Another Paladin Thread: Throw Rocks!

[Jefe Bergenstein]

Good for you. I'll submit that your experience is far from universal. In my experience, having run many many games featuring alignment, and a similar number not featuring alignment, games which feature alignment are far more likely to spawn interesting debates about the nature of ethics and morality than those without. Putting those two little words on the character sheet has a way of focusing attention on such matters, while simply omitting them tends to lead to morality simply being sidelined throughout the game. Characters operate under a morality of expedience, and don't give a second thought to the wider implications of their actions.

I have to disagree with this. People using alignment fall frequently into walking stereotypes. Lawful Stupid, Chaotic Stupid, whatever you will. Theres little reason to consider much beyond whether someone registers on the evil-meter whether they should be killed. People's principles have come up considerably more in our Dark Matter, Unknown Armies and Arcana Evolved games than in virtually all D&D games I've played in. Why? Because you have to put more effort into fleshing your character out, than take a 2 letter crutch. If you flesh your D&D character out that much, then alignment wasnt needed to begin with, and only serves to be a pain in the ass when your DM tells you your alignment shifted because your character tortured the man who kidnapped his daughter, or that a LG character wouldnt stoop to using knockout poison, or the multitude of other pointless arguments that pop up on message boards on a daily basis.

There is value in running games without alignment. But they have a distinctly different feel to them than games featuring alignment. As such, the use of alignment can be considered a stylistic choice, and as such the use of alignment has merit. You may choose to discard it, but doing so is because of your opinion, and should not be confused with an objective measure of the value of the alignment system.

Of COURSE its my opinion. I'm stating it, and presumably I'm not lying about my experiences and opinions on the matter. I dont feel the need to preface every statement on the matter with a wishy "IMO". I dont see anyone presenting any objective merits of alignment either. However, I'd count the numerous fights alignment spawns as a reason to ditch it, and a non-subjective one at that.

Alignment works for some games. It doesn't work for others. That doesn't make the concept "dated and juvenile". Unless, of course, you consider ethics and morality "dated and juvenile".

I consider little boxes that everything fits neatly into a rather juvenile and simplistic concept. I consider black and white morality simplistic as well. So yes, to me, the alignment system as a whole feels like its aimed at crudely providing moral structure for a bunch of 12 year olds.

It's a coarse measure. A sundial rather than an atomic clock, if you will. And since mankind as a whole has not been able to objectively quantify good and evil, it's hardly surprising that the extremely small subset that is D&D players have not yet resolved the issue.

Then what GOOD is it as a rule if the average player cant easily figure out what Batman, Carmilla Soprano, or anyone else's alignment is? If a descriptor is needless at best, and causing problems in many games, why keep it? For loyalty to Gygax? As near as I can tell, thats the sole basis.

And a marriage certificate is just a bit of paper. It's the meaning that these things have that is important. I'm sure any newlywed couple will agree.

You CAN play a chracter without an alignment. Plenty of people are doing it in other games. You can play a GURPS character exactly the same as LG D&D character. You cant really legitimately be married if you arent actually married, can you? So in that case, the bit of paper has value.

 

[Doug McCrae]

The paladin is guilty....from Book of Exalted Deeds

PHB trumps BoED

 

[Abraxas]

In our last game, our party slaughtered a company of orc soldiers and left one alive for questioning.

We managed to secure the survivor's cooperation without physical coercion, and he told us everything he knew about his ogre overlords. After ending the interrogation, I was prepared to cut him loose with a simple warning:

I don't see where it says the Orc surrendered, just that one was left alive. I also don't see any info that the party had discussed letting the captive live - other than the one character who was prepared to cut the orc loose with a warning.

It is possible that this orc was the only one left at more than -10 hp at the end of the battle that they were able to heal back up to 0+. The orc could have just dropped his weapon and said "I surrender" with no gaurantee of safety. The party may have discussed letting the orc go if it answered questions and the paladin may have stated that she wouldn't let it just walk away.

As for the OP's question - IMO the paladin didn't do anything wrong. This might change depending on what actually happened, but it is unlikely.

 

[Wolfwood2]

As for the OP's question - IMO the paladin didn't do anything wrong. This might change depending on what actually happened, but it is unlikely.

Did the player of the paladin do something wrong, then? Was playing his PC that way the best decision for the gaming enjoyment of the group?

 

[robertsconley]

The paladin is guilty....from Book of Exalted Deeds

MERCY

A good character must not succumb to that trap. Good characters must offer mercy and accept surrender no matter how many times villains might betray that kindness or escape from captivity to continue their evil deeds. If a foe surrenders, a good character is bound to accept the surrender, bind the prisoner, and treat him as kindly as possible.​

This is the biggest load of crap for how a good character should act I ever heard. Because it make the character lawful STUPID. You have detect EVIL for crying out loud. Blind obidence to this tenet can cause greater evil down the line.

