them back in the right direction (i.e. "paladins aren't supposed to steal) or tell them that their alignment may need to change.

[tadkins]

Per RAW, animate dead is an evil spell. Although if you're in a world/playing with a DM who doesn't think undead are abominations/perversions, that might change.



It depends on what the DM wants their world to be, as written in the Tome of Necromancy (http://community.wizards.com/forum/previous-editions-general/threads/1059011). Some DMs go with the Crawling Darkness, some go with Playing with Fire. I largely do what I want in either one (unless explicitly forbidden to play the character), and just let the DM dictate my alignment from there.

[goto124]

All these is when alignment doesn't play a huge part of the game and is there mostly as an RP guideline, right?

[OldTrees1]

All these is when alignment doesn't play a huge part of the game and is there mostly as an RP guideline, right?

My "mental model" method has only been used when personality -> alignment -> cosmic. However in that set it should work at any level of moral weight to the plot (amoral plots to moral dilemma plots).

What do you mean?