Detect Evil/Good... Metagaming?

[Moon_Goddess]

ok, if I ever run 3.5 again that settles it, the ACLU is gonna be handing out free amulets that block alignment detection cuz that's just cool


Alignment Concealment Liberties Union

 

[Umbran]

personally, I hate Detect Alignment spells. You can't bring the party into a community where some of the people are evil, so that later one of the evil people surprises them with their evilness with that spell easily available (ex. Paladin running it 24x7).

You realize, of course, that most communities are going to have an issue with such behavior? They don't know what magic he's using - and randomly using magic on members of their community is not going to make them happy.

Plus, the spell (or ability) takes concentration, and several rounds to work properly. If he's running it constantly, the DM would be within rights to penalize him for surprise checks, not allow Spot and Listen to work well for him, and so on. Eventually, the repercussions should make themselves clear - when the people he's looking for realize he's walking around busy looking for auras in front of him, and sneak up behind him...

Somebody blocking their alignment from the paladin makes them a suspect.

How does the paladin know he's being blocked? He shouldn't, generally. A detect evil is cast, and nothing comes back, just as would happen with a Good or Neutral target.

 

[Shemeska]

I like how Pathfinder has interpreted Detect Evil - All evil creatures of 5HD or lower do not project an aura of evil. Only undead, outsiders and Paladins/Clerics are guaranteed to have an aura of evil (or good as it were). This goes a long way to preventing some of the silliness I have seen in games regarding detect evil.

I don't have the book in front of me, and I'm not working on anything involving stats right now so correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that Pathfinder also corrected what I saw as a problem (or at least an ambiguity in the 3.x rules) with detect evil and undead - namely that now they have to actually be evil to register as having an evil aura. Being undead now is only a modifier to the strength of the evil aura, not a condition that actually mandates an evil aura even in the case of neutral or good undead (something that was up for debate in 3.x).

 

[Doug McCrae]

It's not metagaming. Metagaming is using out-of-character knowledge to make in-character decisions. An example would be using acid/fire against a troll when the PC knows nothing about trolls.

The D&D universe is very strange, very different from our own. Alignment is a real, objective property of individuals, and can be detected magically. The inhabitants of the game world presumably know this.

There's always the possibility that an evil NPC would prove useful or have the same goals as the party, and not jump to the PCs throats the moment they turn their backs on him, regardless of his alignment...

Absolutely. Alignment is supposed to be a spectrum of behaviour. All evils aren't psychotic maniacs, in fact there may well be non-violent evil individuals.

Furthermore, one doesn't have to kill someone just because they are evil, though there may well be hardliners who do take this exact approach. It's not uncommon for paladins to be played this way, however I don't think it's the only way a paladin can be played.

 

[Oryan77]

It's not metagaming. Metagaming is using out-of-character knowledge to make in-character decisions.

Yeah, casting Detect Evil just to see if someone is evil or not is not metagaming unless you only decided to cast it because the DM made an out-of-game comment about the NPC being evil. You can be paranoid and cast the spell all you want just to get info on an NPC...it's a little strange and insulting to NPCs, but it's not metagaming.

Here is an example of metagaming an alignment scenario by using spells. In one of my games, a PC unknowingly drank a love potion in a tavern while the other PCs were having drinks at another table. A disguised Satyr was trying to take advantage of her. One player (who seemed to cheat a lot and no longer plays with us) decided to cast Magic Circle Against Evil on himself and walked all the way across the tavern just to stand next to the other PC. She was not doing anything out of the ordinary that her PC has not done before (she can be pretty flirtatious), and she actually wasn't doing anything odd besides talking to the Satyr. There really wasn't even any reason for the other PC to be watching her. The only reason he cast that spell was because he heard me tell her she has fallen in love with this NPC against her will. He said, "I want the Magic Circle in her area to see if her attitude changes any". But there was no reason he would think her attitude was any different. In fact, he was a new player and his PC knew her for about 2 days in game.

An example would be using acid/fire against a troll when the PC knows nothing about trolls.

That's funny, this exact scenario came up a couple of sessions ago in our game. The Elf Ranger started pulling out his acid flasks and chucking them at the Trolls, even though I've never used a Troll encounter in this 6 year long campaign. I pointed this out to the player and I know he wasn't meaning to metagame. This PC is a replacement to the one that died. He's from the Beastlands and is level 10 (started at lvl 8), so I said it was ok and that he could have encountered Forest Trolls or something earlier in his life.

 

[ProfessorCirno]

Murdering someone on the street because he detects as evil is still murder, and it's still an evil action. At best, it's a neutral action, because you're still using an evil means to do something good.

As for detect evil and the tricks that come with it, though obviously you want to use this VERY sparingly, it's important to note that Outsiders who turn against their native alignment still detect as their native alignment. An evil archon detects as good. A good imp detects as evil. And alignment spells work the same - you can smite evil against a good imp.

 

[Janx]

Murdering someone on the street because he detects as evil is still murder, and it's still an evil action. At best, it's a neutral action, because you're still using an evil means to do something good.

If killing an unarmed thing is murder, one could argue that's just tactics. You always want to catch your enemy at their weakest, like launching a fireball into the sleeping orcs camp before attacking.

At the simplest, murder is killing somebody. At a more complex level, there are a bunch of social/legal expectations.

Probably the key difference between justified homicide and murder is whether there is a societal/legal acceptance of the act.

killing enemy combatants (enemy soldiers, orcs) is OK
killing in self defense of self/another during an active crime is OK
killing a non-hostile citizen of the town without a warrant, not OK

having a warrant would mean that the legal system as declared him an enemy combatant

not having a warrant means the PC has no proof that the victim is guilty/evil of anything. Just because you SAY you cast Detect Evil, doesn't mean anything.

in the same way, self-defense relies on the fact that killing the guy during the crime is pretty obvious that he is guilty with minimal risk of mistaken identity.

I tend to see the laws of D&D land being pretty open and wild-westish. Namely to allow for Good PCs doing what they do, without making it too lawyery or nitpicky.

 

[ProfessorCirno]

one could argue

Lawyering is the occupation of devils

In all honesty, your argument - to me at least - is what causes good players to become evil. "Well, maybe if I think of it this way, it's really justified..."

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

I rather like the notion of Detect Alignment, as long as the the nature of alignment is fairly well defined in a particular setting. The fact that what it means can change from setting to setting, imho, makes it a powerful tool that can be used to really color that setting, if done thoughtfully.

I'm fine with different approaches:

• Detect [Evil descriptor].
• Detect Evil Outsiders and Animus, and defining Undead as posessing Evil Animus.
• Detect Evil Concentrations and Auras, which assumes HD "soak" up some form of metaphysical "evilectrons" and emit "evil radiation".
• Detect Immediate Evil Intentions toward Me, my Family, and my Drinking Buddies.
• Detect Things in my Church's Database of Known Evil Things
• separated effects: Detect Evil Outsiders & Divinty, Detect Evil Aberrations & Magical Beasts, Detect Evil Undead, etc
• banning Detect Evil entirely
• etc...

For me, the real key is simply that it's well defined, and (hopefully) is done in a way that makes the setting more interesting.

 

[Plane Sailing]

In my campaigns I always limited Detect Evil/Detect Good to detect the presence of supernatural evil or good (embodied in supernatural creatures or in spells). That worked really well as a solution for my campaigns.

In addition, it worked nicely giving the paladins an always on "hairs pricking on the back of the neck" power. When they came within 30ft of supernatural evil they knew it was present, but it wasn't a directional power IMC.

I'd never consider using Detect Evil as metagaming though. If it is available, the use of it is just gaming, right?