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Danzaver
2008-02-04, 09:10 PM
I have recently decided to remove alignments from my game.

I find them to obstruct roleplaying, and are not condusive to a realistic medieval world.

Sure, they work wonderfully if you want your world to be like Lord of the Rings, but I do not. I find such representations to be bland and tired.

I'm still smoothing out the bumps, since there are a lot of things that target alignment specifically, but it's working quite well. People are actually starting to make their decisions based on what would their character do, rather than the age-old phrase which I am so sick of hearing: "I want to do so-and-so but I'm good, and I'm not sure if it is a good act". In the real world, good and evil are concepts well understood, but man does both good and evil, according to his own nature.

So, I shall try to detail the problems I have encountered with alignment-free dnd and how I have overcome them.

Detect Evil: Detects recent and/or lasting or strong evil acts, and current evil intentions.

Detect Alignment: Stricken from the records, and let it never darken my doorstep again. If people will be disadvantaged by this, give them something like "Detect Inner Nature", where they get an idea of what sort of person their target is inside, kind of like your Nature selection in Vampire the Masquerade.

Smite Evil: I'm thinking of just changing this to be "Smite", and making people be pretty damn sure what they stab is evil (or you have a damn good reason) before you do it, because using it wrongly will bring you out of your god's favour. Some players may substitute it for "Smite Infidel", which is quite simply, smite anyone who doesn't believe in/follow your god.

Protection from Evil/Holy weapon/Unholy weapon: Doesn't work on any but the most saintly or wicked mortals. Works on undead, good/evil outsiders and some magical beasts, and sometimes on the followers of evil/good gods. But generally people are not two-dimensional enough to classify as either good or evil.

Essentially, humans, elves, dwarves, halflings, gnomes, orcs, goblins, kobolds, basically everything whose alignment in the MM is proceeded by the word "usually", sit in the middle between all the two-dimensional deities of light and dark that make up their mythology, unless they have become unbalanced and deny the other half of their nature.

Exceptionally good or evil creatures (though actions, not 'concept'), and good or evil outsiders are treated as per normal.

Comments? Things I have forgotten? Suggestions?

Magnor Criol
2008-02-04, 09:51 PM
It sounds like you've been pretty thorough. I've always liked that interpretation of Smite Evil, turning it into just Smite; it works better as a whole that way, I think. And Detect Evil as Detect Evil Acts has nice potential.

I would suggest to you - and you may already be doing this, you sort of hint at it but you don't explicitly say it - that you leave Outsiders with their alignments. That's part of their nature, being Good, Lawful, et cetera; just as for the mortal races it's in their nature to be a little bit of both extremes.

Also, dig around in the Homebrew forums a bit; there's a few people who've done very similar things, and for very similar reasons, you could glean some ideas from them. The threads are a bit old, though, you'll have to do some searching.

Done right, this could work well, and provide an interesting ambiance to the game.

However, I'm always bothered by the argument that the alignment system leads to flat, 2D characters and hampers roleplaying. I've never found this to be the case. I don't think DnD's alignment system is the best ever, but I don't think it's broken in that way.

Anyone asking that blasted question "I want to do this but I don't know if it fits my alignment" is indeed doing bad roleplaying, but I think the flaw lies with them, not the alignment system. Similarly, DMs should be aware of the fact - and make the fact clear to the players - that as long as they're playing a mortal race, their characters have a little bit of all alignments in them, and punishing a character for a single "out of alignment" act is ridiculous and just as much of a error as the aforecursed question.

The alignment system is a guide, as I've always understood it. You choose CN, or NG, or LE, or whatever, to indicate that your character usually does this sort of action; that's where their inclination lies. Perhaps this is similar to the Nature selection in Vampire: the Masquerade; never having played that, I don't know. But that simply indicates what they'll probably be doing. Lawful Evil characters can perform good deeds on occasion, and Neutral Good citizens can be quite selfish now and then (and don't get me started on the Lawful = must follow laws crap...) They're guidelines, meant to indicate the general mindset of an individual, and except in the case of outsiders don't at all mean that person always acts that way without fail.

