I keep seeing people say they don't need/like/use QIBF, or Motivation/Fear, or a number of other methods of helping with character creation. They have Alignment, which was good enough in Red Bix and it's still good enough now
I keep seeing people say they don't need/like/use QIBF, or Motivation/Fear, or a number of other methods of helping with character creation. They have Alignment, which was good enough in Red Bix and it's still good enough now
No, I don't think anyone on this thread has said that. I've always said that alignment works in conjunction with other features. I like PTBIF, I just like it even more when I'm using alignment with it.
And yes, before people say alignment doesn't work in conjunction with other factors, here's how it does. Alignment provides a general basis/guideline of your characters morality. However their PTIBF's effect how they interact in various situations. For example, if a LG character sees a robber taking money from a baby, their alignment suggests that they probably would interfere. And most likely, they would, but if there flaw is "I hate babies and am unable to sympathize and empathize with them," then they might not help the baby. (Though of course, they might not help the baby either way, the alignment provides an indicator that does not necessarily always get used.)
Alignment helps me, alignment doesn't help you. Ok, you don't have to use it. But no one on this thread said that alignment tells you everything about someone, or that they use it instead of PTBIF's. As I have been trying to communicate this whole thread, (and the last one we debated alignment on too,) no tool works completely on its own to determine everything about your character. Alignment is no exception.
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Alignment helps me, alignment doesn't help you. Ok, you don't have to use it. But no one on this thread said that alignment tells you everything about someone, or that they use it instead of PTBIF's. As I have been trying to communicate this whole thread, (and the last one we debated alignment on too,) no tool works completely on its own to determine everything about your character. Alignment is no exception.
I will go ahead and say that I think PIBF works completely well on it's own with no need for The Nine whatsoever.
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Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
Well, tell me what I'm missing then, Bard. Like I said, the character I gave is Neutral Good. What would you describe that character as?
Without looking at the alignment description: Your character is supposed to be a good, kind person and devoted to helping others. One that probably values life and freedom above all else; sometimes maybe finding herself in opposition to the law if that law is badly designed and if by doing so she can help others. She's definitely not a murderer, not a liar, and others can count on her - a person generally striving for all that's good. Out of all 9 alignments, this is the one that describes a person that's universally good, compassionate, and trustworthy.
And we have our first person on this thread actually arguing that anything about alignment is “universal” - a statement that is simply wrong. One could easily make a neutral good character who has no sympathy for the wicked; one who is a compulsive liar if the lies make the world around them a little better in their eyes. I have a character right now who is a serial killer, but only of those who abuse their spouses/children/elderly parents/other similar situations who probably would best be classified as neutral good.
But, again, no one other than this person is arguing anything about alignment is universal or that you could extrapolate a character from alignment alone. As I have said, alignment is just one tool in a toolbox, and a tool not everyone likes to use. That is no different from how the real world operates - psychologists have dozens of tests they can use for evaluative purposes, each of which has its own flaws and only provides an incomplete look into a personality if viewed on its own. The individual psychologist, by having options, can choose which ones they feel comfortable with and which ones their patients will best respond to.
That is how most folks seem to view alignment - it is a tool of psychological evaluation and, like real world tools, should not be treated as universal truth but rather a smaller part of a greater evaluation… or not used at all in a given case if the treating professional (DM) and/or patient (player/character) do not feel like using it.
Again, that’s all the majority (with only one actual person suggesting any universality to anything in the Nine) of folks on this thread have been saying “I like having this in my tool belt because it helps me/it helps my players.”
And we have our first person on this thread actually arguing that anything about alignment is “universal” - a statement that is simply wrong. One could easily make a neutral good character who has no sympathy for the wicked; one who is a compulsive liar if the lies make the world around them a little better in their eyes. I have a character right now who is a serial killer, but only of those who abuse their spouses/children/elderly parents/other similar situations who probably would best be classified as neutral good.
I mean you can make such a character but that won't be Neutral Good. The boundaries are quite clear, but your interpretation of them is not. Your Serial Killer is Chaotic Good at best since he probably doesn't believe in a fair trial and redemption, it seems. Reminds me of Punisher a bit.
I agree with the rest of your post. Alignment is just one of many tools that may or may not help describe a character in as few words as possible.
Sorry, but you are simply wrong under RAW. The rules clearly establish that alignment is mutable and that the boundaries are not clear. That is why you can have a LG paladin whose pertinence for smiting the wicked makes them almost a murder hobo; there’s no reason a NG equivalent cannot exist, other than a failure to extrapolate accepted practices in one of the Nine to another.
