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I'll admit it upfront, I'm so incredibly happy that alignment by and large went away in 4th edition D&D and I tend to fight anyone who wants to bring it back. Well, if they want to bring it back for their group, that's cool, but I'll still cry a little on the inside.

I blame it on my misspent youth. In college, I was a government major, specializing in law and philosophy. I spent years studying various governmental systems, the philosophies behind them and how they shape the societies they govern. Add to that background my senior seminar, focused on democratic institutions in a pluralistic society, and you might forgive me for having a hard time with the good versus evil alignment in many role playing games.

In the end, I keep asking myself what is good and what is evil. I know what good and evil are to me and I have some examples I consider to be universal, but I know in the course of our human history, the lines have shifted often. For instance, today we have a hard time putting someone to death for stealing seed corn. Given modern transportation infrastructure, replacement seed can be obtained and we have an abundance of it, at least in the US and other industrialized nations. However, back when such a theft was punishable by death, stealing seed corn meant that while your stomach might be full for an evening or so, the whole town would starve that winter.

Besides, many times the most evil acts are committed by those who think they are doing what is right. The Spartans thought they were doing the right thing by refusing to rear the deformed or weak. The Church thought it was doing God's work by killing the heretics and forcing the conversion of millions of people. But I'm not sure how many players would feel comfortable calling these characters or actions good today.

But something should take the place of alignments. I'm far from the only person to advocate the use of personality traits and a character's personal moral code rather than alignment. By expanding beyond a simple one or two word summary of a character's world outlook and motivations, everyone at the table gains a better understanding of the character. And if these traits are discussed with the group as a whole, it's much easier to have a party of mixed values without having it devolve into a series of arguments.

Actually, this type of character building is what appeals to me in the FATE system. In games built from those rules, characters have aspects, a word or phrase that describes them, that can be used to gain bonuses in play through the use of fate points. From my understanding, if the player wants to do something and it's in line with one of the character's aspects, she can spend a fate point to try to make sure it happens.

Let's say that my character considers herself a real charmer. She tries to talk her way past a guard and, well, I don't roll well enough. But she really wants to get past them. If I have a fate point, I can tell my game master that I want to try to use the charming aspect of my character to help me get past the guards. We would then resolve the action, allowing me to reroll or add 2 to a roll result.

What's nice about the system is that there is both a limit to the number of fate points and a way to replenish them. One way to get fate points is through the compel mechanic. The GM can ask a player to do something that might be detrimental to the character but fits with the character concept. For instance, if a character is stubborn, he might continue to argue a point long after it becomes clear he will not win. As a result, he probably suffers a negative consequence, anything from a physical altercation to losing the support of the other character. This rewards the player for allowing his character to have complications placed in his way and gives him the tools to overcome those issues down the road. And, for many groups, having these sorts of complications makes for a better story.

Such a system easily could be incorporated in many D&D games, perhaps with a similar reroll or bonus mechanic. At the very least, I find this sort of character building far superior to any alignment system. As an added bonus, it completely ignores trying to create universal definitions of good and evil which are bound to be a bit overly simplified and arbitrary and highly influenced by our own prejudices.

GRAIN OF SALT (to be taken internally while reading this post): I am not a Twilight fan, and while I tried to give it a fair shake, I'm afraid a bit of sarcastic vitriol has worked its way into this post. Please bear in mind that my HIGH AND MIGHTY JUDGEMENT of the movie is not a high and mighty judgement of its fans. I'm glad other people like it, for it saves me the trouble of trying too hard, myself.

My first impression of the Twilight series was that it was about a girl named Bella and her struggle to choose which abusive relationship she'd rather be in: cold and controlling or angry and violent. I wasn't impressed with the characters, and found the idea of the central plot to be horrible. Recently, however, some "friends" of mine brought over Twilight: New Moon (and the appropriate RiffTrax as an accompaniment), and I finally sat down and actually watched it. The. Whole. Damn. Thing.