I haven't ever really played in a game where the alignments were of true consequence. Our DM would remind us now and then if we were acting extremely at odds with our alignments, like if we randomly slaughtered innocent guards as we got carried away or something, but not in a penalizing way. And we don't play with paladins (who should be a prestige class, representing extraordinary commitment to upholding Law and Good, not a base class...but that's yet another tangent.)

Zincorium
2008-02-04, 09:56 PM
Something you might want to look into is the allegiance system from D20 modern, it's both more realistic and easier to use.

How it works is you declare allegiances. Self is taken for granted, but common ones are family, a particular group like the LAPD, or a general idea like environmentalism. You can have allegiance good or evil, but that represents a conscious choice to serve those ideas rather than just temperment.

This actually translates well into D&D. Detect Allegiance? Hard to get results unless you know exactly what you're looking for, but the results are pretty cut and dried. It also elminates the 'everyone is one or the other' idea.

Roderick_BR
2008-02-05, 06:39 AM
IMHO, alignment is not bland, and doesn't restrict roleplaying, but that's a matter of opinion.

Ok, to drop alignemnt, my suggestions are the following:
1) Drop the paladin. In a game without alignemt, he's useless. He's already limited, and limiting him more will making him even more lame. Maybe you want something like the crusader from ToB, that has alignment restrictions, but works well without any. Unless you want to drop his limitations, making him darn good, like being able to smite anything (the crusader can smite anything, but a lot less times than the paladin). Maybe use the Champion of xxx deity PrC from Forgotten Realms. Classes like barbarian and monk suffers no problems to lose the alignemnt requisites.
2) Protection from X spells: They'll be overpowered for their levels. Split them into 3 types: Protecting Barrier (+2 deflection to AC), Protect Soul (block possession), and Protecting Ward (prevents bodily contact with summed creatures). The Circle of Protection from X can make the barrier thing, and add the +2 deflection to AC.
3) Likewise, spells like Dispell Chaos, Holy Smite, etc, can be split in several spells.
4) Effects from weapons and spells with direct damage, like holy, axiomatic, uholy, etc, wouldn't have a reason to exist, simply put. Get rid of it, and give weapons others effects like flaming, icy, etc.

Talic
2008-02-05, 07:02 AM
I have recently decided to remove alignments from my game.

I find them to obstruct roleplaying, and are not condusive to a realistic medieval world.

Sure, they work wonderfully if you want your world to be like Lord of the Rings, but I do not. I find such representations to be bland and tired.

I disagree. Alignment based games don't automatically turn you into some Tolkien-esque world of hobbits, and one rings, and one-dimensional characters. Bad players and DM's do that.


I'm still smoothing out the bumps, since there are a lot of things that target alignment specifically, but it's working quite well. People are actually starting to make their decisions based on what would their character do, rather than the age-old phrase which I am so sick of hearing: "I want to do so-and-so but I'm good, and I'm not sure if it is a good act". In the real world, good and evil are concepts well understood, but man does both good and evil, according to his own nature.

Agreed on that last part. If people were making decisions based on their alignment before, they were putting the cart before the horse. What's the penalty for most characters for changing alignment? NONE. So, what's the big fear of changing it? There shouldn't be, other than to be able to tell yourself that you can be a good boy, or whatever. Let the horse pull the cart, and let the cart go wherever the horse takes it.


So, I shall try to detail the problems I have encountered with alignment-free dnd and how I have overcome them.

Detect Evil: Detects recent and/or lasting or strong evil acts, and current evil intentions.

Detect Alignment: Stricken from the records, and let it never darken my doorstep again. If people will be disadvantaged by this, give them something like "Detect Inner Nature", where they get an idea of what sort of person their target is inside, kind of like your Nature selection in Vampire the Masquerade.

Smite Evil: I'm thinking of just changing this to be "Smite", and making people be pretty damn sure what they stab is evil (or you have a damn good reason) before you do it, because using it wrongly will bring you out of your god's favour. Some players may substitute it for "Smite Infidel", which is quite simply, smite anyone who doesn't believe in/follow your god.

