Alignment in Dungeons & Dragons 5e
Before I delve into alignments for D&D 5e, lets first take a moment to acknowledge that alignment is one of the many controversial aspects of D&D and it is one of the primary reasons many parents object to the game. In short, any game mechanic that encourages and rewards behavior that would be considered “evil” is something any responsible parent should be concerned about. It is for this reason that we do not allow any evil player characters at our kid-friendly games. No exceptions.
There is a severe penalty included in the rules that I use, if players start acting evil despite their good alignment. Characters lose one level and are reduced to the lowest experience point value for that level. Additionally, they lose all hit points, level bonuses, skills, feats etc that were gained as a result of leveling up to the higher level. If the player chose to multi-class and this is the first level of that class, they are striped of the class entirely. This may sound harsh, but it keeps players from going off the deep end with their characters.
Alignment
The creators of D&D established a very clear grid of alignments. Mechanically speaking, these were to be used in many different ways. By stereotyping behavior and personalities, the designers were able to create game mechanics that affected characters in many positive and negative ways.
The alignment system breaks down into three main categories: Good, Neutral, and Evil. Then these are paired with the the behavior modes: Chaotic, Lawful and Neutral. So we are given:
- Lawful Good, “Crusader”
- Neutral Good, “Benefactor”
- Chaotic Good, “Rebel”
- Lawful Neutral, “Judge”
- Neutral, “Undecided”
- Chaotic Neutral, “Free Spirit”
- Lawful Evil, “Dominator”
- Neutral Evil, “Malefactor”
- Chaotic Evil “Destroyer”
Take It or Leave It
The modern version of D&D has much less emphasis on alignment and many players & DM’s will tell you that alignment is only a guide for how to play your character. I disagree entirely. Alignment is something you either need to accept and incorporate into your game, or it must be scraped entirely.
If you are not going to use alignment in your game, don’t use it at all. Maybe you should consider using Cattell’s 16 Personality Factors instead. This is a much better system if your consider alignment to be a guide for how to roleplay a character. Removing alignment from the game also means you have to ignore all of the alignment based effects, spells, benefits and restrictions within the game.
If you want to keep the alignment system, but want to avoid the player drama that inevitably comes from allowing evil characters at your table, simply ban evil characters. If your group is made up of adults that communicate well AND can keep their in-game and out-of-game relationships separate, you can explore allowing evil characters at your table.
Going Down the Dark Side
A final few notes on allowing evil player characters…If you are going down this path, make sure to have a frank discussion with your players. Establish clear guidelines for what is out of bounds. Establish safe words and timeouts.
Check in with players often to make sure that they are not being alienated or put off by the content the game. I highly recommend that there is a check-in before and after every game. Also give players a way to communicate with you privately. They may be too embarrassed to discuss their objections in front of other players.
If a player does confidentiality raise an objection, make sure that you don’t “out them” to the table. In these cases, I like to take the “blame” on myself. I will tell players that I was concerned by the direction or actions that were taken in the previous session and that I want to make sure that we don’t cross that line again. As the DM, I will steer the game away from situations and remind players when boundaries are being threatened.
The first and most clear rule of every game with evil characters, “No means no.” You can say it in many ways, but here is how I say it, “No means no. There is no arguing with no. There is no barging with no. There is no guilt or shame in saying no. If you can’t abide by that rule, there will be no game.”
