Paladin Code of Conduct

[Drakmar]

Hey Peoples.. I do know that his has been posted in the past.. to my knowledge at least 6 months ago. I am after several Paladin Codes of Conduct.

My group has just started a new game and two of us are Paladins of differing Gods and Cultures (One is of Heironius (standard generic Lawful Good fantasy culture) and the other is of St. Cuthbert (Nordic/Norseman Sterotype culture) and I would like to be able to setup a code that would be applicable.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Sanackranib]

paladin

mercy, honesty, fairness, justice, defend the innocent, loyalty to church/leige lord.

These silly morality codes aught to get them started and provide ample opturnities for the evil villians to exploit them

 

[Drakmar]

thanks for the reply.. I am after more of a list of things like

Thou Shalt Not Wear Pink Underwear On Thy Head For It Is An Abomination Against Thy GOD!!!!

but with a more serious bent.

 

[shilsen]

[Begin self-promotion]

You might want to download Issue 7 of Asgard magazine. It has an article on forming a paladin's code of conduct using a list of specific virtues, along with examples of many paladin types and their individual codes.

I should know, since I wrote it

[End self-promotion]

 

[LostSoul]

What if your Paladin had a low Int and Wis? Would he be able to articulate his Code?

I don't think it is necessary to specify the Paladin's Code, but the player should have a good idea of what it means in his head. I also think the player should decide if he Falls or not, but the DM should step in now and again if he gets way out of hand.

In my game, I have a NG Paladin, and he's done some riskey things. Like attacking a demon in the body of an innocent woman, who threatened to kill the woman if the Paladin attacked, and then burn the whole town down if he did anything else. (She survived; after that, I asked the player what his Paladin felt. He felt guilty, but he did not feel that he violated his "Code", and that was good enough for me.)

 

[Gizzard]

I just give my players the "dogma" section for their god. Its kinda coming at the problem from the reverse angle; the Paladin can feel comfortable following a given course of action as long as he can point at the dogma and say "My god likes me to do this sort of thing." The problem I have with the Code of Conduct is that its a bit more general; somehow I imagine that a Paladin of Torm might disagree with a Paladin of Illmater on certain points. Hence, the dogma.

If you are still looking for concrete reference, a recent Dragon had an article about Paladins. Like #298?

 

[Voadam]

I really do not see St. Cuthbert as Norse, being an actual christian saint and all, but however your greyhawk campaign is set up is your business. Cuthbert seems the stereotypical D&D LG god of clerics who happens to have paladins, at least as portrayed in 1e and 2e products. I see Heironeus as the god of Paladinhood straight, if you see the difference.

I would think a norse paladin would be more focused on smiting evil giants and the forces of hel rather than on mercy (not really a norse virtue) and championing fair damsels, and their law aspects would be dedication to their cause rather than king and country. Word of honor is very big in norse culture (although trickery is OK) and you could focus on that as well.

 

[mkletch]

[Begin self-promotion]

You might want to download Issue 7 of Asgard magazine. It has an article on forming a paladin's code of conduct using a list of specific virtues, along with examples of many paladin types and their individual codes.

I should know, since I wrote it

[End self-promotion]

I was impressed with this article, and that in itself particularly amazed me because the whole debate around codes of condict has become irritating. To have some guidelines that allow for variation (religion, culture, etc.) - the game would have been much better if only such a concept were introduced in 1E days, instead of the archetypical "stupid paladin".

-Fletch!

 

[shilsen]

I was impressed with this article, and that in itself particularly amazed me because the whole debate around codes of condict has become irritating. To have some guidelines that allow for variation (religion, culture, etc.) - the game would have been much better if only such a concept were introduced in 1E days, instead of the archetypical "stupid paladin".

-Fletch!

Thanks. That is actually why I wrote the article in the first place - there were a bunch of threads here debating alignment and paladins, and I got tired of them. A number of people, including me, suggested that players work with DMs to create codes of conduct. And since there were no real guidelines that I knew of out there, I created my own, trying to keep it generic enough that it could be used in most settings. Not that it's made such threads any the less common

Just for the record, I'd never actually played a paladin at the time I wrote the article

 

[Katerek]

Pick up Book of the Righteous, it is chock full of Paladin goodyness.

I could have spent twice the MSRP and it would have been worth it. It is certainly better than most crap out there.