Protection from Evil/Holy weapon/Unholy weapon: Doesn't work on any but the most saintly or wicked mortals. Works on undead, good/evil outsiders and some magical beasts, and sometimes on the followers of evil/good gods. But generally people are not two-dimensional enough to classify as either good or evil.

Essentially, humans, elves, dwarves, halflings, gnomes, orcs, goblins, kobolds, basically everything whose alignment in the MM is proceeded by the word "usually", sit in the middle between all the two-dimensional deities of light and dark that make up their mythology, unless they have become unbalanced and deny the other half of their nature.

Comments? Things I have forgotten? Suggestions?
It seems like you have made about two weeks of work, well thought out work, good mechanical work...

For two seconds worth of problem.

If the fighter wants to stab the guy, great. One stabbing does not an evil character make. Alignment isn't black and white. Actions may be, but alignment is a constant balance of your character's outlook. Good characters can do the occasional evil act. Evil characters can do the occasional good act. The game won't screech to a halt because of this.

Take this example. Joe the Fighter is the type of guy who'd normally give you the shirt off his back. He attends temple worship regularly, folows the rules, and wouldn't dream of getting in a bar fight. He's been commended for saving three towns five times, against goblins, trolls, and gnolls. He holds doors for strangers and pulls out chairs for ladies. One tuesday, during a chase of a fleeing goblin necromancer on wolfback, his horse stumbles and is lamed. Joe rushes to the farmer in the field he was rushing through, and grabs the horse pulling his plow. The farmer protests, and attempts to physically stop him. Joe, focused on stopping the necromancer, hits the farmer solidly, forgetting for a moment his gauntlets. The farmer falls, stone dead from the punch.

Now, both theft and killing are wrong. Is Joe evil? No. A lifetime of good acts aren't undone by one slip up.

Characters should act as they want, and let alignment fall where it may.

Neon Knight
2008-02-05, 07:14 AM
Alignment won't always be a problem. There will be plenty of games where it will never impede you in the slightest.

But, I've never heard of it making someone's game better by its presence, and that was enough for its deletion in my preferred play style.

Added to the fact that there is potential for trouble or dissent form it, and it can't hit the chopping block fast enough in my books.

Talic
2008-02-05, 07:26 AM
Alignment won't always be a problem. There will be plenty of games where it will never impede you in the slightest.

But, I've never heard of it making someone's game better by its presence, and that was enough for its deletion in my preferred play style.

Added to the fact that there is potential for trouble or dissent form it, and it can't hit the chopping block fast enough in my books.

I don't know... I'm of the same view with doctors and the tonsils....

If the problem isn't that bad, don't rip them out.

Personally, I believe that anyone who likes the concept of a paladin (either standard or tyranny, freedom, etc) has their game improved by alignment. Just sayin', is all.

Neon Knight
2008-02-05, 07:38 AM
Personally, I believe that anyone who likes the concept of a paladin (either standard or tyranny, freedom, etc) has their game improved by alignment. Just sayin', is all.

All right. I don't think the Paladin needs alignment to work at all, just divine favor. But that's my opinion.

Danzaver
2008-02-05, 08:13 AM
Thanks everyone,

Zincorium: that d20 modern system thing about alliegances sounds interesting... might have to try to find a copy somewhere...

Thanks for saying I was thorough Talic, but two weeks work? Heheheh, I am flattered. This is just a little thing I have been thinking about every now and again on the bus, or in the shower. This is the first time I have written anything down, I've just been playing by ear. ;D

Magnor Criol: Yes, I have left Outsiders with their alignments and stuff. It's sort of like the medieval philosophy of the human biology. The gods and everything are all made of elements, while man is composed of a mix of all of the elements.

A couple of people said that alignment is not at fault, it is bad DMing or bad players. I sort of agree... in theory...
I believe it is more human nature though, to tend to align yourself into groups. I was noticing in my game that there was a wedge forming between on one side the lawful paladin and good cleric, and on the other side the chaotic sorcerer and the evil barbarian. True, people can manage to see past the alignments to see them as vague guidelines, but your standard recreational player (some of my players have only played in one or two games - a couple I have introduced to gaming myself) probably hasn't thought too deeply into it.

