The example is from before there were aligned-at-start [well, really they're not: they've passed the initial corruption threshold already and begin with at least 15] archetypes to choose from.

However, re-reading the text, I'll admit its possible to interpret it as "after you've aligned". However, if that's the case, the example can also be taken to imply you need ten corruption points AFTER getting enough advances in order to change or de-align.

Probably best we just stick to the text of the rules then?

That's how our group got it, every 10 Corruption you check the advances of your character; if you have 5 more aligned to a specific god than the other three, you're aligned to that god, else you are unaligned (again).

Not "every multiple of ten". If we follow that example so literally as to mean that you do indeed un-align, then with its wording:

" If he then selects a Talent with the key word “Khorne,” he would only have 4 more Talents aligned to Nurgle than any other Gods. However, his alignment would not change until he received 10 more Corruption Points."

If you were at 18 corruption, aligned, and gained a talent that brings you out of your nurgleness, its at 28 if no other shifts occur that this will happen.

The more I stare at it the more I think that example has to just be tossed out for a better one.

Personally the way I handle it is thus: You must have five advances aligned to your god to gain its alignment. The archetype has the alignment. The archetype therefore counts as having five advances toward its god at creation. Go from there. Doing the it-is-magically-aligned-for-no-reason-but-we-say-so method makes little sense to me. One rule says it takes five, the archetype says it has it, common sense adds up to the archetypes having five. No need to apply houserules or brutally penalize a khorne bezerker who gets 5 corruption before getting the experience needed to puchase five khorne aligned advances.

Cryhavok said:

You just applied a houserule. It's a good houserule, in fact the exact same as I would use, but a houserule nonetheless.

The difference between my interpretation, and your interpretation, is that mine actually uses the text. That's why mine is more valid - it actually follows from what's presented. You talk about 'rule of five' but that isn't even a thing. It's only *ever* based off of the number of non-archetype advances a character has - in fact, it's possible to be aligned to a god while having less than 5 more advances to that god (if you have bought up another god's talents and you haven't hit a corruption threshold yet). It is *never* the case that one would get 'phantom' advances without taking talents - that's something you're making up, from whole cloth. You're mistaking what you wish to be true for what's actually there.

Cryhavok said:

This explanation makes the most sense. Instead of Khorne, I'll take the example of the a Thousand Sons Sorcerer since it's more familiar to me. When you look at the Thousand Sons Sorcerer vs an Unaligned Sorcerer from the the Core Rulebook, you notice that the Thousand Sons Sorcerer begins with the following MANDATORY alignment advances which are ALL lacking for the Unaligned Sorcerer:

*****

TZEENTCH

- +5 Willpower

- 1 Forbidden Lore

- Logic

- Foresight or Strong Minded

- Warp Sense

- Boon of Tzeentch

*****

SLAANESH

- +5 Fellowship

*****

NURGLE

- Resistance

*****

KHORNE

- Command

Therefore, you see that there are 6 advances towards Tzeentch and 1 towards each of Slaanesh, Nurgle, and Khorne. This is analogous to the Unaligned Sorcerer purchasing the above Advances and becoming aligned to Tzeentch.

However, one problem still exists in that both the Thousand Sons Sorcerer and Unaligned Sorcerer have Advances to choose from that present an option. For examples: (1) Meditation (Tzeentch) or Mimic (Slaanesh), (2) Scrutiny (Tzeentch) or Deception (Slaanesh). If during Character Creation Mimic and Deception are chosen, then that breaks the Character Alignment system.

This problem can be pseudo-solved if we invoke the rule from the Core Rulebook that Alignment isn't checked during Character Creation. So, on one hand we are saying that Advances during Character Creation don't count, but on the other hand we provide a viable explanation where the Alignment comes from - viable purchases from an Unaligned Sorcerer that completed several Compacts.

It would be unreasonable to say that the (original) Unaligned Sorcery would not count all those Advances when reaching the Corruption Point thresholds of 10 or 20, therefore, why should the Thousand Sons Sorcerer ignore them? That doesn't make sense.

However, starting the Thousand Sons Sorcerer with an Alignment count of 5 seems arbitrary. I would propose that in the cases where an Archetype begins play already Aligned, that a comparison be done between that character and the unaligned counterpart from the Core Rulebook. Then, isolate all the Advances that don't appear in the Core Rulebook archetype, tally up the numbers, and use that as the alignment counts. Even if the tallies don't give a minimum of 5 advances, it's bound to be close. So, the next time Alignment is checked, it's possible to become unaligned, but within reasonable limits, perhaps 1 or 2 Advances.

Terraneaux said:

Actually what you did was see a lack of text on a subject, namely how to handle this situation with pre-aligned characters, and then you ported over text from a different situation (the normal rules for handling characters that can not be aligned at character creation ) without applying any common sense to it at all. The rules for this situation have not been written by FFG, so you are no more valid than me.

The part that has me completely convinced that your way is wrong is actually the part where a khorne berzerker loses 8 from all stats if it is ever not aligned to khorne. Using your rules, this could very well happen in the first session, before the player has even had a chance to get any advances, much less 5+. It is extremely likely to happen before a player has recieved enough experience to get the requisite 5. It is unlikely that the player will be able to avoid that penalty. The thousand sons sorceror would be simularly penalized by the loss of all it's tzeentch psychic powers. I do not believe FFG intends for the players to, almost unavoidably, run into these penalties.

So you can go ahead and have your interpretation, and I will continue to use the "a character can not gain an alignment without having at least 5 aligned advances" interpretation. Also the number 5 is not arbitrary, it is the minimum needed to gain an alignment. If I were to go with a different way, it would be the count the differences method. The only reason I don't is that I don't consider the advanced archetypes to be simple upgrades of the base archetypes. If they were they would have the same special abilities, with something added, at least that is the way I see it.

