Alignement Question

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fishgeekted
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Alignement Question

Post by fishgeekted »

Any idea on why Alignment should be determined for lvl 0 characters? When everything else was randomly determined, alignment is the one characteristic that the player needs to think about. It seems strange that a player should put any real time into a lvl 0 funnel character, when odds are they will die.

It's quite possible that a player would have to think about alignment for MULTIPLE lvl 0 characters for a funnel adventure, and I'm not sure what the payoff for that would really be in relation to the effort put forth. Granted, its probably not very much effort at all to decide on an alignment, but then why not make it a random decision like the rest of the lvl 0 creation process?

It also seems appropriate to determine the alignment at lvl 1 instead of 0, and base it on the actions the character took during their first adventure(s)?

So why lvl 0 and not lvl 1 for alignment finalization? Is it because of the cleric class and other rules are dependent on alignment?

If so, why not at the very least make it random like the rest of the lvl 0 character creation process?

I apologize for repeating myself, it's been a long day. Cheers!
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Raven_Crowking
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Re: Alignement Question

Post by Raven_Crowking »

I let players wait until PCs are level 1 to fix their alignments. However, if they do not have a fixed alignment, they gain neither bonuses nor penalties associated with alignment.
SoBH pbp:

Cathbad the Meek (herbalist Wizard 1): AC 9; 4 hp; S 7, A 7, St 10, P 17, I 13, L 8; Neutral; Club, herbs, 50' rope, 50 cp; -1 to melee attack rolls. Hideous scar.
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finarvyn
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Re: Alignement Question

Post by finarvyn »

I'm the same as RC.

I figure that zero level dudes are nobodies. They don't have a higher calling to adventure, they don't have a real passion to change the world. They're like Luke Skywalker prior to meeting Obi-wan Kenobi, where they may be restless but have zero motivation to actually do anything significant. They might be good or bad folk, but on an alignment scale are all essentially neutral.

Advancement to first level changes all of that. The characters have had some sort of life-changing experience and survived. They now feel the pull to specialize in something (choose a class) and go out to face real danger and have real adventure. This is the time where they must choose which alignment will shape their career.

Anyhow, that's how I do it.
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DCCfan
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Re: Alignement Question

Post by DCCfan »

finarvyn wrote:I'm the same as RC.

I figure that zero level dudes are nobodies. They don't have a higher calling to adventure, they don't have a real passion to change the world. They're like Luke Skywalker prior to meeting Obi-wan Kenobi, where they may be restless but have zero motivation to actually do anything significant. They might be good or bad folk, but on an alignment scale are all essentially neutral.

Advancement to first level changes all of that. The characters have had some sort of life-changing experience and survived. They now feel the pull to specialize in something (choose a class) and go out to face real danger and have real adventure. This is the time where they must choose which alignment will shape their career.

Anyhow, that's how I do it.
Great explanation. I like this and I'm going to make this a house rule in my game.
"When creating your character,choose an ethical system that can justify nearly any fit of temper, greed, cowardice, or vindictiveness, for example, Chaotic Violent..."

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DM Cojo
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Re: Alignement Question

Post by DM Cojo »

Many of my players roll a d3...why not make it all random!
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finarvyn
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Re: Alignement Question

Post by finarvyn »

DM Cojo wrote:Many of my players roll a d3...why not make it all random!
You could do that, but since alignment is more of an attitude I hate to dictate the attitude that the players have to have during play. It's one thing to dictate if they can fight or cast spells, it's another thing to decide if they have to be good guys or bad guys.

