Musings on the "Lawful Jerk" Paladin

[Jefe Bergenstein]

What does this actually have to do with the subject at hand? As you note, alignment is one of the game's most divisive subjects, and you yourself clearly have strong opinions on it, so might you just a little too quick in hauling out that old punching bag? I'm not seeing the real connection between alignment disagreements and jerk paladin player behavior. Classically, the problem takes the form of the paladin butting heads with somebody like the chaotic neutral rogue... and if the rogue is listed as "chaotic neutral", doesn't that kind of imply that her player agrees that what she gets up to is not good? If paladins were notorious for clashing with other "lawful good" characters, I'd be more convinced that conflicts in alignment definitions were to blame. But LG vs. CN? That's just players letting their characters' quite natural conflict spiral out of control and become personal.

It absolutely has bearing. Because the DM can, and is encouraged, to punish the paladin for not being Lawful Good. This means that you have to play YOUR character how the DM thinks he should be played. If there is disconnect between what Lawful or Good means for two parties (and I think this is an undeniable fact at this point) this causes more issues for paladins than the Lawful Good fighter, who just gets a grumbling DM. And because the paladin's companions could lead to his fall, this led to the DM effectively enforcing his view on the entire table, with the paladin being the stick in the mud on many plans. Add in that people don't like being told that their beliefs are evil, or not good, and its perfect storm of suck for something that should be escapist fun. Sorry, cant use a knockout poison, that would be wrong. Ready the burning oil to roast people alive violently!

Alignment won't be useless when you can get 4 out of 5 people to agree what the alignment of someone like Batman is. Cue the 9 alignment Batman meme, but it proves the point.

 

[MarkB]

But what if a sentient creature, let's call them an orc, was hard wired to kill and destroy all other sentient life. That the only reason for their existence is destruction, and the only reason they don't kill is because of selfish reasons. They never know love or compassion as we understand it, they raise children because they have to, not because they love them, etc. It's not nature versus nurture, raise an orc baby in a loving environment and it will still kill you in your sleep if it can just because that's how it gets it's jollies.

Is that orc evil? I would say yes. They are not human, and to assume they would ever go arm-in-arm singing kumbaya with other sentient creatures if given a chance does not fit the base assumption of what an orc is. Now, I will be the first to admit that it may be a gross over-simplification to say that, but then again that's what D&D is all about. For many people it's a fantasy game with a simplified moral structure so we can roll some dice, eat junk food and have fun hanging out without having to concern ourselves with the moral quandary of leaving orphaned baby orcs after slaughtering their parents. Because no matter what we do, that orc baby will grow up to be an evil force of murder and destruction. In other words, an orc.

*Hmmm...maybe cats are evil.

Honestly, the idea of thinking of any sentient species in these terms rather makes my skin crawl, even in a fictional setting. I'd be distressed to be asked to even play a character who thought of sentient beings in those terms.

 

[Oofta]

Honestly, the idea of thinking of any sentient species in these terms rather makes my skin crawl, even in a fictional setting. I'd be distressed to be asked to even play a character who thought of sentient beings in those terms.

I'm not saying I think that way, but you do know it's a game, right? Not reality? Are you saying that it's wrong to say that, for example, Asmodeus is irrevocably evil?

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Honestly, the idea of thinking of any sentient species in these terms rather makes my skin crawl, even in a fictional setting. I'd be distressed to be asked to even play a character who thought of sentient beings in those terms.

What if, instead of an orc, you call it a demon? Is it okay then? What if they're robots? Or liches, who must feed on souls in order to survive? At some point, a sentient creature stops being a person worthy of moral consideration. Are you seriously going to let that egg hatch, so it can grow into a monster and kill all of your friends and family?

Or do you just not want to play in a world of black and white morality, because the idea of anyone being innately evil is too extreme for you? Personally, I would rather kill a thousand irredeemable murder-bots than have to kill one bandit who is only stealing so they can take care of their family.

 

[Sunseeker]

I'm not saying I think that way, but you do know it's a game, right? Not reality? Are you saying that it's wrong to say that, for example, Asmodeus is irrevocably evil?

