D&D 5E (2014) Is Anyone Unhappy About Non-LG Paladins?

[Hussar]

See, that's the thing. People forget that the reason for the code wasn't for rp. It was for mechanical balance. Remove the balance issues and you remove the need for a code.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

See, that's the thing. People forget that the reason for the code wasn't for rp. It was for mechanical balance. Remove the balance issues and you remove the need for a code.

I would personally argue that they have been removed since 2E, where the Paladin was no longer a Fighter+, but actually inferior to the Fighter in some meaningful ways. So that's 25 years...

 

[Uchawi]

I am more concerned about the alignment implementation in regards to being optional or needed, but not somewhere in between. For example if alignments are optional, then I don't want alignment references showing up in odd places like the random table for a wild mage. So for me it is more about consistent application of any rule. I don't want to have to remember obscure references for when a rule may appear in the game and worse the developers overlooking it when introducing new rules.

 

[Ichneumon]

Ever since the Lawful Good restriction was penned in that first PHB, non-LG paladins have been inevitable. The concept of the anti-paladin fascinated players from when the paladin first existed, and while this class stayed officially LG until 2008, splatbooks and Dragon articles have been more than happy to explore different archetypes of the paladin. The "Lawful Good only" restriction was never going to survive serious scrutiny, and while some players feel comfortable with only the Holy Knight to represent paladinhood, there are many fine non-Lawful Good paladin concepts out there that people want to explore. I'm all for having them available.

It will be interesting to see what oaths are available. I think an Oath of Freedom would be great, even if it tends towards the more chaotic end of the scale. The blackguards could be represented by the Oath of Betrayal, which I could see errant paladins of other oaths switching to if they can't abide by their original oath (I'd have the player making this choice, rather than delivering it from on high).

 

[Emerikol]

I disagree. Following a code is not hard. So if every Paladin just follows their code they get to be more powerful? Following a code is a roleplaying hook. Just like Clerics follow the dictates of their deity.

Putting in world flavor restrictions on yourself is just plain roleplaying. It's not mechanical nor should it be. And I'm not arguing what was done in the past pro or con about balancing the classes. I'm saying that today we should not balance classes with roleplay restrictions. Roleplay restrictions are there to make playing the class more fun and more flavorful. If you don't enjoy it then don't play that class. Some people actually do enjoy it.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I disagree. Following a code is not hard. So if every Paladin just follows their code they get to be more powerful? Following a code is a roleplaying hook. Just like Clerics follow the dictates of their deity.

Putting in world flavor restrictions on yourself is just plain roleplaying. It's not mechanical nor should it be. And I'm not arguing what was done in the past pro or con about balancing the classes. I'm saying that today we should not balance classes with roleplay restrictions. Roleplay restrictions are there to make playing the class more fun and more flavorful. If you don't enjoy it then don't play that class. Some people actually do enjoy it.

Er, who are you even arguing with here, Emerikol?

I think pretty much everyone agrees that we shouldn't balance classes with RP restrictions. I see no-one disagreeing, anyway.

Roleplaying restrictions which don't have a mechanical impact do indeed potentially make a class more flavourful (when handled well - I always loved Rangers not being able to have more loot than they can carry, for example), but again, not sure who is disagreeing with this.

As "then don't play the class", well, sure, but if a class is so limited by RP elements that hardly anyone will play it, it certainly shouldn't be in the PHB, as it's wasting space. I'm not sure what exactly you're advocating for, here.

 

[Hussar]

But, if you enjoy it and the mechanics aren't an issue, then why do those restrictions need to be baked into the class?

If you like it, can't you just play your character that way?

 

[Sword of Spirit]

I think that's one legitimate way to go, yes. It requires rethinking "clerics" pretty heavily. 2nd ed AD&D did a bit of this. I personally think it puts a lot of pressure on the coherence of the paladin class, though, because once you go polytheist and, from the point of view of the game system, abandon the view that LG is the objectively best alignment, it becomes rather mysterious why only one set of gods has special champions.

