thumb|A D&D alignment chart
In the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game, alignment is a categorization of the ethical and moral perspective of player characters, non-player characters, and creatures.
Most versions of the game feature a system in which players make two choices for characters. One is the character's views on "law" versus "chaos", the other on "good" versus "evil". The two ,<!--"Axes" is the plural of "axis"; pronounced with a long E--> along with "neutral" in the middle, allow for nine alignments in combination. Later editions of D&D have shifted away from tying alignment to specific game mechanics; instead, alignment is used as a roleplaying guide and does not need to be rigidly adhered to by the player.
The original version of D&D (1974) allowed players to choose among three alignments when creating a character: lawful, implying honor and respect for society's rules; chaotic, implying rebelliousness and individualism; and neutral, seeking a balance between the extremes.
In 1976, Gary Gygax published an article title "The Meaning of Law and Chaos in Dungeons and Dragons and Their Relationships to Good and Evil" in The Strategic Review Volume 2, issue 1, that introduced a second axis of good, implying altruism and respect for life, versus evil, implying selfishness and no respect for life. The 1977 release of the Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set incorporated this model. As with the law-versus-chaos axis, a neutral position exists between the extremes. Characters and creatures could be lawful and evil at the same time (such as a tyrant), or chaotic but good (such as Robin Hood).
Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (AD&D), released between 1977 and 1979, continued the two-axis system. The 1981 version of the Basic Set went back to the earlier one-axis alignment system.
AD&D 2nd Edition, released in 1988, retained the two-axis system. In that edition, a character who performs too many actions outside their alignment can find their alignment changed, and is penalized by losing experience points, making it harder to reach the next level.
D&D 3rd Edition, released in 2000, kept the same alignment system. However the Eberron Campaign Setting (2004), released for 3.5 Edition, subverted many of the established D&D tropes including alignment. Evil beings of traditionally good races and good beings of traditionally evil races were encouraged but the alignment definition remained true to D&D standards, with good and evil retaining their meanings. Oppositely aligned characters will side with each other briefly if a threat looms over all. Keith Baker highlighted that in Eberron "alignment is a spectrum". In that edition, "good" replaced neutral good and did not encompass chaotic good; "evil" replaced neutral evil and did not encompass lawful evil; "unaligned" replaced true neutral and did not encompass lawful neutral and chaotic neutral. 4th Edition was the start of de-emphasizing alignment in D&D. Wired highlighted that 4th Edition's de-emphasis of "alignment and traditional racial stereotypes", along with other adjustments to the core races, allowed for more "PCs and NPCs with unknown and shifting motives".
D&D 5th Edition, released in 2014, returned to the previous schema of nine alignments, and included a tenth option of "unaligned" for creatures that operate on instinct, not moral decision-making. With 5th Edition, alignment was decoupled from most of the D&D game mechanics, such as "no rules that limit certain classes to characters of a specific alignment, or spells that impact characters differently depending on" alignment. In December 2021, official errata removed the suggested alignments for playable races in 5th Edition sourcebooks. Mordenkainen Presents: Monsters of the Multiverse (2022), a sourcebook which revised roughly 250 previously published monsters, removed preassigned alignments for creatures except in the cases of specifically named characters. Creature stat blocks that also have playable races "now state that they can be any alignment" while "other monsters, such as demons, with a strong association to a given alignment feature the word 'typically' next to their alignment. This insinuates that exceptions to a preassigned alignment are possible, encouraging DMs to potentially subvert player expectations and utilize monsters in unanticipated ways".
A character's alignment can change. If a lawful neutral character consistently performs good acts, when neutral or evil actions were possible, the character's alignment will shift to lawful good. During game sessions, the Dungeon Master decides when alignment violations occur, as it is subjective and often frowned upon, if not outright disallowed. Bill Slavicsek and Richard Baker's Dungeon Master for Dummies noted that a party of good or neutral characters works better as the motivations for adventures are easier, the group dynamics are smoother, and the "heroic aspects of D&D shine through in ways that just don't happen when players play evil characters". Although player characters can adventure for personal gain rather than from altruistic motives, it is generally assumed that the player characters will be opposed to evil and will tend to fight evil creatures.
The third edition D&D rules define "good" and "evil" as follows:
Lawful good
A lawful good character typically acts with compassion and always with honor and a sense of duty. However, lawful good characters will often regret taking any action they fear would violate their code, even if they recognize such action as being good. Such characters include gold dragons, righteous knights, paladins, and most dwarves.
Neutral good
A neutral good character typically acts altruistically, without regard for or against lawful precepts such as rules or tradition. A neutral good character has no problems with cooperating with lawful officials, but does not feel beholden to them. In the event that doing the right thing requires the bending or breaking of rules, they do not suffer the same inner conflict that a lawful good character would. Examples of this alignment include many celestials, some cloud giants, and most gnomes. Salon television critic Heather Havrilesky, while reviewing the HBO television series True Blood, analyzed the program's characters in terms of D&D alignments and identified protagonist Sookie Stackhouse as chaotic good, her vampire boyfriend Bill Compton as lawful neutral, Eric Northman as lawful evil, and Lafayette Reynolds as chaotic neutral. In "Hostiles and Calamities", the 11th episode of season 7 of The Walking Dead television series, the character Eugene Porter makes a reference to the D&D alignment system when describing himself as "...not good. I'm not lawful, neutral, or chaotic." The alignment chart Internet meme humorously categorizes various items—often characters from works of pop culture—in a three-by-three grid.
The system has also been used in research into how people create virtual avatars in the digital world. For example, the computer role-playing game Neverwinter Nights 2 inherits the D&D alignment system and researchers have used the NW2 avatar creation process to show that American undergraduate students tend to select avatars that are similar to their own moral values.
Zachary Pilon, for Comic Book Resources, commented that alignment in 5th Edition Dungeons & Dragons is now "more of a storytelling tool" than something with "mechanical benefits", adding that "the history of the mechanic means that Wizards of the Coast is unlikely to ever remove it in entirely, but the current nine options are outdated and should either be improved or changed outright". Pilon highlighted that "the variety of ways each individual alignment can be interpreted or justified can lead to a single character being viewed as several alignments, with each being just as appropriate as the other. While this is alright when it comes to placing favorite movie or anime characters on the D&D alignment chart, the individual interpretation of in-game alignments means players can be upset with where a Dungeon Master places their character or how the setting applies an objective morality to what is a subjective view of morals and ethics". Pilon suggested that the more complex alignment system from Wizards of the Coast's Magic: The Gathering—five colors of mana with 32 unique combinations which correspond to various outlooks—could be adapted to Dungeons & Dragons in order to update the alignment system.
Since 2018, the alignment system has also been popularized as an Internet meme, with users making their own alignment charts to humorously categorize objects, fictional characters, celebrities, animals, and even abstract concepts. Online communities have also been made around the meme, such as r/AlignmentCharts, a subreddit dedicated to sharing and creating alignment charts that apply the format to many different themes with different alignments being introduced.
See also
- Alignment (role-playing games)
- Book of Exalted Deeds
- Book of Vile Darkness