D&D General Fighting Law and Order

[chaochou]

A more accurate description, to me, would be that players face limits in their play of their PCs.

Yes, there's a rather hilarious hypocrisy to saying 'the player has full control of their PC... right up to the point I take that PC away from them and make them an NPC for doing something I don't like.'

 

[Mort]

Yes, there's a rather hilarious hypocrisy to saying 'the player has full control of their PC... right up to the point I take that PC away from them and make them an NPC for doing something I don't like.'

As long as it's done with full disclosure ahead of time and in good faith during play- I don't see a real problem.

Disallowing evil PCs is actually a pretty common limitation.

 

[theCourier]

Well, I'm a Rebel.

You're not a rebel, you're a bad DM.

 

[CreamCloud0]

Disallowing evil PCs is actually a pretty common limitation.

even if being of Evil alignment is usually quite tangential to the actual root of the issues 'banning evil PCs' is meant to solve, the other three sides of alignment can do things just as messed up while often feeling like they haven't done anything wrong 'because i'm doing it for the side of good' or 'it's part of my sworn oath to eradicate X'.

 

[Oofta]

A more accurate description, to me, would be that players face limits in their play of their PCs.

The player always decides what their character does. The DM is the only one allowed to run evil characters in my game. I don't really care how you choose to describe that and I don't see why it matters to you so much to attempt to be pedantically correct.

 

[Mort]

even if being of Evil alignment is usually quite tangential to the actual root of the issues 'banning evil PCs' is meant to solve, the other three sides of alignment can do things just as messed up while often feeling like they haven't done anything wrong 'because i'm doing it for the side of good' or 'it's part of my sworn oath to eradicate X'.

I didn't actually say evil alignment, that's typically just what it says on a character sheet.

I meant it in the broader sense of PCs acting like the bad guys/villians.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Just out of morbid curiosity: what 'consequences' would they have faced if they meekly let themselves be captured?

 

[Oofta]

even if being of Evil alignment is usually quite tangential to the actual root of the issues 'banning evil PCs' is meant to solve, the other three sides of alignment can do things just as messed up while often feeling like they haven't done anything wrong 'because i'm doing it for the side of good' or 'it's part of my sworn oath to eradicate X'.

I don't care what alignment people put on their character sheets. If they put "evil" on their sheet and never say or do anything evil, I wouldn't consider the alignment accurate. I consider torture evil and will tell players that if it comes up. I don't care if you have LG on your character sheet, torture someone and your PC is evil and I don't care how you justify it.

There's some gray area, but there are some things I draw a hard line on such as torture, rape, killing innocents because it's expedient or for fun, etc.. Yes, it's an arbitrary line based on my sense of morality but I'm clear on what those lines are and they aren't particularly strict.

 

[CreamCloud0]

I didn't actually say evil alignment, that's typically just what it says on a character sheet.

I meant it in the broader sense of PCs acting like the bad guys/villians.

oh for sure, but just in general i get the impression that when people are 'banning evil PCs' they realise that someone with the Good/Lawful/Chaotic alignment written on their sheet can be a totally deplorable person and will ban those individual characters on a case by case basis but don't offer that same grace to Evil alignment characters in the opposite direction just banning them wholesale from the game, where they've basically banned both the Evil actions and the Evil alignment.

while the evil alignment does contain utter monsters that doesn't mean they all are, to quote the wreck it ralph movie "just because you are a Bad guy, it doesn't mean you are a bad Guy"

 

[hawkeyefan]

But again, you're operating with the agenda that the PCs shouldn't fight their way out. That's up to them IMO.

No, I’m being a simulationist. Surely whatever means the stranger had to get in could be used to get out?

Ignoring that and forcing a decision on the players to fight their way out or not seems like more of an agenda.

The DM made some mistakes but I'm not sure it's quite as bad as your list here. The main mistake - and in fairness we as analysts have the wonderful advantage of hindsight - is your fifth point: the mysterious stranger should have either had means of escape on hand or told the PCs to stay put and that they'd get out safely soon enough e.g. after he'd bribed enough guards.

The DM is responsible for the whole scenario. The only choices the players had to make were within the very narrow parameters set by the DM.

I think the players made some in-character mistakes as well, upstream of the combat. Once things got nasty, though, it seems one thing simply led to another in a fairly predictable fashion.

A forced arrest leading to a bloody escape. Yup… that’s as predictable as it gets.

even if being of Evil alignment is usually quite tangential to the actual root of the issues 'banning evil PCs' is meant to solve, the other three sides of alignment can do things just as messed up while often feeling like they haven't done anything wrong 'because i'm doing it for the side of good' or 'it's part of my sworn oath to eradicate X'.

Or “I don’t know what we’re supposed to be doing, we keep winding up back in this jail cell, I guess we’re supposed to fight our way out”.