Again, there is only one person on this thread who seems to want to ignore RAW and make alignment into some thing it explicitly is not. That is a minority view among the player base, and, while is a problem, I do not think is a sufficient problem to toss out the entire system. Now, tossing out a player who insists their view is the only correct view (and also might have other problematic ideas about the game which would make them unfun to play with even if alignment did not exist, like, say, for example, “Wizards is wasting its time being more inclusive, other people should just get over it”) makes a lot more sense to me than tossing out a system which the silent majority find flexible, useful, or easy to ignore.
Well, tell me what I'm missing then, Bard. Like I said, the character I gave is Neutral Good. What would you describe that character as?
What you're missing is the realization that only one person out of the 2,415 who have viewed this thread so far said that you can use an alignment to describe everything about a character. As I have said ever since I joined this thread, alignment is a tool that works with other tools to help determine a character's actions. Alignment does not work on its own to give a detailed description of one character. It works with other factors to do that.
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BoringBard's long and tedious posts somehow manage to enrapture audiences. How? Because he used Charm Person, the #1 bard spell!
He/him pronouns. Call me Bard. PROUD NERD!
Ever wanted to talk about your parties' worst mistakes? Do so HERE. What's your favorite class, why? Share & explainHERE.
Hm. Are you not the one, Caerwyn, who told me that many of your new players ignore all the other, 'harder' tools for character development in favor of solely using alignment?
Curious. If a brand new player can use nothing but alignment to determine the entirety of their character's persona and demeanor, why can't the far more experienced players in this thread tell me the personality and demeanor of my Neutral Good character? Rognir's the only one who's tried. He was not correct outside of very broad, fuzzy, low-rez terms, but he tried. Anyone else care to try?
Hm. Are you not the one, Caerwyn, who told me that many of your new players ignore all the other, 'harder' tools for character development in favor of solely using alignment?
Curious. If a brand new player can use nothing but alignment to determine the entirety of their character's persona and demeanor, why can't the far more experienced players in this thread tell me the personality and demeanor of my Neutral Good character? Rognir's the only one who's tried. He was not correct outside of very broad, fuzzy, low-rez terms, but he tried. Anyone else care to try?
More accurately I said I have players who are not going to bother with a more complicated system that requires them to think about who their character is before the game starts (they like to come up with their quirks and such during the game, not before), and it is perfectly “serviceable” (note I used a word which indicates something being okay, but far from ideal) for them to just give me alignment and they can use the game itself as the way to further flush out alignment.
It’s not how I would do it, and it certainly gives me less up front information as the DM, but *shrugs* if it helps them gry an incomplete foundation for their character that they’ll be able to build on during the game? Sure, they can go for it - no skin off my nose and it helps them, so why would I care?
Repurposing the following from earlier in the thread (if we're gonna propose little quandaries for each other):
I write down "chaotic good" under alignment. Presumably this means I need to remember that that is shorthand for "I act on the basis of my conscience heedless of what others think" but perhaps I've been playing D&D long enough to have already internalized that.
I write down "I act on the basis of my conscience heedless of what others think" as one of my personality traits (I could make it an ideal or a flaw, even, but let's keep this simple).
In terms of who my character is, or how they behave, is there a difference between those two? If so, what is the difference, and what is the reason for that difference?
Repurposing the following from earlier in the thread (if we're gonna propose little quandaries for each other):
I write down "chaotic good" under alignment. Presumably this means I need to remember that that is shorthand for "I act on the basis of my conscience heedless of what others think" but perhaps I've been playing D&D long enough to have already internalized that.
I write down "I act on the basis of my conscience heedless of what others think" as one of my personality traits (I could make it an ideal or a flaw, even, but let's keep this simple).
In terms of who my character is, or how they behave, is there a difference between those two? If so, what is the difference, and what is the reason for that difference?
This is going to sound like a silly answer: The first is shorter and that has utility. There’s already a lot to grasp for new players and the idea of coming up with quirks independently or reading a dozen or so addition sentences and having to review and choose one (especially if done at the end, like Beyond has it set up to do) can be surprisingly overwhelming.
Two questions that can be driven by the DM can prove surprisingly calming and help cut through the haze of sensory overload inherent when first experiencing a game with infinite options. “Does your character follow a specific code or defer to higher authority, act more in their whims, or fall somewhere in between?” “Is your character more likely to put others first, but themselves first, or fall somewhere in between?”