It's a terrible movie. Let's be clear about that. But even the worst movie has some redeeming moments and, in the proper context, can provoke discussion and interest, and New Moon is no exception. As I watched, I realized I'd seen these archetypes marketed to pre-teen girls and their mothers before. A pale, effeminate character who is vaguely aloof but very, very pretty? Legolas would only need a handful of glitter to translate into Edward Cullen. A dark and dangerous individual who, while being heir to an ancient legacy, still remains devoted to the one he loves? If Aragorn had a few tufts of fur on him...

It's not a completely cromulent comparison. Aragorn and Legolas had something that no character in New Moon has: depth. But the tweeny reaction to their onscreen presence? There are some very strong parallels to be drawn there. So, if we can draw lines, however tenuous, between New Moon and Lord of the Rings, and from there make the leap to D&D, then Kevin Bacon does so declare that I should attempt to mine New Moon for some sort of D&D trope application.

It was surprisingly easy. It only required a slight change of context and the removal of all of the horribly convenient plot devices that the author seems to rely heavily upon. Consider this: Vampires are hideous monsters. They are known to take to themselves a thrall, someone who becomes devoted to them due to the vampire's ability to psychologically manipulate the poor mortal.

If I look at the Twilight movies as the story of a thrall, told from the perspective of a thrall, many things begin to make much more sense. It turns Bella from a vapid, useless twit to a much more tragic character. Because the story is told from the perspective of one already socially manipulated to be devoted to her vampire master, it makes sense that Edward would be seen as a sympathetic character instead of the monster we know him to be. For all we know, vampires really do sparkle in the eyes of their thralls. If all Edward is doing is meant to break Bella further, to enslave her body and mind and ensure her complete, unshakeable devotion, then I say he's doing a damn good job at being a monster, as he should be.

With this, the context of the movie changes; I know there is no hope for Bella, but I can hope for her anyway, that she might break the enchantment of her vampiric lord. I can wait, breathless, as the shirtless Jacob almost manages to pull her from her doomed path, and question whether she'd really be better off with the shamelessly violent wolf-child or if her death as a thrall would be more humane. The sheer insanity of the movies becomes compelling fiction, if only we can remember that while Bella is a thrall, we are not, and we can tell the monsters from the men in the world.

This, then, applies itself far more liberally to a D&D plot. A poor girl's family beseeches help, as she has recently turned moody and violent, with screaming night terrors. Further investigation allows the players to realize that she has been visited often by a dark and mysterious figure, whom they discover is a terrible vampire. Perhaps the girl tries to dissuade the party from confronting the vampire; her defense of him would be vigorous and committed. The party can decide whether the girl is worth saving, both from the vampire and from herself.

This puts the party in the role of Jacob, then, which seems appropriate. It's not hard to translate one murderously violent character into four or five murderously violent characters who also seek fame, fortune, and adventure. If the party pursues the vampire regardless of the girl's feelings, finds his lair, and fights off his other minions, then finally confronting him could be the epic showdown in D&D that I kept praying for over and over while actually watching the movie.

Who knows what other otherwise dismissable media might contribute to our games? What sort of things have you sourced ideas from that may have been utterly ridiculous but you still managed to translate into an interesting and compelling plot?

Jennifer Snyder is an awesome all-around geek girl and a great proponent of tabletop RPGs. When she isn't busy playing games or wreaking havoc on Twitter as @Level30Yinzer, she works on the outstanding RPG-focused non-profit she and her husband founded in 2009. You can find more information at Level30Yinzer.com.

So if you are wondering if I fell off the face of the earth or something, worry not. I spent the last week traveling to and from Indianapolis and my first ever Gen Con. I thought PAX East was amazing and yet Gen Con exceeded even that. One of the big reasons I had such a great time at Gen Con is the Dark Sun game I played in on Friday, run by Chris Sims.

Chris is an amazing Dungeon Master. I hope one day I can be as good as him, particularly when it comes to confidence at the table. He's also an awesome story teller and I felt more connected to his game than any other game I've been in.

Beyond Chris, I had the chance to play with two people I knew from Twitter, Jared von Hindman and NewbieDM. In addition to them, Robert Schwalb played with us. Rob was on my list of people to meet at Gen Con so it was a great honor and privilege to play at a table with him, even when he insisted having his character, Taewyn, constantly defile us, which meant we kept taking damage whenever he used certain powers.

