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D&D General A paladin just joined the group. I'm a necromancer.
- Thread starter Fauchard1520
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FrogReaver
As long as i get to be the frog
Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
The alignment rule in the beginning of the MM says that the DM can make exceptions. That is also a rule. Changing Zombies to be entirely non-evil so that Animate Dead doesn't result in evil casters is not an exception. It is a complete change of the MM RAW statblock and would be homebrew.
There is no hypocrisy. There is no contradiction. And all that I am saying is how RAW works and how homebrew works. It's really easy. If you want Animate Dead to work differently, change it. You have the power!!!
FrogReaver
As long as i get to be the frog
Just to be sure I'm following: Your argument is that one can make alignment changes to Orcs by RAW but cannot make alignment changes to Zombies by RAW?
Todd Roybark
Hero
Which is what people say about viruses now, and pinocchio as a sentient construct.
I will acknowledge, yours is a technically correct answer.
Undead are technically not alive, nor are undead exactly dead.
Neither are Demons and Angels. If one destroys every angel on the material plane, is that a morally neutral action?
The position you have advocated is fine for a game of D&D that doesn’t want to deal in moral nuance. The last sentence is not meant in a pejorative sense.
That said, I am extremely wary about technical definitions in moral concerns, that have such narrow scope....it is how decisions like Dred Scott happen in real life.
Gary Gygax, infamously wrote in Dragon Magazine, that it would be perfectly acceptable for a Lawful Good Paladin to perform a conversion by the sword, and then execute the prisoner to prevent backsliding.
PC races slaughtering ‘lesser, evil races, with impunity, is a long standing fantasy trope.
Most D&D games include a hell of a lot of violence. So slaughtering orcs like Anakin slaughters Tustin Raiders is fine by RAW...is the inevitable result.
So Maxperson, would you characterize Eberron as an Official D&D houserule?
Calling something a houserule, sounds much more pejorative than calling it a Setting Change.
Every setting, including the Forgotten Realms, have setting rules. Is every official setting then one large Houserule?
Alignment, like the racial restrictions for the Bladesinger subclass, are crystal clear: changes to those restrictions is fine, free, and not to be discouraged.
What you define as RAW, in terms of setting defaults is clearly spelled out in the PHB,DMG, and Monster Manual as examples of one type of cosmology.
The type of D&D fundamentalism being argued, is very disturbing to me.
Enjoy, folks, clearly opinions can not be swayed.
Communication Terminated.
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Chaosmancer
Legend
Funny, nothing in the spell animate dead says "use the default fluff" it actually says "The target becomes a skeleton if you chose bones or a zombie if you chose a corpse (the DM has the creature’s game statistics). "
In fact, it doesn't mention fluff at all. All it says is that the DM will provide the stats.
So, you are adding to the spell, to support your argument.
I do not understand why it is okay to change the default for Orcs, to make them not evil, but not the default for zombies or skeletons, to make them not evil.
I'm sorry, the Vikings are not RAW. Could you please quote RAW text from either the Player's Handbook or the Monster Manual.
And nothing setting specific remember, because that is homebrew, not RAW.
Cool beans, but half-orcs prove you wrong. Dead people can't procreate.
Orc may be vile, but they don't always kill everything on sight.
Ah, wonderful. You have a section of the book that disagrees with the entry from the Monster Manual. And you would like to use it to provide a reasonable doubt argument. That's wonderful.
Of course, The Monster Manual still states that "Orcs gather in tribes that exert their dominance and satisfy their bloodlust by plundering villages, devouring or driving off roaming herds, and slaying any humanoids that stand against them. " and Volos tells us "Orcs aren’t interested in treaties, trade negotiations or diplomacy. They care only for satisfying their insatiable desire for battle, to smash their foes and appease their gods. "
I suppose the most reasonable answer would be that Half-Orcs occur when their Father is killed before he gets around to killing their mother.
After all, RAW tells us that they do not care for diplomacy and they slay any humanoid that stands against them. And that must be true, because it is RAW.
Ah, I see the problem here.
See, it isn't that you can't make non-evil Zombies. It is just that you can't make all zombies non-evil.
So, if good necromancers only make up 50% of the necromantic population, and so 50% of all zombies are evil and 50% are neutral, is that okay per RAW?
Well, that's too high, isn't it. If it was 50%, like I said before, it would be in the statblock. So let's say 10% of zombies are neutral, and 10% of orcs are good.
Heck, I'm practically giving you bonus, zombies are only moving one step up the alignment ladder and the evil orcs are moving two.
Flamestrike
Legend
Just because my fridge is objectively in my kitchen, doesnt mean I cant ever move it.
Then it'll objectively be somewhere else.
A person with an evil alignment is objectively evil, regardless of what the person (or anyone else) subjectively assumes or thinks about their morality.
Doesnt mean they have to be evil forever though. They can change alignment like anyone else, at which point their alignment changes to a new objective alignment.
Umm, yeah. Accepting surrender, prohibiting (and stopping) further murder and bloodshed, while treating your prisoner/ captive with mercy, dignity and respect, and seeking to redeem them is, in fact good.
And I also said ''UNLESS THE DM RULES OTHERWISE''. Multiple times. Which you're ignoring for what I can only assume is intellectual dishonesty, and your bizarre obsession with being obtuse..
To answer your question (again, and for the billionth time); Orcs and Undead are evil by default, unless the DM rules otherwise.
Because Warforged are alive, and Modrons are not. Warforged are not contructs; they're humanoids. They (Warforged) have been expressly alive (and living) since they were introduced in 3.5.
In game, Warforged are often treated with prejudice as many people see them as constructs (robots) lacking life. We (the players of the game) know they're not constructs, they're actually humanoids, and they're alive.
Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
Where would a DM go for Zombie stats? Let me think...
So it's your contention that the spell intends for the DM to make up those stats?
You're confused because you are making up arguments for me that I never made. Not once did I say anything about changing the default for orcs.
The same applied to both stat blocks. If you want to change the stat block for orcs to read LG, that's homebrew. If you want to change the stat block for skeletons and zombies to LG, that's homebrew.
If you want to make some exceptions for this orc or that zombie, it's covered by RAW in the alignment section and would not be homebrew.
Understand now?
LOL
Either they kill everyone as soon as they see them(your statement) or they don't. Which is it?
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Flamestrike
Legend
Viruses are alive. Pinnochio was not (at first). Heck; he spent his entire story trying to become alive.
It deals just fine with moral nuance. It literally has zero impact on player agency; if your Good aligned player wishes to engage in genocide of the local Orc village, tossing the screaming Orc children on the pyre, and crucifying the adults as a warning to others, fine.
I'll pick up my eraser, rub out 'Good' and write in 'Evil' on his Character sheet.
The Player (and indeed the Character) are free to perform the actions, and can subjectively genuinely think they're noble and righteous and what they did was a good act, or for the 'greater good'. Heck; they can think what they want.
Objectively, they're wrong. As the character finds out when he dies and his soul goes to the Nine Hells (or the equivalent, or gets judged False by Kelemvor, or whatever fate is in store for Evil do-ers in the game world). The Gods have spoken.
Moral nuance and player agency preserved.
Lanefan
Victoria Rules
As long as things stay in character the game doesn't stop, and IMO nor should it. If that what the characters are gonna do then that's what they'll do, and I'm quite happy to let it play out whether I'm DM or - as in this case - player.
Regardless of any alignment change, the biggest ramification for this character at the time was being tossed from the party...and as our PCs collectively know a lot of people (we all have multiple PCs in the campaign world) the odds of him ever getting into any party again in the future* are rather slim.
* - the same campaign is still going.
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