Two nice, simple questions, with only three choices each. I cannot count the number of times giving my new and overwhelmed characters that very simple foundation proved a useful launching point for building something more complex.
Check out the Personal Characteristics from an NPC in Radiant Citadel:
Personality Trait. “Success for my business and success for my family are one and the same.”
Ideal. “My family’s legacy will spread across the land.”
Bond. “My son is the light of my life.”
Flaw. “It’s not that I’m paranoid; it’s that a lot of people want what I have.”
I mean, this makes it so easy to roleplay this character. What is their Alignment? Honestly irrelevant because adding an Alignment on top of this wouldn't add that much, in my opinion. You could place this character in a fair amount of different societies and all that would change are the social mores.
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Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
Repurposing the following from earlier in the thread (if we're gonna propose little quandaries for each other):
I write down "chaotic good" under alignment. Presumably this means I need to remember that that is shorthand for "I act on the basis of my conscience heedless of what others think" but perhaps I've been playing D&D long enough to have already internalized that.
I write down "I act on the basis of my conscience heedless of what others think" as one of my personality traits (I could make it an ideal or a flaw, even, but let's keep this simple).
In terms of who my character is, or how they behave, is there a difference between those two? If so, what is the difference, and what is the reason for that difference?
The difference is that “Chaotic Good” is the abridged, quick reference “keyword” version, and faster to say, like PHB is for “Player’s Handbook.” It’s a form of shorthand, with two words one can convey the entire concept you needed a dozen words to state explicitly. Like we say “Fighter,” “Barbarian,” and “Monk”instead of “highly trained, disciplined and capable martial combatant who predominantly uses weapons and armor;” “naturally talented but emotionally reckless martial combatant who predominantly uses weapons but eschews armor;” and “highly trained, disciplined, and capable martial combatant who predominantly eschews both weapons and armor.” Does it all mean the same things? Yes, but “Fighter,” “Barbarian,” and “Monk” convey the exact same concepts with a single word, or at a glance.
Repurposing the following from earlier in the thread (if we're gonna propose little quandaries for each other):
I write down "chaotic good" under alignment. Presumably this means I need to remember that that is shorthand for "I act on the basis of my conscience heedless of what others think" but perhaps I've been playing D&D long enough to have already internalized that.
I write down "I act on the basis of my conscience heedless of what others think" as one of my personality traits (I could make it an ideal or a flaw, even, but let's keep this simple).
In terms of who my character is, or how they behave, is there a difference between those two? If so, what is the difference, and what is the reason for that difference?
The difference is that “Chaotic Good” is the abridged, quick reference “keyword” version, and faster to say, like PHB is for “Player’s Handbook.”
So, just to be clear, there is no difference in terms of who my character is, or how they behave?
(Also it's a lot easier to remember an actual abbreviation like "PHB" over alignment shorthand. It's a bit like trying to remember the difference between "action" and "bonus action." You have to learn it first, and even experts get tripped up by details like "if I cast a bonus action spell, I can only cast a cantrip for my regular spellcasting action.")
Two questions that can be driven by the DM can prove surprisingly calming and help cut through the haze of sensory overload inherent when first experiencing a game with infinite options. “Does your character follow a specific code or defer to higher authority, act more in their whims, or fall somewhere in between?” “Is your character more likely to put others first, but themselves first, or fall somewhere in between?”
Great. Ask those questions. That's already miles better than alignment-as-written.
And I would allow any answer. None of this "only 3 acceptable answers" crap; that's just tying their hands for your sake.
LATER EDIT: for example, imagine that the player answered that first question with "Yes, I follow the laws of my state, but screw the feds" or "My family worships Chauntea, but I only follow my family's code, because I think Chauntea is dumb."
Repurposing the following from earlier in the thread (if we're gonna propose little quandaries for each other):
I write down "chaotic good" under alignment. Presumably this means I need to remember that that is shorthand for "I act on the basis of my conscience heedless of what others think" but perhaps I've been playing D&D long enough to have already internalized that.
I write down "I act on the basis of my conscience heedless of what others think" as one of my personality traits (I could make it an ideal or a flaw, even, but let's keep this simple).
In terms of who my character is, or how they behave, is there a difference between those two? If so, what is the difference, and what is the reason for that difference?
The difference is that “Chaotic Good” is the abridged, quick reference “keyword” version, and faster to say, like PHB is for “Player’s Handbook.”
So, just to be clear, there is no difference in terms of who my character is, or how they behave?