Of course, he wouldn't have been able to do that if I didn't keep healing him with my shaman, Malamac, a good shaman and one who was particularly close to 3 other party members. Yet, he was doing so much damage, I justified it in that a living party was better than a dead one.

However, at the end of the adventure, I got my revenge. We defeated the big bad guy before he could finish his evil ritual. At this point, Taewyn thought it best to take over the ritual in case it would make him powerful instead. Since he had just killed, as in negative bloodied hit points, Malamac's close friend, I had to avenge the death. As a result, I attacked Taewyn, rolled a crit, and killed him.

So that is the story of how I was defiled by Robert Schwalb and how I killed his character. It was an awesome game and one I'll remember for a long time. Now to design some t-shirts for my group.

I had a great time running our regular game last night. No one quite wanted to stay on task but we still got through a bunch of story and encounters in the time we had together, which was awesome. The game started easily enough. Last session the PCs had defeated Ragdin and his henchmen when they came to collect the latest group of "volunteers" for the Shadow Army. They allowed Ragdin to live with the promise that he would make it easier for them to enter the mine where they are holding Sirius Darkmagic.

Mimics, Mimics, Everywhere

This session was supposed to be them going to the mine but, like PCs like to do, they took a bit of a detour. The bard was convinced that a man in town, Garel, still had the papers about the Shadow that he stole from various libraries. So they decided to break into the guys house.

Now, I'll be honest, I had nothing planned for this event. I mean, I knew where the guy lived, in the end, he was just a dwarf who had more money than sense thanks to the papers he stole. But the players had no idea about this and they started making checks for...every...movement. Perception to see if the door was trapped. Arcana to make sure it didn't have an arcane trap. The list just goes on. Believe me, I'm not complaining, but it told me they wanted something to happen.

Trying to think quickly on my feet, I settled on the idea of mimics. I invented a study on the first floor of Garel's house since that would be a good place for papers. Ok, so a desk full of papers, some chairs and bookcases. What to make into mimics? The desk was a bit obvious, so I settled on the chairs. True to form, they asked all sorts of questions about the desk but the chairs sat there, unnoticed.

So what should be the trigger? Ok, how about one old looking sheet of paper, its corner sticking out from the pile? On it, one word, "Die!". When the bard found the paper, lifted it from the desk and read it, we rolled initiative and had fun with the mimics for a bit. I think the players felt rewarded for their carefulness and they had the fun of reminiscing about instant death traps without their characters actually being in one.

The Shadow Army's Home Base

After they settled out the mimics and terrorized poor Garel, they made their way to the mine. I created this encounter months ago and I'm glad I was finally able to run it. The entrance to the cave is beneath a waterfall cascading off the side of a cliff. One both sides are recently constructed platforms holding dwarf fire archers. While they are using dwarfs to guard, they didn't use them to build, a fact gleefully pointed out by Ragdin to the PCs when they interrogated them. It didn't take much to trigger their collapse, and when the tumbling rocks also wiped out a bunch of minions, things were even more fun.

As the last minion and archer died however, a large form sprang forth from the pool beneath the waterfall. A dragon! It flew high into the air. A few seconds later, the body of a dwarf, Ragdin, fell and landed at the feet of some of the players. The black dragon then landed in front of them and taunted them the best he could. "Did you really think I wouldn't notice that you had turned Ragdin against me?" he asked.

A recent addition to the encounter, I created the dragon that morning. I started with the earthquake dragon from Monster Manual 3 and just changed some things to make it fit a black dragon better. I can't say that it's the best conversion ever, but I'm pretty happy with it. And the exploding aura is pretty awesome. However, working on this dragon did bring a few more bugs in Monster Builder to the surface, but I'm sure they'll fix it soon. One of them involves the additional speeds. For some reason it keeps putting the difference from normal instead of the full distance.

Overall the fight between the PCs and the dragon went really well, with the players honestly afraid for a good portion of the battle. I think having the elite rather than the solo was a great change. It had just the right amount of hit points to worry the players without dragging out the fight past the fun limit.