In other words, in my particular game, I felt it was better to get rid of alignments.

Since doing so, the barbarian has calmed down a lot, and the sorcerer has stopped setting towns on fire (though maybe that's because their characters are now in a homosexual relationship with each other - seriously, how many DMs can say that? Bizarre.)
On the other side, the Cleric has been having a lot of fun making his character a bit more like church inquisitor - has recently cleaned up a town with a massive drug problem, torturing then killing a dealer in the process (sorry, 'interrogating and giving a chance at redemption'), which I know the player would never have done with an alignment because he gets too hung up on the fact that his alignment is good.

I don't say that everyone should get rid of alignments, but in my game I felt that they were getting in the way and tearing the group apart. My players were playing their alignments too much and their characters too little, and I'm sure I was enforcing alignments too much anyway. I had developed a habit of saying "what's your alignment?" when they told me they were going to light yet another fire to cover up yet another crime, and I would try to use their alignment to talk them out of it... *sigh*

Zincorium
2008-02-05, 08:39 AM
Honestly, I wouldn't worry about finding a copy. It's what I put in my post and a few specific feats (which you don't really need). Very simple for players to grasp.

Nowhere Girl
2008-02-05, 08:46 AM
The problem isn't just the idea of alignments themselves; it's the fact that no one can agree precisely on what alignments mean. Take, for example, even the Book of Exalted Deeds (or whatever it's called), which holds that mercy is an inherently and inescapably good act, while failing to show mercy is apparently not good.

I disagree. I understand mercy as, instead, the near-polar opposite of justice, because as justice implies people getting exactly what they deserve, mercy implies somehow giving them less than they deserve. That would instead make justice lawful and mercy chaotic. If justice says "an eye for an eye," mercy says "well ... you can keep your eye this time, but don't do it again!" I hold, furthermore, that lawful good is therefore not merciful -- it's a brand of good that holds that the greatest good is in fact achieved in part though strict adherence to justice, and therefore, paladins should in fact be some of the most merciless people in the world. Why? Because if they don't hold that strict standard, the slippery slope begins. To one who would show mercy in a misguided attempt to do good, such a paladin would point out that the road to hell is paved with "good intentions."

I bring this up to point out that if I can't (and I absolutely cannot) even agree with one of the published books' take on alignment -- which take I believe also contradicts the PHB anyway ... and if people argue over what alignments mean all of the time (and they certainly do) ... then how can anyone, at character creation, be sure of properly selecting an alignment anyway? My lawful good might be someone else's lawful neutral or evil. And while changing alignment is usually harmless, this does matter and is hurtful when it comes to classes that are damaged by alignment change.

That's what I hate about alignment the most: your character could potentially be instantly gimped because your DM interprets alignments differently from you. So I think this effort -- finding a way to divorce the game from alignments -- is a good one, but as much because no one can agree on their exact meanings as because they cause players to think more about their alignments than their characters' personalities when trying to roleplay.

feefait
2008-02-05, 09:15 AM
I don't use alignments in my homebrew world, but if we play a standard DnD settign/game we usually do use them. I agree, to often a character becomes about the alignment, and not the character. He have a notrious player who always plays Chaotic, usually good, but sometimes neutral. Just very hard to work with a player whose motivation is always alignment based. Personally I really like the way WW used to do it with archetypes and such. That's kind of how we work it.I changed the detect spells to detect outsiders or empathy to get how characters/npcs/monsters are feeling. But then in my campaign it is a world over run but demons and outsiders, so it's still a viable ability.

Danzaver
2008-02-05, 09:37 AM
The problem isn't just the idea of alignments themselves; it's the fact that no one can agree precisely on what alignments mean. Take, for example, even the Book of Exalted Deeds (or whatever it's called), which holds that mercy is an inherently and inescapably good act, while failing to show mercy is apparently not good.