(Also it's a lot easier to remember an actual abbreviation like "PHB" over alignment shorthand. It's a bit like trying to remember the difference between "action" and "bonus action." You have to learn it first, and even experts get tripped up by details like "if I cast a bonus action spell, I can only cast a cantrip for my regular spellcasting action.")
Convenient of you to delete the rest of my post that was full of other examples of D&D shorthand that players have to learn and remember. 👍
Haven't they?
I keep seeing people say they don't need/like/use QIBF, or Motivation/Fear, or a number of other methods of helping with character creation. They have Alignment, which was good enough in Red Bix and it's still good enough now
Please do not contact or message me.
No, I don't think anyone on this thread has said that. I've always said that alignment works in conjunction with other features. I like PTBIF, I just like it even more when I'm using alignment with it.
And yes, before people say alignment doesn't work in conjunction with other factors, here's how it does. Alignment provides a general basis/guideline of your characters morality. However their PTIBF's effect how they interact in various situations. For example, if a LG character sees a robber taking money from a baby, their alignment suggests that they probably would interfere. And most likely, they would, but if there flaw is "I hate babies and am unable to sympathize and empathize with them," then they might not help the baby. (Though of course, they might not help the baby either way, the alignment provides an indicator that does not necessarily always get used.)
Alignment helps me, alignment doesn't help you. Ok, you don't have to use it. But no one on this thread said that alignment tells you everything about someone, or that they use it instead of PTBIF's. As I have been trying to communicate this whole thread, (and the last one we debated alignment on too,) no tool works completely on its own to determine everything about your character. Alignment is no exception.
BoringBard's long and tedious posts somehow manage to enrapture audiences. How? Because he used Charm Person, the #1 bard spell!
He/him pronouns. Call me Bard. PROUD NERD!
Ever wanted to talk about your parties' worst mistakes? Do so HERE. What's your favorite class, why? Share & explain
HERE.I will go ahead and say that I think PIBF works completely well on it's own with no need for The Nine whatsoever.
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
Well, tell me what I'm missing then, Bard. Like I said, the character I gave is Neutral Good. What would you describe that character as?
Please do not contact or message me.
And we have our first person on this thread actually arguing that anything about alignment is “universal” - a statement that is simply wrong. One could easily make a neutral good character who has no sympathy for the wicked; one who is a compulsive liar if the lies make the world around them a little better in their eyes. I have a character right now who is a serial killer, but only of those who abuse their spouses/children/elderly parents/other similar situations who probably would best be classified as neutral good.
But, again, no one other than this person is arguing anything about alignment is universal or that you could extrapolate a character from alignment alone. As I have said, alignment is just one tool in a toolbox, and a tool not everyone likes to use. That is no different from how the real world operates - psychologists have dozens of tests they can use for evaluative purposes, each of which has its own flaws and only provides an incomplete look into a personality if viewed on its own. The individual psychologist, by having options, can choose which ones they feel comfortable with and which ones their patients will best respond to.
That is how most folks seem to view alignment - it is a tool of psychological evaluation and, like real world tools, should not be treated as universal truth but rather a smaller part of a greater evaluation… or not used at all in a given case if the treating professional (DM) and/or patient (player/character) do not feel like using it.
Again, that’s all the majority (with only one actual person suggesting any universality to anything in the Nine) of folks on this thread have been saying “I like having this in my tool belt because it helps me/it helps my players.”
Sorry, but you are simply wrong under RAW. The rules clearly establish that alignment is mutable and that the boundaries are not clear. That is why you can have a LG paladin whose pertinence for smiting the wicked makes them almost a murder hobo; there’s no reason a NG equivalent cannot exist, other than a failure to extrapolate accepted practices in one of the Nine to another.
Again, there is only one person on this thread who seems to want to ignore RAW and make alignment into some thing it explicitly is not. That is a minority view among the player base, and, while is a problem, I do not think is a sufficient problem to toss out the entire system. Now, tossing out a player who insists their view is the only correct view (and also might have other problematic ideas about the game which would make them unfun to play with even if alignment did not exist, like, say, for example, “Wizards is wasting its time being more inclusive, other people should just get over it”) makes a lot more sense to me than tossing out a system which the silent majority find flexible, useful, or easy to ignore.
What you're missing is the realization that only one person out of the 2,415 who have viewed this thread so far said that you can use an alignment to describe everything about a character. As I have said ever since I joined this thread, alignment is a tool that works with other tools to help determine a character's actions. Alignment does not work on its own to give a detailed description of one character. It works with other factors to do that.
