D&D 5E Is he evil?

[Beleriphon]

And yet, if he were your typical, traditional feudal samurai, the act would likely be considered honorable. The peasant tavern worker dared draw a weapon on him. Being cut down where he knelt would be a fitting punishment. Again: background, culture, setting, mores, region. These are all factors.

In Rokugan it would be dishonourable to not kill the peasant that just drew steel on a samurai.

 

[Celebrim]

I didn't say anything and we kept on gaming and having fun. Now, thinking back on it, I keep wondering, was this act evil?

Chaotic (took matters into his own hands)
Evil (No mercy)

If he had killed the man while he was under threat, then that would be acceptable under almost all moral codes. To kill someone after he's yielded is at best neutral, and in this case (because the Battlemaster presumably doesn't have Judge Dredd's legal authority to act as judge and executioner), it's evil. Proper good behavior would have been to either extract an oath from the offender (more Chaotic) or to turn them over to authorities (more Lawful), with Neutral Good seeing the correct choice as being the one that promotes the greatest good and correctly made based on wisdom and foresight (will the bouncer learn his mistake, or will he repeat the offense).

If this sort of behavior becomes a pattern, I'd definitely require the PC to take an evil alignment. Indeed, I'd probably move any nominally "good" aligned character to neutral immediately.

 

[Celebrim]

In Rokugan it would be dishonourable to not kill the peasant that just drew steel on a samurai.

In Rokugan, if it were true that it was also honorable to kill the peasant that just drew steel on a Samurai, it would also be true that the Samurai had the legally recognized authority to act as judge, jury, and executioner in such cases.

But this only establishes that Samurai's have a legal right and obligation to "dispense justice". It doesn't establish that it is necessarily good for them to do so, or even that in the source material (real world Japanese culture), a Samurai whose honor was already above question, might grant mercy to someone and be deemed honorable for doing so. Japanese stories are filled with examples of characters who receive mercy that they did not deserve (for whatever excuse the protagonist has), and then are pierced by this act and try to atone for their dishonorable ways.

 

[Beleriphon]

In Rokugan, if it were true that it was also honorable to kill the peasant that just drew steel on a Samurai, it would also be true that the Samurai had the legally recognized authority to act as judge, jury, and executioner in such cases.

I perhaps failed to explain the way I wanted, or at all. Rokugan it might still be "evil", but culturally expected. As such for our D&D question, probably evil but who knows what the end result will be since we don't have enough info to make a real determination.

 

[Shasarak]

In Rokugan, if it were true that it was also honorable to kill the peasant that just drew steel on a Samurai, it would also be true that the Samurai had the legally recognized authority to act as judge, jury, and executioner in such cases.

But this only establishes that Samurai's have a legal right and obligation to "dispense justice". It doesn't establish that it is necessarily good for them to do so, or even that in the source material (real world Japanese culture), a Samurai whose honor was already above question, might grant mercy to someone and be deemed honorable for doing so. Japanese stories are filled with examples of characters who receive mercy that they did not deserve (for whatever excuse the protagonist has), and then are pierced by this act and try to atone for their dishonorable ways.

The problem with Honour in Rokugan is that it does not equal Good and in fact an Honourable act of "Mercy" may very well be to kill them so that their family is saved from dishonour. Because otherwise the whole family may have to be killed because of one persons mistake.

 

[Celebrim]

The problem with Honour in Rokugan is that it does not equal Good and in fact an Honourable act of "Mercy" may very well be to kill them so that their family is saved from dishonour. Because otherwise the whole family may have to be killed because of one persons mistake.

I'd argue that "honor" anywhere is a Lawful. Honorable is about following a code that other people know and expect you to live by. If that code promotes mercy, then it's probably LG. If it promotes always punching back twice as hard, it's probably LE. If it is all about proportionately, then it is probably LN.

Or in other words:

LG: Never worse than "Eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth"
LN: Always "Eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth"
LE: Never less than "Eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth"

 

[Riley37]

So did this Battlemaster have the legal status of a Samurai? If so, he's Lawful and possibly Evil; some samurai abused their authority in Evil ways.

If he did not hold such a role, if he had not been properly entrusted with the authority of kirisute gomen, then any actual samurai should find him and kill him, for infringing on what is theirs and theirs alone, no?

 

[Maxperson]

Ahh, I thought all this discussion was in relation to the question of " Is he evil? " Especially when paladin codes and samurai behavior was swept up into the mix. I still don't agree with the term innocent for a person in the bouncer's position though. Obviously they were doing their job, but taking up arms in a barfight still isn't close to innocent.

Nope the question was whether the act was evil or not, and the innocence of the bounce is irrelevant to that. From the OP.

I didn't say anything and we kept on gaming and having fun. Now, thinking back on it, I keep wondering, was this act evil?

 

[Maxperson]

Not sure how to delete a post

 

[Fanaelialae]

I'm not ridiculing it. I was coming up with more fiction like the robots.

I'm not seeing it. You weren't coming up with your own hypothetical scenario to counter mine, you just meaninglessly compared my hypothetical scenario to a fictional character. Given that I was quite up front about the scenario not being a real world example, it came across as very dismissive at the very least.

As for your argument, do you have one that doesn't involve western society inexplicably and spontaneously deciding that murder isn't evil?

Sure thing. I've largely been avoiding real world examples in lieu of historic or fictional ones because I don't want to violate ENWorld's policies, but I've come up with several examples that should be safe.

Cheating on your spouse. Immoral but perfectly legal.

Lying is another example. Immoral but commonly legal.

Parking on the side of a street longer than the posted limited. Not immoral but certainly illegal.

Driving through a red light after having made absolutely certain that you cannot possibly harm anyone by doing so (a long red light on a deserted road at 3 am). Not immoral but quite illegal.

These are not exceptions to the rule. I could go on and on and on. Morality does not define legality. While some things are both immoral and illegal, many things are legal but immoral, or not immoral and yet nonetheless illegal.