I disagree. I understand mercy as, instead, the near-polar opposite of justice, because as justice implies people getting exactly what they deserve, mercy implies somehow giving them less than they deserve. That would instead make justice lawful and mercy chaotic. If justice says "an eye for an eye," mercy says "well ... you can keep your eye this time, but don't do it again!" I hold, furthermore, that lawful good is therefore not merciful -- it's a brand of good that holds that the greatest good is in fact achieved in part though strict adherence to justice, and therefore, paladins should in fact be some of the most merciless people in the world. Why? Because if they don't hold that strict standard, the slippery slope begins. To one who would show mercy in a misguided attempt to do good, such a paladin would point out that the road to hell is paved with "good intentions."


Thanks for your input Nowhere Girl, I <3 your Avatar by the way.

What I think you described, is the essential doctrinal difficulty which could /divide/ the Paladin community. We're not just talking lines in the sand, we're talking CIVIL WAR. While the bad guys look on and laugh. XD

That's the problem with fundamentalism.

Actually, that makes me think... could you have a Progressive Lawful Good... like, a Buddhist Paladin. Who protects the weak without getting involved in justice. Who upholds the 'laws of the universe' rather than human law...

I think there's a damn good character idea in there somewhere. :smallbiggrin:

Prophaniti
2008-02-05, 09:57 AM
In my campaigns, including when we play in fixed settings like FR, I simply remove all concrete effects and limitations regarding alignment from all mortal beings from the Material Plane. Well, I do a lot more than that, like using FaxCelistis' Paladin fix or the Ultimate Paladin. But in the end it's a fairly simple concept and none of my players have had any issues with it. Detect [Alignment] and Protection from [Alignment] still affect things like outsiders and undead, as do spells like Holy Word.

With PC classes and PrCs, all alignment restrictions are removed, though some of them, like Pale Master or True Necromancer will still carry severe social stigma and will still get you chased by Knights, Clerics and Paladins of good/anti-undead deities.

I'm currently working on a fix for the Paladin class that actually turns them into a PrC (with more powerful abilities) that you can gain, along with a matching in-game title, from certain churches. The most powerful and organized ones, including those of Evil deities like Hextor and such. This, IMO, is the ideal fix for the class. A player who wants to start as something like a Paladin would start simply as a Fighter, Cleric or, most probably, a Knight with strong ties to a church.

Sorry, bit of a tangent there. Bottom line: I agree, using the alignment system as written is confining and leads to hours of debating whether something is 'good' or 'evil'. We get into enough rules arguments as is, so eliminating alignment as something with concrete effects on players was a simple and logical step.

Darrin
2008-02-05, 10:25 AM
I have recently decided to remove alignments from my game.

I'm doing something similar with a campaign I just started. So far, the major areas that require the most work:

1) Paladin. Smite Evil becomes just Smite. I figure the extra damage is limited enough to not worry so much about who gets Smited. I've removed Detect Evil and Aura of Good (never understood what the heck Aura of Good was useful for, except a big neon "Evil Creatures Attack Me!" sign). I've replaced it with something similar to a Discern Lies ability. Rather than just give the Paladin black&white killswitch, he has something to help him determine if someone is up to no good, but needs to put some thought into it. It also adds to the Paladin's image as a legal enforcer: he can act as a one-man judicial court in a pinch. No one chose to play a paladin, so we haven't really had a chance to playtest this.

2) Domain spells for Chaos/Evil/Good/Law. Any spell with an alignment descriptor has to be removed from play or heavily modified to work on either all targets or just hostiles. The various Chaos Hammer/Shield of Law stuff needs to be generalized or removed. I have managed to rework all of the alignment domains so they no longer use any alignment descriptors but still retain the flavor/intention of the alignments. The Chaos domain uses a lot of entropic, confusion, or insanity based spells. Law uses command, hold person, imprisonment, etc. Evil uses mostly necromancy or undead-related spells. Good uses luck, divination, or positive energy type spells. So far, no divine casters, so no chance to playtest this yet.

3) Damage Reduction and aligned weapons. I haven't quite worked out how to handle this yet. So far, I think I can handwave anything that comes up case-by-case by just switching the DR to someone else, like 10/lawful becomes 10/adamantine, or 10/chaotic becomes 10/cold iron or just 10/magic. Likewise, magic weapons that do extra damage based on alignment... if any come up in play, I'll probably just switch them to a different weapon ability on the fly. An unholy weapon might become vampiric (a different kind of +2 bonus ability), a lawful weapon might become paralyzing, a holy weapon might become disruptive, etc. I thought about mapping each alignment ability to a similarly themed ability and changing all the DRs to match, so DR/lawful becomes DR/paralyzing, and so forth, but it feels like a klunky cop-out solution.

