Is a coup de grace an evil act?

[the Jester]

Korimyr was using terminology developed for the 2e Ravenloft campaign setting to distinguish the good-evil (moral) and law-chaos (ethical) axes of alignment. Admittedly, it's not commonly used, and may not make intuitive sense to those new to the game or unfamiliar with the Ravenloft setting.

For the record, this terminology was actually developed way back in 1e, in Unearthed Arcana (I believe in the first appearance of the forbiddance spell).

 

[Cavalorn]

It's not evil, it's just not especially good.

A good character might have wanted to give the guy a chance to mend his ways. He didn't actually kill anyone, he just tried to, and there was a chance to take him out of the fight without killing him, so death is excessive from a good PoV. Batman, for example, wouldn't kill a thug who tried to kill him. Mercy would be the rule. Good characters kill only when necessary.

Just because the CDG isn't something a good character would do does not make it evil, however, and besides, any DM who tells you that you didn't do something is not the kind of DM you want to game with.

Rules wise, isn't there a thing you can do to a helpless opponent that's very much like a coup de grace in execution but actually knocks the opponent out cold for several hours, like how an assassin can use death attack to paralyse instead of kill?

If not, I'd suggest the following as a house rule: the knockout strike. Resolve exactly as a coup de grace, but with the attacker dealing non-lethal damage, and a failed save resulting in unconsciousness rather than death.

 

[Chupacabra]

Cavalorn, love your idea of the non-lethal CDG knockout house rule.

If there was a way to ensure a 1 or 2 hour knock-out, I'd have gladly done that rather than play lethal whack-a-mole on the bandit's head. Heck, I was just trying to keep him out of the fight for more than 1 minute by any means necessray. I thought the only real way was to stave in the side of his noggin so his buddies could not wake him up with a nudge.

Well, maybe I should learn more Summoning spells and just call forth critters to do my brain bashing for me. No muss, no fuss, no alignment drift (I think....)

 

[Cavalorn]

If there was a way to ensure a 1 or 2 hour knock-out, I'd have gladly done that rather than smash in the bandit's head with my club. Heck, I was just trying to keep him out of the fight as much as possible. I thought the only real way was to stave in the side of his noggin.

See 'knockout strike' suggestion added above.

It's a silly deficiency in the RAW that there's not already a standard non-lethal equivalent of the coup de grace. You can batter an opponent into unconsciousness with repeated non-lethal blows; you can kill him with a single dagger thrust if he's helpless; but you can't cosh a tied-up bandit?

 

[Shadowdweller]

Just a useful reminder how distant our current mores may be from those of a fantasy medieval world, if a couple of hundred years can make such a difference to us!

Indeed, there's certainly been plenty of moral variation across societies throughout history. Slavery, torture, killing as an accepted means of dealing with insults, wrapping up the mouth to avoid killing insects, etc.

This only creates a problem D&D-wise if you try to claim that they're all good on that objective scale the game uses (unless you happen to be a supporter of cultural relativism). All in all it's we, members of whatever society we belong to, who decide how "Good" or "Evil" are defined. So it's to be expected that they're based on modern versions thereof.

 

[Hejdun]

If they kill the dragon in its sleep like cowardly rats, then they diminish themselves. Good people are self-sacrificing, and one of the cute little paradoxes of being a good guy is that it often extends to sacrificing the moral high ground if it will save the lives of innocents. Superman would rob a bank if it would save a person's life.

I wasn't aware that all Good characters had to be brave. I also wasn't aware that a red dragon was innocent. I also wasn't aware that Superman was in DnD. Your statement on self-sacrificing is conditional on it saving innocent lives. The red dragon isn't innocent by any stretch of the mind. It's also always chaotic evil, so there's no chance of redemption.

In fact, you just proved that waking him up and fighting him in a "fair" fight would be more evil than CdGing him. Since CdGing him has a very small chance of him surviving, there's a very small chance that he'll be able to threaten innocent lives in the future. By waking him up and fighting him in a fair fight, there's a MUCH higher chance that he'll survive and continue to harm innocents. Therefore, since waking him up has a greater chance of innocents being killed, the first option is better. In which case, the "self-sacrifice" could arguably be the guilt of not giving the dragon a sporting chance.

Oh, there's a big difference, you (and others) are just dismissing it, but that doesn't make it non-existent. Dropping a guy with the stroke of a sword in the heat of battle is much different than slitting the throat of a sleeping man. If the guy had a fair chance to block the deathblow and failed to, then there's no onus to provide him with succor afterwards.

There may be the difference, but it's extremely hazy at best. You're ignoring the fact that if you drop a guy with a sword, the fact that he dies is directly caused by a) you hitting him with your sword and b) you deliberately watching him die instead of helping him bleed. You caused him to die, it's not like he would've died without you.

And the sleeping bandit did have a "fair chance" of avoiding damage: the saving throw. That, and he had friends around who could've woken him up. It's too bad if he wasn't good enough friends with them that they would try to wake him up. Hell, he also had a fair chance by saving against the fortitude saving throw induced by the CdG. Combat isn't fair. Ask any modern day soldier (who no doubt have MUCH better morality than soldiers in the middle ages) if they would give their enemies a fair chance in combat. They'd look at you like you're crazy; they take any advantages that their enemies give them. I don't see why there's this obsession with things being fair. Combat is never fair, unless you're in a very strict duel. Otherwise, throw your fairness out the window when you're locked in mortal combat.

 

[Ogre Mage]

Here's a hypothetical situation for you. A red dragon is terrorizing the area around a large town. Lucky ones just get their money and stuff taken from them, the unlucky ones end up bheing a smear on the ground. The townsfolk commission the party to kill the dragon.

Through cunning and luck, the party makes it into the dragon's lair and come upon the dragon sleeping. The party is Good aligned, and want to keep their Good alignment. Should they:

1. CdG the dragon in his sleep with the biggest weapon your party has.

#1 I would say is chaotic good.

I would agree that slaying the sleeping dragon is a good act, but I would also argue that the red dragon represents very specific case -- a monster so powerful, destructive and always inherently evil, incapable of reform (as per the MM) that a good character would be justified in using any means necessary to stop it.

But what if the sleeping evildoer was a low-level bandit who had robbed and murdered people? Unlike the dragon, the PCs probably have the capability to capture and incapacitate the bandit without killing him or her. In this instance, I believe slaying the bandit would not be a good act, because the PCs have reasonable means of stopping him without killing him.

Perhaps some would say that killing a sleeping dragon and killing a sleeping first level bandit are the same thing. But I've never been one to subscribe to Grand Unified Theory. These issues are gray areas.

 

[caudor]

I don't think it's evil. How did the enemy get in such a state that someone could coup de grace him in the first place? Someone was trying to kill him? Hum.

In essense, would it make the Paladin feel any better if someone threw the evil helpless one out a window?