Mercy is for those who can be redeemed i.e. have the capacity of changing their alignment.
Mercy means that you don't torture and give evil enemies a clean and quick death.

The whole assumption that all of the sentient creatures in standard D&D are capable of choices about their alignment. Some are but for many they are instrinctly good or instrinctly evil. That is the nature of the game.

 

[Deuce Traveler]

This is the biggest load of crap for how a good character should act I ever heard. Because it make the character lawful STUPID. You have detect EVIL for crying out loud. Blind obidence to this tenet can cause greater evil down the line.

Mercy is for those who can be redeemed i.e. have the capacity of changing their alignment.
Mercy means that you don't torture and give evil enemies a clean and quick death.

The whole assumption that all of the sentient creatures in standard D&D are capable of choices about their alignment. Some are but for many they are instrinctly good or instrinctly evil. That is the nature of the game.

This is why the Book of Exalted Deeds fell short. It was uninspired, unlike the Book of Vile Darkness, which seemed to be written by someone who enjoyed the challenge. The Book of Exalted Deeds read as if it was written just because the company thought it would be a good marketing idea after they came up with doing the BOVD.

 

[painandgreed]

A good character must not succumb to that trap. Good characters must offer mercy and accept surrender no matter how many times villains might betray that kindness or escape from captivity to continue their evil deeds. If a foe surrenders, a good character is bound to accept the surrender, bind the prisoner, and treat him as kindly as possible.

It doesn't say that after accepting their surrender, being bound, and treating them kindly, that they can't still find them guilty according to objective standards and summarily execute them in a manner as quick and painless as possible.

There's plenty of wiggle room in the alignments for the DM to adjudicate them how they feel. Indeed, how it is done may differ from campaign to campaign according to setting, play style, and atmosphere. Most DMs I have ever had simply ignored alignment all together. The one that didn't and expected PCs to be good and preform good actions had the following rational:

D&D is a game about killing things and taking their stuff, not about moral dilemmas. Therefore, alignment should be handled so that it should not interfere with the goal of killing things and taking their stuff if not aid it. Heroic games are about good fighting and overcoming evil. If the good characters aren't allowed to do this then the entire genre falls apart. So being good, should mean killing evil. Being good determines the methods they use and reasons for doing so, but should not interfere with it.

This has always made sense to me. If you plan on running a game about killing monsters and taking their stuff, then you shouldn't sweat the rules that might interfere with that. If you want to run White Wolf's Paladin: the Angsting, then by all means complicate things with interpretations that make the character's life harder. But please, make sure you explain your interpretations to the PCs ahead of time and make sure they understand them, because no matter how clear you think the rules are, I garantee you that others will disagree. Being the DM may mean that you are correct, but unless you just like hour long arguements that stop the game completly and cause bad feelings between you and the players, please make sure they know your feelings on things before you tell them their character is nerfed because of behaviour they thought was perfectly fine. My personal advise to DMs is that if players are goign to do something that would grossly violate their alignment, then you should warn them of such before the actions takes place and allow them to decide their course with that knowledge. Then they at least won't be surprised when they lose their paladinhood. If you happen to miss telling them of such, you might warn them, but otherwise let the issue drop, because if it wasn't obvious enough for you to catch it during play and talk to them about it, it's not important enough to start arguements over.

 

[sckeener]

PHB trumps BoED

Ok I'll bite....where does it say a paladin can kill an unarmed orc that was under his protection?

They might be able to ignore mercy under the guise of lawful, but if they broke their word, they broke their code.

also

“Good” implies altruism, respect for life, and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings. Good characters make personal sacrifices to help others.
“Evil” implies hurting, oppressing, and killing others. Some evil creatures simply have no compassion for others and kill without qualms if doing so is convenient. Others actively pursue evil, killing...out of duty to some...deity.​

I can't say the paladin had respect for the dignity of the orc and I'd have to say he had no compassion for the orc & killed without qualms.

 

[Sejs]

Depends on the type of paladin.

For every paladin that acts as the firm hand of mercy, there's another who takes up the mantle of the unwavering fist of justice.

And they're both equally right.


So no, your paladin was okay, they just follow the 'suffer no evil to live' road more than not.

 

[Sejs]

Ok I'll bite....where does it say a paladin can kill an unarmed orc that was under his protection?

They might be able to ignore mercy under the guise of lawful, but if they broke their word, they broke their code.

also

“Good” implies altruism, respect for life, and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings. Good characters make personal sacrifices to help others.
“Evil” implies hurting, oppressing, and killing others. Some evil creatures simply have no compassion for others and kill without qualms if doing so is convenient. Others actively pursue evil, killing...out of duty to some...deity.​

I can't say the paladin had respect for the dignity of the orc and I'd have to say he had no compassion for the orc & killed without qualms.

"Alhandra, a paladin who fights evil without mercy and protects the innocent without hesitation is lawful good."