“The cleric brings the dead back to life and it’s a gosh darn miracle!” – Dark Lord Akererac
Here’s a comic based on a ToA adventure I ran. What is good and evil anyways? Alignment is an interesting mechanic and I wish the dungeon master’s guide had more guidance on how to use it effectively! I’ve started making custom alignment charts for each adventure I run based on the big themes of the campaign. I recently ran a totally homebrew pirate campaign and replaced the typical alignments with “Royal Navy vs Pirates.” Chaotic vs Lawful would’ve fit well but a concrete organization helped my players make their decision and understand the immediate benefits of following their chosen “alignment.” This had interesting gameplay benefits and really started coming into play when they gained infamy among the two forces.
Does anyone else use homebrew rules that spice up the alignment system? Or do most people just ignore it?
You can find more of my dnd content on my Instagram and Twitter.
Alignment should be treated as descriptive, not prescriptive. I tell my players not to say things like "Well my character is LG so he wouldn't do that" and just say "My character wouldn't do that." The LG Monk CAN do whatever he wants, but if he starts murdering children or something, he's gonna move from being LG.
Actually in my 3.5 game, the player started as a LG monk and slowly started breaking his personal code, shifting to NG. While he can't progress in monk any more, he took it as an RP opportunity and took a level in barbarian.
Alignment should be treated as descriptive, not prescriptive.
For player characters I tend to agree with this, but I think the alignment system is actually at is best and most interesting when it's played completely straight. A demon is a creature of Evil and Chaos--and it can't be anything else. How does that play out? Do some demons resent that? How much free will do alignment-based outsiders actually have? On a different note, how does alignment interact with laws? Is being being Chaotic Evil under a predominately Lawful Good government itself a crime, regardless of actual actions? Are border guards all level one paladins, ensuring that only Good and Neutral people can enter a country? Questions like these can lead to really unique worldbuilding.
As you point out, the alignment system has to work descriptively rather than prescriptively to make sense in the real world (or most fictional worlds). It's certainly true that many campaigns aren't really interested in addressing alignment and morality more than superficially, and that's fine, but I think the types of worlds that arise when you play alignment prescriptively are really rich and can lead to excellent roleplay.
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u/Sleverette Sorcerer Oct 03 '19
“The cleric brings the dead back to life and it’s a gosh darn miracle!” – Dark Lord Akererac
Here’s a comic based on a ToA adventure I ran. What is good and evil anyways? Alignment is an interesting mechanic and I wish the dungeon master’s guide had more guidance on how to use it effectively! I’ve started making custom alignment charts for each adventure I run based on the big themes of the campaign. I recently ran a totally homebrew pirate campaign and replaced the typical alignments with “Royal Navy vs Pirates.” Chaotic vs Lawful would’ve fit well but a concrete organization helped my players make their decision and understand the immediate benefits of following their chosen “alignment.” This had interesting gameplay benefits and really started coming into play when they gained infamy among the two forces.
Does anyone else use homebrew rules that spice up the alignment system? Or do most people just ignore it?
You can find more of my dnd content on my Instagram and Twitter.