D&D 5E Is trafficking in soul coins ostensibly evil?

[Zardnaar]

Changing your alignment was definitely a thing in 1E and 2E. Can't remember if it was still in place in 3E, if it was, I never saw it enforced, or did so myself. Because alignment is so subjective I think it's good it's being/been phased out. But I like the concept, it adds a lot to the game and wish WotC would have provided better rules/guidelines on the topic. 2E had a cool page or two with an example scenario that incorporated all the alignments, but I don't remember whether it's in the PHB or the DMG. Hard to believe that in 50 years there was never a supplement by TSR/WotC on alignment, aside from a few articles in Dragon and elsewhere. I think the closest we ever got was the Book of Vile Darkness and the Book of Exalted Deeds. I'd take that over another adventure any day.

BG3 sounds like a cool game but my attention span is very limited for PC/console games nowadays. I bought a Nintendo Switch last March and I played it for a good month or so then my interest waned, and I can't even remember the last time I played it.

Tyrants of the 9 Hells was the last book today with Faustian pacts.

Wyll can get out of it but death is the right moral choice in the D&D universe.

 

[Chaltab]

Pretty much yes.
In older material you're looking at an alignment change to LE for making the pact.

The reason he's a fool though is because mortal existence is temporary. Condemning your soul to the hills is essentially permanent.

He did do it to save the lives of others but who knows he doesn't end up as a devil that causes more death than what he saved.

Considering what he stopped was an attempt to

Spoiler

free Tiamat to walk the face of Toril, I don't think that's likely.

A lot of older material has opinions that I find morally questionable at best; an alignment shift to LE for a faustian bargain like that is one of those things IMO. Especially when he's a minor without all the relevant information.

 

[Zardnaar]

Considering what he stopped was an attempt to

Spoiler

free Tiamat to walk the face of Toril, I don't think that's likely.

A lot of older material has opinions that I find morally questionable at best; an alignment shift to LE for a faustian bargain like that is one of those things IMO. Especially when he's a minor without all the relevant information.

There's others who can stop tiamat though. She's more like Godzilla though.

Adding another devil can kill more people than tiamat can. Your mortal existence is temporary. Selling soul is a two for 1 for evil. One less for another plane +1 for the Hells.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

And that's a perfectly fine way to play your paladins, but I can reasonably say that is NOT par for the course for in typical dnd (and you can use modules as your guide for what the "standard" is). Dnd provides no innate morale qualms with PCs (including good paladins) gleefully slaughtering legions of evil creatures. Heck certain good gods even encourage it.

And? What is commonly done and what is correct need not have any relation to one another.

If murdering evil creatures if perfectly ok with the good gods upstairs, I can see a neutral character having no beef with using the soul coin of an evil soul that was just going to get tortured in hell anyway.

Why? Killing soldiers on the battlefield is perfectly okay. That doesn't mean using POWs for slave labor is okay. One form of violence emphatically does not justify the other.

 

[Zardnaar]

And? What is commonly done and what is correct need not have any relation to one another.


Why? Killing soldiers on the battlefield is perfectly okay. That doesn't mean using POWs for slave labor is okay. One form of violence emphatically does not justify the other.

Devils in the details it's legal to use PoWs for labor.

Can't be directly war related labor and they get to go home after the war.

Eg farm work is fine munitions plant no.

 

[Joshua Randall]

Alignment change was still in the game in game in 3E FWIW. I agree the game is better off without that subsystem.

(That said I did get some amazing drama out of an evil NPC upon whom my PCs used a helm of opposite alignment. Although even when she was evil she wouldn’t have used soul coins! )

 

[Stalker0]

And? What is commonly done and what is correct need not have any relation to one another.

Again though.... Paladin PCs commonly slaughter evil creatures without any repercussions from their gods (which is the only source of morality in game that matters.) If good gods (who are the literal source of good morality in game, aka they literally define what is good) have no issue with it....than it shows that things that in our world that would be absolutely criminal are A-ok in dnd land.

Why? Killing soldiers on the battlefield is perfectly okay. That doesn't mean using POWs for slave labor is okay. One form of violence emphatically does not justify the other.

We aren;'t talking about slave labor, we are talking about evil souls that would have gone to hell being used as currency instead. Its not like they are being tortured "more" than if they were in hell proper.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Devils in the details it's legal to use PoWs for labor.

Can't be directly war related labor and they get to go home after the war.

Eg farm work is fine munitions plant no.

Note that I said slave labor. The laws of war do not permit enslavement of POWs. There are restrictive rules about what kinds of labor POWs may be asked to perform, and their working conditions must be up to a certain minimum standard that is WELL above slavery conditions.

 

[Zardnaar]

Note that I said slave labor. The laws of war do not permit enslavement of POWs. There are restrictive rules about what kinds of labor POWs may be asked to perform, and their working conditions must be up to a certain minimum standard that is WELL above slavery conditions.

I'm aware but there's various types of slavery. And depends on where one draws the line eg serfdom, PoW, prison labor, indentured servitude.

It exists in my games mostly off camera.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Again though.... Paladin PCs commonly slaughter evil creatures without any repercussions from their gods

Don't care. Commonly-done DOES NOT mean rightly-done. Lots of people IRL tell lies without repercussions. That doesn't make telling lies okay.

(which is the only source of morality in game that matters.)

No it emphatically is not.

We aren;'t talking about slave labor, we are talking about evil souls that would have gone to hell being used as currency instead. Its not like they are being tortured "more" than if they were in hell proper.

It is enslavement though. Continuous, torturous enslavement of a soul. That is literally said in the description of soul coins:

Carrying Soul Coins. To hold a soul coin is to feel the soul bound within it — overcome with rage or fraught with despair.