I think it is reasonable to say Asmodeus is currently incredibly evil. That's not to say there's not like, an epic quest line and a DC 9000 you could attempt in order to redeem him. That's also not to say that just because he is evil, doesn't mean he isn't sometimes on the right side of things. It's important to keep in mind that in Asmodeus' case (and by extension all Devils) they are by nature LAWFUL Evil and understand such concepts of honor, loyalty, comradeship, and the value of a well-written contract. While their ideas of these things may be twisted and their endgame may be their own advancement, devils may do good things because at some future point it will be to their gain.

LE, unlike LG, does not have a problem with doing things outside of their alignment, provided it serves their interests in some manner.

I also have to generally agree with [MENTION=40176]MarkB[/MENTION] on this, I've seen some of the posts by people who favor "A jolly good game of 'Kill the Orc'." and frankly it's a little disturbing. I think games set a dangerous precedent when they start running around saying X race is intrinsically evil. It's not terribly difficult to make a game that always sets up Orcs as the "bad guys" but at the same time never says "they're evil". It doesn't even need to be a "shades of grey" campaign to do this.

 

[MarkB]

I'm not saying I think that way, but you do know it's a game, right? Not reality? Are you saying that it's wrong to say that, for example, Asmodeus is irrevocably evil?

Asmodeus isn't a race, he's a person - in fact, a personification of a concept.

A race of living, thinking mortal people is another matter. I find the idea of conceptualising any group of people, even fictional ones with green skin and tusks, as "evil by nature" codifies a very unhealthy way of thinking.

And no, it's probably not that harmful to do in small doses, in a fictional setting, in a game played for fun. But is it really a mindset you want to dabble in, even for fun?

 

[Oofta]

What if, instead of an orc, you call it a demon? Is it okay then? What if they're robots? Or liches, who must feed on souls in order to survive? At some point, a sentient creature stops being a person worthy of moral consideration. Are you seriously going to let that egg hatch, so it can grow into a monster and kill all of your friends and family?

Or do you just not want to play in a world of black and white morality, because the idea of anyone being innately evil is too extreme for you? Personally, I would rather kill a thousand irredeemable murder-bots than have to kill one bandit who is only stealing so they can take care of their family.

I agree ... like I said, orcs aren't humans with a skin condition. There are a lot of grand simplifications in D&D. Hit points, armor class, some creatures are born evil. I don't have a problem with the fact that an orc is no more redeemable than the creature from the Aliens movie, or the ebola virus. It's a game after all.

Do I think a race of orcs could really exist? Do I think of people that way? Of course not. To say I can't separate the two is insulting.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Do I think a race of orcs could really exist? Do I think of people that way? Of course not. To say I can't separate the two is insulting.

If orcs were to really exist, in the real world, who is to say they would be more like humans than they would be like demons?

 

[Oofta]

If orcs were to really exist, in the real world, who is to say they would be more like humans than they would be like demons?

The monster manual? The game world is not the real world. Orcs, as written in the monster manual, good and evil as defined in D&D doesn't exist in the real world.

What's funny here is that this is supposed to be a thread about how people have a hard time with judgmental paladins. Yet I'm being judged for taking D&D at face value, that orcs are an evil race. That a presumption of many campaigns is that true good and evil exist. Somehow I'm suddenly a sociopath for accepting the game at face value and not concerning myself with the morality of a fictional character killing fictional monsters.

Good grief.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

What's funny here is that this is supposed to be a thread about how people have a hard time with judgmental paladins. Yet I'm being judged for taking D&D at face value, that orcs are an evil race. That a presumption of many campaigns is that true good and evil exist. Somehow I'm suddenly a sociopath for accepting the game at face value and not concerning myself with the morality of a fictional character killing fictional monsters.

I think I'm agreeing with you, but it's hard to tell.

The game world is not like the real world. Most paladin problems occur when there's a misunderstanding about how the world works. It's not fair to judge the paladin by the standards of our real world, because their world is a different place where absolute evil is a known fact. If any particular game world lacks the concept of Good and Evil, because everything is some shade of gray morality, then the paladin doesn't make sense in that world.