In Defense of Alignment
A lot of the discourse I see on alignment seems to veer one of two ways: 1. Alignment is outdated and restricting, putting a stranglehold on players that dictates how their characters should act in particular situations. 2. Alignment doesn't really add anything to the game. I'll try to tackle these in some sort of organized chaos. Is alignment outdated? By edition standards, yes. Fifth Edition has undeniably removed any semblance of significance that alignment may have on the game. At this point, alignment is strictly a barometer for general disposition that gives DMs a shorthand on "how should the character think about things?" Spells and features that target "evil" or "good" actually target specific creature types instead. Clerics and Paladins can lose their powers for ticking off their deities or breaking their oaths, but these things are generally very tangentially connected to alignment. Among old school gamers, alignment lives on ...