Musings on the "Lawful Jerk" Paladin

[Oofta]

It's funny. For all the wailing and gnashing of teeth about lawful stupid paladins, I've never had that problem. Chaotic Insane Neutral who stab their ally in the back "just to see what happens"? Those are the people that have caused issues with my campaign. Even if you're talking haughty/stuck up characters, the worst ones I've encountered were not playing paladins.

Of course I may be biased, I don't enjoy campaigns where you have to (literally) choose between helping a demon or helping a devil. I want to play a game where I can pretend to help both the demon and devil while actually setting them up to fight each other while I wait in the wings to clean up the leftovers. It may not work, but I want at least a chance to be a hero. Put me in enough no-win situations and I'll soon be a no-show at your table. If I wanted to fight an endless struggle against despair and gloom with no hope of winning, I'd talk politics with my brother-in-law. No thanks.

 

[Eltab]

Part of the problem with Classic LG Paladins is that the clearly Good acts a person can perform do not require Shining Armor or a Big Sword as necessary equipment. Swords and armor lend themselves to the doing of deeds that partake of Evil - or at least Badness.

More of the problem stems from intellectual laziness or immaturity or just not having had enough time in life yet to think deeply on questions like: what is Good? What is Evil? Can they be known objectively, to everybody? Are they something that depend on each individual's experience ("You're going to find the truths we cling to often depend greatly upon your point of view.")? What ideas and ideals do all Good acts have in common? All Evil acts?
(If you ate getting a headache reading this, then you understand me correctly.)

 

[Greg K]

Well, in my campaigns, I expect the LG Paladin to be like Perceval and Galahad. If I don't have a place for that in a campaign, the LG Paladin does not exist. If I do have include the Paladin and the player can't play the equivalent of a Grail Knight, play something else.

As for Paladins being the only class to be held to such behavioral standard? In my campaigns, the clerics of each deity have a specific set of strictures that they are supposed to follow. A player of a cleric receives a copy of the strictures of his or her character's deity Break the strictures and the cleric has to face consequences (which vary by the stricture broken and the specific circumstances surrounding the violation).

 

[Winterthorn]

Interesting that the stigma isn't about LG, but about LG + Paladin. I've yet to read complaints about LG Fighters, or LG Wizards, or LG Clerics, or LG Rangers, etc. It's just the Paladin. So perhaps it really was the original Gygaxian class conditions that are responsible for all these years of RP drama?

 

[Zardnaar]

Why is no other class persecuted for being tied to an alignment or particular behavior? Has no one beef witht the chaotic backstabbing rogue? The cantankerous neutral bard? The incospicuous unaligned druid? And what about the damn elf?! He thinks he's better than everone!! And would it kill the orc to bathe?? He says it might..

IN the good old days Paladins were special. Those who could not live up to the code or could not maintain it were no longer Paladins. Good and evil are cosmic forces in D&D (well except for settings like Darksun).

Badly played Lawful Jerk Paladins are annoying along with Chaotic Stupid (CN).

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

I've heard the stories, and am aware of the stereotype. But I've never actually encountered one in play.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

Alignment Is Stupid: There is no subject in D&D more divisive than "what is the definition of (X Alignment)?" Defining what is Lawful, what is Good, and what is the median intersection of the two values has seen more ink (physical and virtual) spilled over D&D's history than anything else. No two people honestly believe the same way, which is why it's problematic for any class to rely on it as integral to its identity. The fact that Paladins rely on a single specific alignment (vs the Any Lawful, Any Chaotic, Any Neutral, Any Good, Any Evil classes) is a particular hinderance to it - druids used to be just as bad for alignment-based quibbles in 2e, when they were Must Be True Neutral.

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.

 

[Oofta]

Part of the problem with Classic LG Paladins is that the clearly Good acts a person can perform do not require Shining Armor or a Big Sword as necessary equipment. Swords and armor lend themselves to the doing of deeds that partake of Evil - or at least Badness.

More of the problem stems from intellectual laziness or immaturity or just not having had enough time in life yet to think deeply on questions like: what is Good? What is Evil? Can they be known objectively, to everybody? Are they something that depend on each individual's experience ("You're going to find the truths we cling to often depend greatly upon your point of view.")? What ideas and ideals do all Good acts have in common? All Evil acts?
(If you ate getting a headache reading this, then you understand me correctly.)

Or maybe the problem comes from people that don't accept that whether they agree or not, some people do see the world as black and white (not saying that I do). Or that in a fantasy campaign there truly could be evil races.

I accept that some people play the game as escapism. In some campaigns the world that is simple, where there is definitive right/wrong, good/evil. Not everyone plays for the same reason.

I think maybe that's the biggest issue I have with paladin haters. They are all "heaven's to Betsy how dare you be so judgmental!", which is IMHO an extremely judgmental thing to say. While I never played a character that pushes their beliefs on others, I have no problem with people that play PCs that for example would not allow fellow PCs to torture.

Is it lazy to play a paladin based off The Tick? Sure. Just like it's lazy to play the umpteenth million character based off of Drizz't. Or Legolas. Or Batman. Or .... well you get the idea.

Sorry for the rant, but I don't play D&D (well, not always anyway) as if it were philosophy 101. That, and too often mod writers/DMs try to set up "moral dilemmas" which are basically "We're going to read some box text which explains why you have to do one of two evil acts. No, you don't have any options, chose which equally innocent victim to kill or the game is over."

That's not a dilemma, that's a DM abusing their power of world crafting and telling a lazy story.

 

[MarkB]

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.

I've seen plenty of alignment-is-stupid-linked issues with paladins. The most common is "what does Lawful mean?" Does a Lawful character have a rigid personal code that they stick to regardless of local rules and laws? Or do they always obey the local law regardless of whether it is fair or just?

Combine that with the Paladin, who does have a rigid personal code that they must follow, and the resulting arguments can span game sessions.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*