Definitely. Although I have a soft spot for the traditional mace and shield cleric, I think 2e did a much better job of clarifying what a cleric should be with their specialty priests. 2e did what I basically recommended earlier: cleric = priest and priest = cleric.

I tend to like opening up the class to different takes on it in order to allow other alignments their champions. Me and a friend--neither of us affiliated with WotC in any way--were working on our own version of D&D before we heard about 5e, and a lot of our ideas bore a striking resemblence to what they have actually done with 5e. In this case, we were having the exact disagreement over the merits of having a "champion" class, with paladin as a subclass (our system had everyone getting a subclass at 3rd level also!), or just calling the class "paladin" and then having there be a LG subclass (we were thinking "cavalier" as the name for it). My friend, much like many people, didn't like applying the name "paladin" to anything other than the LG class, while I thought it was more important for the list of classes to be recognizably traditional by not introducing a new "champion" class. In a case of parallel development, WotC apparently agreed with my take.

The other way of going is the 4e way, which embraces the distinction between clerics and paladins as primarily mechanical (and adds invokers into the mix) - so you get STR clerics and paladins, WIS melee clerics, CHA paladins who are mostly melee but with a bit of spell-casting, then WIS caster clerics and invokers filling the role of "white wizards".

I think it's a bit of an unstable combo to try and go both ways at once.

It definitely doesn't work well both ways. I think that's a problem a lot of people have. If you fail to make a class identification for "priests" then the only real distinction between a cleric and a paladin is what weapons they use, which makes one wonder why both classes are even needed.

 

[DDNFan]

It will be interesting to see what oaths are available. I think an Oath of Freedom would be great, even if it tends towards the more chaotic end of the scale. The blackguards could be represented by the Oath of Betrayal, which I could see errant paladins of other oaths switching to if they can't abide by their original oath (I'd have the player making this choice, rather than delivering it from on high).

Oath of Freedom paladin, CG would be a character I'd love to play, but it would end up being similar to a slavery-hating, law-breaking barbarian-rogue in temperament, if not abilities which would be more magic based. But those are still interesting mechanical and philosophical differences even among CG characters, which I like.

However the Oaths need repercussions for acting contrary to your Oath. Maybe a temporary disconnection to the magical powers granted for the Oath itself, would be fine. It's not so much a power balancing mechanic as a roleplay enhancing one, and I just don't believe in people taking Oaths with their fingers crossed behind their backs and still getting rewarded for that, and treated like they are still following the path. I would even go so far as to say you can't progress along the Oath. There should be a way to switch your Oath with a ritual or a lengthy change of religion. People do it that quite a bit, I don't see why D&D gods or magic need their followers to keep following them until they die, even over their objections. Others might jealously seek vengeance. Like if you betray a vow and go from paladin to anti-paladin, that's more serious than going from a champion of justice to a champion of freedom. I think changing along the good-evil axis is worse than the law-chaos one.

People who are chaotic often do have an internal compass or vow or code or mission, it just isn't rigid, or dogmatic in the same way. A rogue could take a vow of lawbreaking, and say he needs to steal something every day, and as a paragon of that type of Oath, gain appropriate abilities that assist them in achieving that objective. Lots of interesting characters are possible, and they all depend on Oaths being taken and not broken. Take your Oath seriously, no matter what it may be, it needn't be alignment based but a LG paladin of justice should exist, and lose his powers (even temporarily) if he breaks his Oath.

They need to add optional rules for that, to make the entire purpose of the class make sense again. Right now the class makes no sense, because Oaths are often merely treated as fluff to gain tha goodiez you want for your murder hobo du jour. Oaths are not fluff.

 

[exile]

I like my Paladins LG. That said, I think-- in the context of various campaign settings-- there should be room for holy warriors/paladins of other alignments.