And you are right, you can have an alignment without having 5 advances towards one god. You can not, however, gain an alignment without having 5 advances towards one god. As I see it, those archetypes are gaining an alignment at character creation, hence my application of the rule.

For alignment purposes, the archetype is irrelevant. There is no bearing on the alignment whether you are CSM Sorcerer, Thousand Sons, or Disciple of Chaos Psyker. When you look at my example of the Thousand Sons vs Unaligned Sorcerer, for the purposes of alignment advances, they are indistinguishable.

There is no de facto inherent quality for Thousand Sons to be aligned to Tzeentch. Consider that during the Horus Heresy the Traitor Legions purged from their OWN Legions those that remained Loyal. Also consider what happened as a result of the Rubric - some Thousand Sons remained on good terms with Magnus, while others did not. Therefore, just because the character is a "Thousand Sons Sorcerer" shouldn't imply that their is some kind of de facto inherent quality that says he must be aligned to Tzeentch for the purposes of Alignment.

To reinforce the point, the fact that pre-aligned characters CAN change Alignment serves to suggest that there is nothing special about these characters with regards to Alignment. Therefore, in this particular case Alignment can be reasonably treated as being gained through simple Advances of the base Archetype in the Core Rulebook.

However, the pre-aligned characters are unique Archetypes with regards to OTHER matters. For examples, only Thousand Sons Sorcerers have access to Blessings of Magnus and Incendiary of Tzeentch. But this is no different from Disciples of Chaos not being able to wear Legion Power Armour.

With regards to Alignment, though, I would say there are absolutely no differences betwenn a standard CSM Sorcerer, Thousand Sons Sorcerer, and Psyker, or any other Archetype for that matter. All that matters is the number of Advances. In this case, I would not just take "5" Advances for the Alignment, but rather look at the tallies of all the Advances beyond what is granted as a CSM and Sorcerer.

Qaia said:

Well, your approach sure fails the Keep It Simple approach. Who the hell wants to sit down and derive values from other Archetypes (which may or may not have 'basic' versions)? No one I know would bother with all that when the 'take 5' approach is so much easier and gives the needed starting point.

@HappyDaze

It may not be simple (although, let's face it: How difficult is it to open the relevant pages of two books, put them next to each other and look up which advances do not appear in both of them?), but it does help when it comes to mark distribution - a regular character could be somewhat farther along the road to the mark by the XP amount. And many of the advanced archetypes will be striving for the mark ASAP.

Cifer said:

You're making a huge assumption that each advanced archetype clearly derives from one of the basic archetypes. I would say this is incorrect. Consider the Khorne Berserker. It could be argued that it's Champion, Chosen, or Forsaken since it has elements of all three. I instead contend that it's none of those but something unique.

HappyDaze said:

My favorite example of this is the Frost Father. What is his supposed "base" archetype? And what do you do if your advanced archetype doesn't have a skill or talent that the base one does? Also do you figure different values for q'sal sorcerors for each of the three cities?

HappyDaze said:

There does seem to be a lot more variety with regards to the Khorne Berserker, now that I look at it. Remarkably, the Thousand Sons Sorcerer is literally a duplicate of the Unaligned Sorcerer. But with regards to the Khorne Berserker, it does appear that treating him as a distint Archetype actually does make more sense since there is not a great deal of overlap with any one distinct Unaligned Archetype from the Core Rulebook. Additionally, a little bit more of a careful reading, the Tomes do actually state "four NEW character Archetypes" (my emphasis, page 26 in Tome of Fate and page 24 in Tome of Blood).

So, I backtrack on my previous statements, but not for the reason of "simplicity", as I always prefer realism to simplicity (even though the rules are flexible to allow for both cases, take for example the case of ammunition as stated in the Core Rulebook).

However, I still think it's unrealistic that the Alignment counts should all be 0 so that a Khorne Berserker or Thousand Sons Sorcerer could become Unaligned without purchasing any Advances at the next Corruption Point threshold. Without any clarifications from FFG, the most reasonable option to me (and closest to realistic situations) would be to set the start the Alignment counts at (5,0,0,0).

Qaia said:

It's unrealistic, but it's what we're left with as the rules don't leave any special case for aligned archetypes.

For my part, I'd throw my hat in the ring with the (5,0,0,0) house rule being the best way to resolve aligned archetypes, since it's not clear if any of the aligned archetypes are clearly based off of 'normal' archetypes.

Qaia said:

So you ended up taking a complicated route to get back to the simple answer I proposed. Extra effort for nothing, but at least you're back on the same page.

HappyDaze said:

No, it wasn't extra effort for nothing. Did I lose some sort of precious time or something that I should regret trying to find a more plausible explanation to implementing a system other than relying on KISS? My time, my efforts. If you want to rely on KISS because your time and efforts are so precious to waste, then go ahead.

Qaia said:

Well, your time, your effort, and…

You accomplished nothing more than to come to the same conclusion as those of us that opted with the quick and simple answer. Should you regret it? No, not if you've learned from it. Some people just have to try harder than others to accomplish the same task.

Qaia said:

No, going by you supposed examples, you apparently can't imagine them.

[ADMIN: Edited for content.]

Khorne is readying the arena for you two. Personally I think this is rediculous. You dont have to see eye to eye. You are allowed to disagree. But it is even possible to do all that without fighting.

And, just to note: There are IIRC two advancements the Chosen does not have in common with the Berzerker; the Frostfather and Chem Warrior are pretty close to the Renegade and the Q'Sal Magister is built entirely upon the psyker. The rest I haven't yet checked.

I realize this is a bit of thread necromancy, but I have a related question.

Advanced archetypes all seem to start with at least 15 Corruption. Does that mean they all start with a Gift of the Gods?