BoringBard's long and tedious posts somehow manage to enrapture audiences. How? Because he used Charm Person, the #1 bard spell!
He/him pronouns. Call me Bard. PROUD NERD!
Ever wanted to talk about your parties' worst mistakes? Do so HERE. What's your favorite class, why? Share & explain
HERE.Hm. Are you not the one, Caerwyn, who told me that many of your new players ignore all the other, 'harder' tools for character development in favor of solely using alignment?
Curious. If a brand new player can use nothing but alignment to determine the entirety of their character's persona and demeanor, why can't the far more experienced players in this thread tell me the personality and demeanor of my Neutral Good character? Rognir's the only one who's tried. He was not correct outside of very broad, fuzzy, low-rez terms, but he tried. Anyone else care to try?
Please do not contact or message me.
More accurately I said I have players who are not going to bother with a more complicated system that requires them to think about who their character is before the game starts (they like to come up with their quirks and such during the game, not before), and it is perfectly “serviceable” (note I used a word which indicates something being okay, but far from ideal) for them to just give me alignment and they can use the game itself as the way to further flush out alignment.
It’s not how I would do it, and it certainly gives me less up front information as the DM, but *shrugs* if it helps them gry an incomplete foundation for their character that they’ll be able to build on during the game? Sure, they can go for it - no skin off my nose and it helps them, so why would I care?
Repurposing the following from earlier in the thread (if we're gonna propose little quandaries for each other):
In terms of who my character is, or how they behave, is there a difference between those two? If so, what is the difference, and what is the reason for that difference?
This is going to sound like a silly answer: The first is shorter and that has utility. There’s already a lot to grasp for new players and the idea of coming up with quirks independently or reading a dozen or so addition sentences and having to review and choose one (especially if done at the end, like Beyond has it set up to do) can be surprisingly overwhelming.
Two questions that can be driven by the DM can prove surprisingly calming and help cut through the haze of sensory overload inherent when first experiencing a game with infinite options. “Does your character follow a specific code or defer to higher authority, act more in their whims, or fall somewhere in between?” “Is your character more likely to put others first, but themselves first, or fall somewhere in between?”
Two nice, simple questions, with only three choices each. I cannot count the number of times giving my new and overwhelmed characters that very simple foundation proved a useful launching point for building something more complex.
Check out the Personal Characteristics from an NPC in Radiant Citadel:
Personality Trait. “Success for my business and success for my family are one and the same.”
Ideal. “My family’s legacy will spread across the land.”
Bond. “My son is the light of my life.”
Flaw. “It’s not that I’m paranoid; it’s that a lot of people want what I have.”
I mean, this makes it so easy to roleplay this character. What is their Alignment? Honestly irrelevant because adding an Alignment on top of this wouldn't add that much, in my opinion. You could place this character in a fair amount of different societies and all that would change are the social mores.
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
The difference is that “Chaotic Good” is the abridged, quick reference “keyword” version, and faster to say, like PHB is for “Player’s Handbook.” It’s a form of shorthand, with two words one can convey the entire concept you needed a dozen words to state explicitly. Like we say “Fighter,” “Barbarian,” and “Monk”instead of “highly trained, disciplined and capable martial combatant who predominantly uses weapons and armor;” “naturally talented but emotionally reckless martial combatant who predominantly uses weapons but eschews armor;” and “highly trained, disciplined, and capable martial combatant who predominantly eschews both weapons and armor.” Does it all mean the same things? Yes, but “Fighter,” “Barbarian,” and “Monk” convey the exact same concepts with a single word, or at a glance.
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Content Troubleshooting
So, just to be clear, there is no difference in terms of who my character is, or how they behave?
(Also it's a lot easier to remember an actual abbreviation like "PHB" over alignment shorthand. It's a bit like trying to remember the difference between "action" and "bonus action." You have to learn it first, and even experts get tripped up by details like "if I cast a bonus action spell, I can only cast a cantrip for my regular spellcasting action.")
Great. Ask those questions. That's already miles better than alignment-as-written.
And I would allow any answer. None of this "only 3 acceptable answers" crap; that's just tying their hands for your sake.
LATER EDIT: for example, imagine that the player answered that first question with "Yes, I follow the laws of my state, but screw the feds" or "My family worships Chauntea, but I only follow my family's code, because I think Chauntea is dumb."
Convenient of you to delete the rest of my post that was full of other examples of D&D shorthand that players have to learn and remember. 👍
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting