Breaking the stereotype of the chaste paladin

[NewJeffCT]

I think this is just a difference in GMing philosophy. In the campaign I'm currently in, we had a similar disagreement over the Monk class. Some people believe that the core classes should be used in all settings; others believe that they should only be used in settings where they correspond to a cultural archetype. For me, having the Paladin class exist outside of medieval Christendom and Islam is as absurd as the Monk class existing within medieval Christendom and Islam.

In my view, if one wants to create a non-spell casting holy warrior for another sort of culture, the Paladin is a less than ideal starting point, just as the Monk is a less than ideal starting point for a generic or European-style ascetic. In my view, non-chivalric holy warriors shouldn't be locked into the code requirement, alignment requirement or pushed so vehemently towards mounted combat.

I have no objection to what people who are trying to universalize the Paladin are trying to achieve. I'm just questioning whether universalizing the Paladin is the most efficient or logical way to do it. Aren't there prestige classes or variant core classes that do a better job of creating warriors dedicated to Tyr and other gods ill-suited to code-following men on horseback?

For somebody like me with little time to devote to gaming (unfortunately) due to a very active 21 month old daughter, a full time job with a long commute and a non-gaming wife, it is easier for me to adapt a paladin or monk to a different culture than it is for me to develop a whole new character or prestige class that is more culturally correct. The group I game with rarely uses prestige classes as it is - I think we have had 1 or 2 since the advent of 3E - so, using a new prestige class potentially opens up a can of worms.

And, it's not like we say "no" to prestige classes - we just don't have that much interest.

 

[fusangite]

True. Chastity/celibacy only becomes an issue if you think all D&D paladins should aspire to be like Galahad, which is apparently the aim for some people (fusangite, for example, if I'm not misreading) posting to this thread. I personally find that incredibly reductionist and not borne out by the PHB paladin's description, so I do not.

You're only kind of misreading. The Readers Digest condensed version of my argument is this:

Part I
1. Core D&D character classes are not all equally culturally universal.
2. Some classes clash with the cultures from which they are not derived such as the Monk and Paladin.
3. There is plenty of D20 material that contains core and prestige classes that are culturally compatible. Thus, if you want to have a divine champion or holy warrior in a non-chivalric culture, you should look in those books. Similarly, if you want to have an ascetic or martial artist in a non-oriental culture, you should look in those books.

Part II
There is a lot of confusion arising from people failing to make distinctions between what archetypal Paladins did and what archetypal Paladins aspired to. Grail knights aspired to celibacy; the fact that not all achieved it does not mean that this is not what they were striving for. In Wolfram von Escheback's Parzifal, the story begins with Parzifal accidentally/innocently raping a woman and killing the Red Knight. But the fact that he does those things doesn't make them part of the ideal behaviour of a grail knight; carnality is depicted in these stories as something that stands between the self and God. People cite the example of Guenivere and Arthur's carnal relationship; but isn't this married status part of what disqualifies Arthur from achieving the grail himself?

 

[Vocenoctum]

You're only kind of misreading. The Readers Digest condensed version of my argument is this:

Part I
1. Core D&D character classes are not all equally culturally universal.
2. Some classes clash with the cultures from which they are not derived such as the Monk and Paladin.
3. There is plenty of D20 material that contains core and prestige classes that are culturally compatible. Thus, if you want to have a divine champion or holy warrior in a non-chivalric culture, you should look in those books. Similarly, if you want to have an ascetic or martial artist in a non-oriental culture, you should look in those books.

I simply have to disagree.
There are entire orders of monks and paladins in FR. I think you're reading too much into the paladin that simply isn't there. To put it another way, it's possible to build your grail knight from the paladin class, but not everyone of the paladin class must be, or aspire to, the Grail Knight archetype.

Part II
There is a lot of confusion arising from people failing to make distinctions between what archetypal Paladins did and what archetypal Paladins aspired to.

How many times in the arthurian mythos were they called paladins? Taking only first edition's paladin, they are charitable warriors of good that fight evil, and must adhere to a code of lawfulness and goodness. They (unlike most people) are punished for straying by lose of powers. Anything else is simply added by your own preconceptions, not the material.

I think the grail knights are more Exalted types, rather than paladins. It's not like paladins are the top of the Good Pile.

 

[Lord Pendragon]

Anything else is simply added by your own preconceptions, not the material.

And yet, the fact that many of us share those preconceptions might indicate something in the material itself is fostering them, don't you think?

Incidentally, FR is a world created around the foibles of D&D. It's nonsensical to try and use FR to in turn justify those foibles.

I think the grail knights are more Exalted types, rather than paladins. It's not like paladins are the top of the Good Pile.

I disagree. I believe that the entire "exalted" concept is an way to bring the goodness that paladins exemplify in the standard D&D game to the rest of the classes. A paladin is a bastion of good right out of the box. To get the same thing as a rogue, you tack on "exalted." Using "exalted" when describing a paladin is, IMO, superfluous.

 

[Agback]

Agreed - my original post on this subject over a week ago was me wondering if people played the paladin any differently than the chaste/celibate/sexless Sir Galahad archetype.

I have done so. My last paladin was married, and he considered his wife to be the best thing in his life except for God. He didn't like fighting, and found the necessity of using violence from time to time in his calling very distressing. If he had not been married he would have become an Augustinian monk, so basically his wife was the only thing that kept him paladining. (The campaign year was AD 1092, so it was too early for him to join a fighting order, and I doubt he would have wanted to.)

 

[Victim]

And yet, the fact that many of us share those preconceptions might indicate something in the material itself is fostering them, don't you think?

Incidentally, FR is a world created around the foibles of D&D. It's nonsensical to try and use FR to in turn justify those foibles.I disagree. I believe that the entire "exalted" concept is an way to bring the goodness that paladins exemplify in the standard D&D game to the rest of the classes. A paladin is a bastion of good right out of the box. To get the same thing as a rogue, you tack on "exalted." Using "exalted" when describing a paladin is, IMO, superfluous.

Perhaps the reason you share those preconceptions is because the game mechanical idea of a paladin evolved while your idea stayed the same. While the paladin is based on chivalric knights, and can be used to create them, it can also be used to do other things. While the current rogue is based on the old thief class, and readily supports sneaky robbers and backstabbers, not all rogues have to be sneaky robbers and backstabbers.

Yeah, that's why the restrictions for exalted characters are harsher than the paladin code (although you seem to want to force exalted restrictions on paladins by default), and why paladins can gain quite a bit from exalted mechanics too. In fact, characters that already have alignment contraints can lose the least from Exalted feats, since the power up is generally the same while the increase in restrictions is less. An exalted rogue gives up alot of flexibility in use of his skill set, while the paladin gives up little - and part of that burden will be shared by other characters.

I don't find it difficult at all to rationalize different takes on classes.

 

[War Golem]

Core D&D, for better or for worse, is a game of moral absolutes. This is the only way the alignment/outer planar/alignment subtype/holy weapon/etc. system presented in the D&D cosmos can be internally consistent.

<snip>

FWIW I see the paladin's code as a sort of modified "Asimov's laws of robotics" - i.e., a set of laws, which when applied to any given situation, will tell the paladin either how he must act or that it doesn't matter how he acts.


Law 2: The paladin will always offer evildoers a chance to repent in order to bring them from guilt to innocence except where doing so would violate the first law (e.g., if the villain is about to offer up a child sacrifice, you do not wait to save the child in order to offer the villain a chance to repent).

<snip>

Thoughts?

--The Sigil

Hi The Sigil,

I couldn't agree more about your point of D&D being a game of moral absolutes. I think many people overlook this aspect of D&D, some intentionally, some quite knowingly. But core D&D is a setting with a cosmology that is structured around planes and beings that are absolute exemplars and personifications of various, defined moralities. Thus, there are beings that are GOOD, and beings that are EVIL. No ifs, ands, or buts.

That said, I disagree with your Law 2. In their aspect as a holy warrior, I view paladins more as destroyers than redeemers. When confronted with a clear "evil-doer," I believe a (Lawful Good) paladin is mandated to kill/destroy, not redeem.

I'm not saying there's never any gray area in these situations, but there is certainly a lot less in the campaigns I run than (apparently) those of many other people on these boards.

p.s. And one note on topic, I don't agree that there should be special restrictions on paladins' sexual activities.

Cheers,
-War Golem

 

[fusangite]

I simply have to disagree.
There are entire orders of monks and paladins in FR. I think you're reading too much into the paladin that simply isn't there. To put it another way, it's possible to build your grail knight from the paladin class, but not everyone of the paladin class must be, or aspire to, the Grail Knight archetype.

Yes. But this is a matter of taste; people who like Faerun are people who are not especially concerned with their world making sense culturally or mythologically. I would make the case that Paladins in Faerun are no more out of place than anything else because everything in Faerun is out of place. Faerun is a fine world to play in if you don't see realistic or culturally resonant mythology or culture as important things in your game. I'm not telling you that you have to run Paladins the way I run them; I'm just saying that if you care about the kinds of things I care about, Paladins and Monks are problematic classes.

How many times in the arthurian mythos were they called paladins?

Never. But that's a spurious argument. I'm not arguing about what Paladins and Monks are called. I'm arguing about what they refer to. You could use the same argument to argue that D&D halflings have nothing to do with hobbits.

Taking only first edition's paladin, they are charitable warriors of good that fight evil, and must adhere to a code of lawfulness and goodness. They (unlike most people) are punished for straying by lose of powers. Anything else is simply added by your own preconceptions, not the material.

There is a middle ground you are missing here. If my perception is part of a shared cultural understanding of something, it has an actual reality to it beyond the inside of my head. As is abundantly evident by other posts in this thread, many people who play D&D see the Paladin as referencing the same chivalric ideal.

 

[shilsen]

You're only kind of misreading. The Readers Digest condensed version of my argument is this:

Part I
1. Core D&D character classes are not all equally culturally universal.
2. Some classes clash with the cultures from which they are not derived such as the Monk and Paladin.

This is where I differ with you. I agree that the ideas for the monk and the paladin class were predicated upon certain cultures. But I don't think those cultural assumptions are necessary to the existence of such classes in the game, and I don't think the classes as they exist in 3e even necessarily call on the original source material as much as you do. Does the PHB monk work for a half-orc order which completely mimics, say, historical Japanese martial arts monasteries? Sure. Does it work for an order of elven mystics whose power comes from their kinship with nature? Sure. Does it work for a secret order of urban halfling commandos who train their bodies and minds to achieve extraordinary physical feats without the benefit of weapons and armor? Sure. The same is true for the paladin. It works well with the grail knight ideal. It also works well with a number of other ideals without having to change anything from the PHB.

 

[fusangite]

This is where I differ with you. I agree that the ideas for the monk and the paladin class were predicated upon certain cultures.

So far so good.

But I don't think those cultural assumptions are necessary to the existence of such classes in the game, and I don't think the classes as they exist in 3e even necessarily call on the original source material as much as you do.

That depends entirely on the style of game you play. In some people's playing style those things don't matter very much. In my playing style, they matter a lot.

Does the PHB monk work for a half-orc order which completely mimics, say, historical Japanese martial arts monasteries? Sure. Does it work for an order of elven mystics whose power comes from their kinship with nature? Sure. Does it work for a secret order of urban halfling commandos who train their bodies and minds to achieve extraordinary physical feats without the benefit of weapons and armor? Sure.

It only "works" for those things if you don't care about the things I care about. You are free to not care about them. Nowhere in my posts do I suggest that classes cannot be viewed in exclusively mechanical terms with no reference to culture. I'm simply saying that if you view them in those terms, you are playing a different style of D&D than I am.

For someone like me, Magical Medieval Society: Western Europe is a very important text and the Forgotten Realms corpus is best ignored. For someone like you, the reverse is likely true. I'm simply saying that if you care about things like cultural resonance and mythological archetypes, it is very problematic to decouple the Paladin from chivalric culture.

The same is true for the paladin. It works well with the grail knight ideal. It also works well with a number of other ideals without having to change anything from the PHB.

I don't know how many times I have to say this but I'm not arguing about the text of the PHB. The text of the PHB encourages you to have Shaolin monks wandering around 13th century Europe. It also encourages you to have societies where there is no such thing as gender only sex -- and Forgotten Realms is an ideal example of this. If this were an argument about the rules, it would have ended on the first page -- you would be right and I would be wrong. But, from the poster's original comments, and the way the thread has unfolded it seems clear to me that we are discussing what range of options people playing Paladins have; and it seems pretty clear to me that the range of options you have is determined by how important you think mythic and cultural resonance are in your game.

We all have our own requirements for making D&D play "feel real." What I am stating is that if a person shares my requirements, the chaste Paladin is the way to go.