Detect Alignment ever useful in a game?

[Tangerine]

Specifically in video games. There must be cases where it has a use beyond confirming the obviously evil guy is evil.

[rusty_shackleford]

vtmb, auspex

[Tweed]

My brother tried to use it as a paladin in BG1 when he played it blind, figuring that evil npcs were probably up to no good.

[rusty_shackleford]

My brother tried to use it as a paladin in BG1 when he played it blind, figuring that evil npcs were probably up to no good.

Did it work? I tried in IWD and it was useless

[Oyster Sauce]

KOTOR 2
2 of your party members can see force alignments if you switch to first person view while controlling them. I think it can see jedi/sith through walls so you know what's coming. It's also used to see one story character's alignment early on. You can learn it from a companion too. "Useful" is a bit of a stretch though.

[Tweed]

My brother tried to use it as a paladin in BG1 when he played it blind, figuring that evil npcs were probably up to no good.

Did it work? I tried in IWD and it was useless

In the end I think it wound up being obvious. People like Edwin and Silke wanted you to commit murder. The one who seemed kind of fishy was the halfling who wanted to sell you a stone to flesh scroll at an outrageous price for Branwen. As a first time player though if you detect before you speak it at least gives you the idea that this person is going to lie to you or at least give you a quest that's going to go against your beliefs.

[Acrux]

My brother tried to use it as a paladin in BG1 when he played it blind, figuring that evil npcs were probably up to no good.

Did it work? I tried in IWD and it was useless

BGs and IWD were notoriously bad about correct alignment and creature types for NPCs and some enemies. The Oversight mod fixed that for BG2 - I don't know if the EEs took Oversight's fixes.

[flecktarn]

I remember a quest in BG2 where it was useful. In the docks district, I think. Been a while, so don't recall the details.

[Tangerine]

My brother tried to use it as a paladin in BG1 when he played it blind, figuring that evil npcs were probably up to no good.

Did it work? I tried in IWD and it was useless

In the end I think it wound up being obvious. People like Edwin and Silke wanted you to commit murder. The one who seemed kind of fishy was the halfling who wanted to sell you a stone to flesh scroll at an outrageous price for Branwen. As a first time player though if you detect before you speak it at least gives you the idea that this person is going to lie to you or at least give you a quest that's going to go against your beliefs.

IWD is what brought it up. I saw it in the spell list on level up and couldn't think of a single time foreknowledge of alignment would have been useful, since most evil characters are so cartoonishly evil you know within the first dialogue box. It'd be neat if you could detect alignment and use it to accuse an NPC of being evil/underhanded.

[Acrux]

Did it work? I tried in IWD and it was useless

In the end I think it wound up being obvious. People like Edwin and Silke wanted you to commit murder. The one who seemed kind of fishy was the halfling who wanted to sell you a stone to flesh scroll at an outrageous price for Branwen. As a first time player though if you detect before you speak it at least gives you the idea that this person is going to lie to you or at least give you a quest that's going to go against your beliefs.

IWD is what brought it up. I saw it in the spell list on level up and couldn't think of a single time foreknowledge of alignment would have been useful, since most evil characters are so cartoonishly evil you know within the first dialogue box. It'd be neat if you could detect alignment and use it to accuse an NPC of being evil/underhanded.

Curse you, Pomab!!!

[Rand]

Alignment was Gygax's biggest mistake to put in game.

Moorcock's law vs. chaos paradigm (where that ******** came from, including... choke... "alignment languages"... barf...) only really (sort-of) works in his settings and is, IMO, silly in the kind of game D&D became.

Detect good and detect evil should only detect supernatural manifestations of good and evil, and not mortals.
Detect law and detect chaos are just generally stupid, though you could make an argument for supernatural chaos.
(Just not "chaos" beings like Slaadi. And since they follow rigid rules on how they live and function how are they chaotic, anyway?).

[Acrux]

Moorcock's law vs chaos = bad

Poul Anderson's law vs chaos = good

[Rand]

Moorcock's law vs chaos = bad

Poul Anderson's law vs chaos = good

If anything, I dislike Anderson's wishy-washy system more.

[Norfleet]

I favor the Williamsist view on alignment.

[Tangerine]

In the end I think it wound up being obvious. People like Edwin and Silke wanted you to commit murder. The one who seemed kind of fishy was the halfling who wanted to sell you a stone to flesh scroll at an outrageous price for Branwen. As a first time player though if you detect before you speak it at least gives you the idea that this person is going to lie to you or at least give you a quest that's going to go against your beliefs.

IWD is what brought it up. I saw it in the spell list on level up and couldn't think of a single time foreknowledge of alignment would have been useful, since most evil characters are so cartoonishly evil you know within the first dialogue box. It'd be neat if you could detect alignment and use it to accuse an NPC of being evil/underhanded.

Curse you, Pomab!!!

He's an arrogant, over-charging sand ****** that was sent to a frozen shithole to keep him away from the royal court. Of course he'd pop evil.

[SoLong]

(Just not "chaos" beings like Slaadi. And since they follow rigid rules on how they live and function how are they chaotic, anyway?).

I'd love to known why you think they follow rigid rules? Their society is basically anarchic tribalism, any rules they do have constantly change on a whim, they don't understand traditional diplomacy and their trains of thought are mindbendingly convoluted for non-Limbo beings.

[Rand]

(Just not "chaos" beings like Slaadi. And since they follow rigid rules on how they live and function how are they chaotic, anyway?).

I'd love to known why you think they follow rigid rules? Their society is basically anarchic tribalism, any rules they do have constantly change on a whim, they don't understand traditional diplomacy and their trains of thought are mindbendingly convoluted for non-Limbo beings.

Their "biology".
They have a defined froggy form.
They follow explicit rules about which form is generated and why
Red slaad produce blue slaad, while blue slaad produce red slaad, with green slaad only being produced from infected spellcasters, and they they always evolve into gray slaad if they live long enough.
And their powers are basically fixed (unless the DM gets creative and makes major variants) with the only "chaos powers" being an alignment damage burst and an alignment damage protection spell. The rest of their powers are control spells that seem more "lawful" than anything.
And they have a literal hierarchy with demigod like slaad at the top.

Nothing about that says "primordial chaos" to me.
If you were to make chaos creatures, these aren't it.

[asf]

green salad

[Ilovecheezecake]

In IWD1 a paladin could sense the evilness of a npc and expose the yuan ti early on

[Humbaba]

Paladin CHARNAME's personal quest in BG2 requires you to use detect alignment to figure out whether or not the guy trying to take your ward (some ********'s daughter if I recall) away on a trip is evil. Afaik, him being evil is randomly generated.