4th Edition made a great Paladin...

[Mallus]

Something tells me that the evil god of war
and conquest or the god of lies wouldn't be bestowing their champions to heal people.

A god that wants their forces to succeed in more than one battle would.

 

[Celtavian]

re

Because the evil Cleric's party needs healed too?

I like flavor first over balance. The cleric's party needs healing too is not much of a reason why he should have the same powers as the Cleric of a good god.

 

[Celtavian]

re

Maybe not physical healing. But inspirational healing - sure he would. So, just reflavor your Cure Light spell, and rename Healing Word to Inspiring Word...

Lay on Hands might become "Inspiring Whip" or something like that...

That's more creative. I would like that better.

Something along the lines of whipping your teammates to get them to do the job would fit a healing surge. I could see that.

 

[Celtavian]

re

Back in 1e, my play group came up with an Anti-Paladin or Dark Paladin, which was essentially Lawful Evil. However, he was pure evil in the sense that the Paladin was pure good. With the new rules, a Paladin of this type could easily be created. But the Paladin still needs to heal himself and bring his divine might to the party. His goal should still be to honor his god and see himself as a holy warrior (that is, carrying out his god's will for the good of all).

Evil is not a frame of mind. Unless they're insane, people don't just wake up and think about what they can do to be evil (contrary to much modern entertainment). They do evil things 1) under the misguided belief that they are doing right, or 2) they don't know how to be any other way.

Even if I were wrong about the Knights Templar being the source of the Paladin, they make for a good point here for the point of the evil Paladin. Many of them performed wicked atrocities under the precept that they were serving the Christian God and doing so with full pardon. Their point of view was that they were doing God's will. But under our more sensitive consciences, it is clear that they were evil through and through. This is your evil Paladin, but the class should still apply. Their god will want them to survive and to keep their fellows alive.

To others in the thread, the 3e Cleric was fashioned after the 1e Paladin, not the 4e Paladin on 3e Cleric. The 1e Cleric only had a mace, a breast plate and mage-like powers with a bit of healing tossed in.

But given that DnD is a fantasy game, I prefer more idealized version of certain things. Evil has its place, but I just don't see evil gods giving the same things as good gods to their servants.

I wouldn't classify all the Knights Templar as evil. They were a human organization with a goal. There were good and evil men within their ranks. I've no idea why you think the Knights Templar is an evil organization. Because they killed people for their cause? C'mon now, that is the human race since the dawn of time with few exceptions.

 

[Corjay]

Well, they were promised riches and admittance to heaven no matter what sins they committed prior to, during, or after the invasion of the holy land. The promise of riches and the freedom to rape whomever their perverse desires incite them to, to torture for the shear fun of it, and to murder at will are not exactly noble incentives.

My point wasn't that they were ALL evil. My point was that the majority were and it was allowed. Being puritanical was far from the requirement.

 

[Andor]

Well, they were promised riches and admittance to heaven no matter what sins they committed prior to, during, or after the invasion of the holy land. The promise of riches and the freedom to rape whomever their perverse desires incite them to, to torture for the shear fun of it, and to murder at will are not exactly noble incentives.

My point wasn't that they were ALL evil. My point was that the majority were and it was allowed. Being puritanical was far from the requirement.

I think you're confusing the Templars with Crusaders. And even the Crusades varied wildly from one to the next with the 4th crusade in particular probably taking the "Do as I say, not as I do." prize when they decided that actually going to the holy land to fight muslims was too far to walk and just sacked the christian city of Constantinople instead.

The Templars were a monastic order that spent most of their time guarding pilgrims on thier way to and from the holy land. They eventually evolved into the first bankers in europe.

 

[Corjay]

Yes. Sorry, I was forgetting myself. The Templars arose from the Crusaders (though the Templars still became the equivellent to the mafia, offering "protection" and insurance, sometimes being the very ones doing the robbing on the road) when the Crusaders no longer had a Crusade. So yes, I was speaking of the earliest form, the Crusaders.

 

[SSquirrel]

Lay on Hands might become "Inspiring Whip" or something like that...

Where there's a whip there's a way

 

[SSquirrel]

double

 

[Celtavian]

re

Well, they were promised riches and admittance to heaven no matter what sins they committed prior to, during, or after the invasion of the holy land. The promise of riches and the freedom to rape whomever their perverse desires incite them to, to torture for the shear fun of it, and to murder at will are not exactly noble incentives.

My point wasn't that they were ALL evil. My point was that the majority were and it was allowed. Being puritanical was far from the requirement.

Sorry man, this is a false view of the templars. Not even the majority were evil and you need to do some reading before you make such a statement.

The Templars were organized. They had banks and fortresses and land holdings. They followed a code. They may have had their share of evil man, but they certainly were not an evil organization allowed to "rape or kill" who they wanted to. They certainly did not do such things.

There was a Templar justice system. If one of their knights did as you seem to think they did, they would bring it the leaders for justice.

Sorry man, the Knights Templars and various crusaders had respect for the Muslims they fought against and vice versa. If you read the history of the organization, you will understand that you do not get the kind of holdings they had by being a random murdering organization with no sense of justice or code. What you are talking about are barbarians. I don't know if you noticed but the barbarians lost against the organized Knight organizations exactly for the reasons you stated: they didn't care about how they treated the people they fought.

The Knight Templars, Hospitalers, Teutonic Knights, and various other Knightly organizations employed the rule of law and had a specific idea of how to treat people.

I'm not saying there weren't men who profiteered. But I am saying it wasn't the majority. They did very much care how their knights conducted themselves.

Alot of the knights that joined the Templars and various other organizations were men who gave up wealth and prestige in regular society fighton a crusade. They gave the majority of their wealth to Templar organizations.

I can't recite the history all hear. But you picked kind of a poor topic to discuss. I'm a student of Christian knightly organizations, though I'm not a Christian. Speaking as a person not aligned with or interested in aligning with any relgion, purely as a person who studies the subject as a personal interest, the knightly orders were far from the barbarian evil organiztions you claim they were. Far, far, far from the truth.

Do your research. The Knights Templar were organized, ethical, moral, and not all evil as an organization. Nor were the majority the butchers you claim them to be. They were just as men were back then, save that they were successful for quite a while until their own people turned on them because of the power struggle between the knights and the royal power.

It's a great history if you ever want to give it a read. The Spanish organizations, The Teutonic Knights, Knights Templar, Hospitalers, and various other knightly organizations. I wouldn't oversimplify any human organization as you have done.

But as I said, DnD is idealized. So the grayness of human morality doesn't much enter into it.