Just my thought on the matter. If random alignment works for your group, go for it. My group wouldn't like it because they are highly cooperative and tend to lean toward "law" and away from "chaos."
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"The worthy GM never purposely kills players' PCs, He presents opportunities for the rash and unthinking players to do that all on their own."
-- Gary Gygax
"Don't ask me what you need to hit. Just roll the die and I will let you know!"
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Doug Kovacs
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Re: Alignement Question

Post by Doug Kovacs »

I agree alignment can wait until after the funnel, unless there is some mechanical reason why players might need to decide an alignment. Most of the time there isn't.


finarvyn wrote:You could do that, but since alignment is more of an attitude I hate to dictate the attitude that the players have to have during play. It's one thing to dictate if they can fight or cast spells, it's another thing to decide if they have to be good guys or bad guys.

Just my thought on the matter. If random alignment works for your group, go for it. My group wouldn't like it because they are highly cooperative and tend to lean toward "law" and away from "chaos."
You get into the whole alignment can of worms here, but I never cease to feel compelled to repeat: Alignment isn't good guys and bad(evil) guys. You can call me inflexible on this point if you want.

You can always make it be that in your game but in my opinion stripping the subtitles of alignment out of the game means stripping out the most interesting thing many adult, thinking, participants enjoy about the game... Like me. We had this discussion a while back on G+ and it was interesting that that conversation started with " law isn't good and chaos isn't evil" and progressed from there.
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finarvyn
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Re: Alignement Question

Post by finarvyn »

Doug Kovacs wrote:We had this discussion a while back on G+ and it was interesting that that conversation started with " law isn't good and chaos isn't evil" and progressed from there.
Ah, well that's what I get for not being a G+ guy, I suppose. I miss good stuff and don't even know it.

My thoughts on alignment are biased by my exposure to OD&D and the way it was done "in the day." I agree that DCC takes a different direction than I do in my campaign.
Marv / Finarvyn
DCC Minister of Propaganda; Deputized 6/8/11 (over 11 years of SPAM bustin'!)
DCC RPG playtester 2011, DCC Lankhmar trivia contest winner 2015; OD&D player since 1975

"The worthy GM never purposely kills players' PCs, He presents opportunities for the rash and unthinking players to do that all on their own."
-- Gary Gygax
"Don't ask me what you need to hit. Just roll the die and I will let you know!"
-- Dave Arneson
"Misinterpreting the rules is a shared memory for many of us"
-- Joseph Goodman
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Doug Kovacs
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Re: Alignement Question

Post by Doug Kovacs »

finarvyn wrote:
Doug Kovacs wrote:We had this discussion a while back on G+ and it was interesting that that conversation started with " law isn't good and chaos isn't evil" and progressed from there.
Ah, well that's what I get for not being a G+ guy, I suppose. I miss good stuff and don't even know it.

My thoughts on alignment are biased by my exposure to OD&D and the way it was done "in the day." I agree that DCC takes a different direction than I do in my campaign.
I understand. there are really so many ways to handle it. For a long time I'd thrown out alignment all together. I also argued a bit for a 9 alignment system in DCC, and used alignment to explore a lot of ideas in my teenaged years that seem very basic, to me now. Ultimately Joe had the final word in the rules of DCC of coarse. Lately I like to interpret alignment as broadly as possible so that every opinion someone might be able to wrap their brain around is permissible under a large banner. I think that's what Joseph was going for while stroking the easiest approaches some people seem to default to. His diplomatic attitude seems to pervade a lot of the game. It's also similar to running a game that encourages roleplaying, but doesn't constantly punish those who might have a more difficult time with it. To me, a world where good and evil are really starkly and obviously different in all areas is a real fantasy land radically different from the reality I've dwelt in. Harley Stoh said something like " there are situations in which lawful creatures go to war with each other, and situations in which the chaotic can cooperate" I agree with that. I feel I'd be somewhat hypocritical to be deciding what is and what is not moral behavior (i.e. good guys and bad guys) in all the myriad situations that PCs might find themselves when philosophers and theologians have been in disagreement for all of history. I don't really want to swap out the opinions of the greater powers or gods in my fantasy world with my opinions, no matter how desirable or easy that might seem to be. In this way I am kind of ironically preaching my own belief system, but one thing I can say is that it's not parochial.
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