How important are alignments?

I don't know if some of my friends would agree with me but I think that too much emphasis on alignments is a dead end. Why? Because alignments are part of a combination of factors which draw on sky, earth, and underworld. But it is a mistake to study or focus on just one aspect - alignments - without studying and trying to understand the rest of the complex context of factors.

Did you know, having read Manitou by Mavor and Dix, that they spend a significant portion of the book writing about rock piles? You probably forgot because that part of their book does not make an impression. Actually Jim spent a lot of time studying rock pile sites in the Falmouth area and writing about it. However the significance of rock piles does not come through in the book because [I claim] the book is focused on alignments and that misses a lot of what rock piles are about [namely the earth and the underworld, by my interpretation].

So what else should people look at, if not alignments?I do not wish to be too didactic but I am interested in topography, shape, materials, and statistics from many sites.