Oeryn
2008-02-05, 10:56 AM
I don't really have anything constructive to add, except to say that I decided to take alignment out of my game I'm running online, for pretty much the same reasons the OP did. The adjustments I made are eerily similar to what's already been proposed by the OP and others, so I won't get into those.

But I've been running the game for over a year and a half, now, and it's gone great. The characters seem MUCH more nuanced and interesting than any other game I've ever played in (in 20 years of playing D&D), and the system has held up with no problems whatsoever.

Highly recommended.

Artanis
2008-02-05, 12:08 PM
You could change alignment to a mere description for most people (read: adventurers), but keep the mechanics intact for things where conflict is unlikely to arise. For example, a made-out-of-pure-evil beings like a Demon could always ping as evil on Detect Alignment, Smite Evil, and weapons with the Holy ability.

*shrug* just my 2cp

EvilElitest
2008-02-05, 12:36 PM
However, I'm always bothered by the argument that the alignment system leads to flat, 2D characters and hampers roleplaying. I've never found this to be the case. I don't think DnD's alignment system is the best ever, but I don't think it's broken in that way.

In any game i play, i like two things

1. A good well defined alingment system that makes sense and doesn't contradict its self. D&D almost pulls this off, though you need to read BoED and BoVD
2. No aligments at all

I don't like the current 4E system, thats seems to have the worst traits of both
from
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Citizen Joe
2008-02-05, 12:50 PM
You could simply make alignment a DM only tool.

PC's are controlled by players but the DM needs some sort of framework for deciding motivation of all his creatures.

Oeryn
2008-02-05, 12:52 PM
You could simply make alignment a DM only tool.

PC's are controlled by players but the DM needs some sort of framework for deciding motivation of all his creatures.

I've found that --while that can be an decent "shortcut" for lesser NPCs-- if you use it for the major ones, it makes them just as bad as characters based on alignment.

Just "how bad" you think that is may vary, though, so it may work for some.

Diamondeye
2008-02-05, 02:14 PM
I'm in favor of the alignment system, although I think there are better ways of doing it. The RIFTS/Palladium alighnment system is my favorite.

In my experience, the biggest problems with alignment come from 3 sources

1) Viewing alignments too narrowly. Not all characters who are good are good to the same degree. Characters who are neutral may tend towards good or evil and not all evil creatures are evil to the same degree. The same holds true for law/chaos

Take for example, Bishop, the evil human NPC Ranger who joins the party in NWN II. Bishop is selfish, crude, uncaring, and mildly sadistic. He's listed chatotic evil and the game designers did a good job of conveying that. However, he's not nearly as chaotic evil as, say, a Maralith.

2) Confusing the law/chaos axis with the good evil axis.

3) Inserting too much real-world complication into the question. If you want to simulate the real world, then yes, I would ditch the alignment system or at least reduce its impact. However, I generally don't try to do that. I generally try to keep it simple. The question about mercy v. justice, for example, is very interesting, but is too complicated to be worth worrying about in the game.

I also think it's good, on this same note, to keep the real-world religious views out of the picture. Someone above found it necessary to make a comment about fundamentalists. I've never encountered the word in game terms ever, and I really think it's better to keep our personal beliefs, or issues with beliefs, out of the game and the discussion.

The main purpose alignment serves, for me as a DM, is to measure whether the character is roleplaying or if they are simply doing what's convenient for metagame reasons. Real people have intangible values that they hold to in varying degrees of strength which may or may not be to their material benefit at any given time. If a character wants to play a cynical deceptive mercenary, that's fine too, but then if they suddenly act chivalrous it needs to be for a reason; keeping the free drinks at the tavern coming for example. I find it irritating when characters exhibit multiple personalities based on what's mechanically convenient, and more importantly, I find it unfair to those who may sacrifice mechanical advantage for a given concept, and then stick to it.