LostSoul said:
Self-doubt from facing far too many no-win situations, where the Paladin is forced to pick between the lesser of two evils.
This one rings true for me. I imagine being a paladin as not necessarily something you choose, or a job description you must adhere to, but rather something you
are with all of your being. You don't spare a guy because your code says so, you spare a guy because you truly believe it's the
right thing to do. Same with smiting evil. As a result, the only way a true paladin can really fall is by betraying himself, by becoming something other than he had been.
That said, the most likely scenario for a fallen paladin, as I see it, wouldn't be a lack of faith, but an over-abundance of it, pushing him over the line between righteous and tyrannical.
Imagine if you will a paladin, Ser Galahad. Galahad is an honest, trusting, and truly innocent soul, and as such has been chosen by his god to represent his living will among mankind. He carries a sword which he wields for righteousness.
But then one day he comes to a clearing. In it he finds six young men and women, all brutally slaughtered. The horrors he sees in that clearing will haunt him always, rising up from his nightmares every time he closes his eyes, filling the emptiness between thoughts with a nameless dread he will never quite be rid of. Clutching his sword in a white-knuckled fist, he rides on, determined to find the culprits.
Eventually he arrives in a town nearby. It's a small town, but there is new construction in the town square. A clocktower is being added onto the local church, of his god no less. The villagers are in a great mood. The atmosphere almost seems festive. When he mentions the murders in the clearing, the people claim to know nothing, but Galahad realizes quickly that they are lying to him. They know something. He asks again---forcefully---and discovers the truth.
It had been a bad year, you see. Crops had been poorer than expected, and most of the villagers had been struggling to make ends meet. So when the traveling necromancer happened by, offering a thousand gold crowns for the lives of six youths... Well, it had been a difficult decision, of course, but in the end, they'd had no choice. Six lives bartered for the lives of six hundred. Of course, they had no idea that the man would
torture them! That is truly horrible. But they hadn't known that. They thought it would be a clean death. And even if the six suffered, at least some good has come of it. Now, not only are they spared the pains of a poor harvest, but they even have enough money to build a new clocktower...
The paladin is stunned. He remembers the bodies, knows more intimately than he can bear the horrors which were visited upon them. These villagers...these creatures...delivered six innocent souls into...
that...because of a few failed crops?! And now, with the blood still fresh on their hands, they are holding a festival, are in fact building a new clocktower onto the church in the name of
his god?!
In an instant, the rage floods his soul like liquid fire. No, these creatures are no longer human. They sold their humanity the moment they sold six of their own to torture and death. They are nothing. No better than rabid dogs who attack innocent children. They
are rabid dogs. No, not dogs. Snakes. Snakes which must be
destroyed.
He thinks not of redemption. He thinks not of justice or righteousness. Only vengeance. Six innocents died in that clearing, and the villagers are
celebrating! Almost blind with anger...with
hatred...he storms into the village square, where the townspeople have gathered in the church for a sermon. He bolts the doors closed, knowing everyone is inside, knowing there will be no way for them to escape.
And he burns it down.
And when at last the flames give way to darkness once more, the blackened ash which is all that remains of the church and its six hundred occupants is as nothing compared to the blackness that lives in Galahad's soul.
Damn them. He thinks, red-rimmed eyes filled with hate. Hate for a humanity that could do what had been done in that clearing. Hate for a humanity that could celebrate afterward.
Damn them all.
He slowly turns, and walks into the night.
