Bad Paladin... or My First Paladin thread...

[Mallus]

Frankly, things like "Divine Soul" (or whatever it was) irk me beyond belief. The entire "A class for every personality trait" movement seems to be a codified replacement for actual roleplaying anyway.

Player: My character is a Divine Soul. I plan on taking several levels of Alcoholic Letch and then starting Paladin around 5th as he comes to see the light.

Amen, brother!

 

[Jesus_marley]

I think this is a great concept for a Paladin. It highlights (at least for me) the idea that a character does not necessarily "choose" to become a paladin... they have the choice thrust upon them by their god. Like a Cleric, a paladin is a tool of their deity. Who are they to question the divine wisdom that has placed this honour (and burden) upon them.

As a caveat however, I would steer away from committing "overt" evil acts such as theft. Have that be the first step on his journey... that he never again steals from a church poorbox. As for the morally ambiguous (and distasteful) boorish behaviour (whoring, drinking and gambling) I fully endorse RPing the daily struggles that he would have with these.

 

[Voadam]

I woudn't try to play Gaulstaff in a group w/other PC Paladins... unless they were cool with the idea. I might like playing a trad. Paladin, in the super-straightman role, with someone else playing Gaulstaff. Could be amusing.

But if we're talking about other, NPC Paladins, why would it matter? They're just fodder/foils for the PC Bad Paladin... ideally each "side" learning from the other.

What would be the point of not lifting the ex-paladin conditions across the board?

Why is the god making the point of having the class power stripping restrictions then making exceptions?

Saying the LG god moves in mysterious ways would not be a satisfying answer.

I enjoy campaigns that take out the unnecessary RP/alignment restrictions and open up the archetypes (divergaent paladins, chaotic monks, lawful barbarians, etc.), but if you want to play the one exception to an otherwise applicable rule in my game I'd want a good answer for why to bend the problem rules instead of replacing them with a general rule that I like better.

 

[Mallus]

What would be the point of not lifting the ex-paladin conditions across the board?

Why would you feel the need to make a global-level rules change just to allow one (hopefully) interesting character? What's gained by doing that?

Why is the god making the point of having the class power stripping restrictions then making exceptions?

The scenario I outlined involved the god teaching a lesson about grace.

Saying the LG god moves in mysterious ways would not be a satisfying answer.

What's musterious about my scenario?

I enjoy campaigns that take out the unnecessary RP/alignment restrictions and open up the archetypes (divergaent paladins, chaotic monks, lawful barbarians, etc.), but if you want to play the one exception to an otherwise applicable rule in my game I'd want a good answer for why to bend the problem rules instead of replacing them with a general rule that I like better.

What answer would you need beyond a player saying "I'd like to play this character. I think it neat. Its not unbalanced vis a vis the mechanics"?

 

[bodhi]

Saying the LG god moves in mysterious ways would not be a satisfying answer.

Why did George Burns pick on John Denver? Why is Neo the One? Why is any Chosen One chosen?

Now, that said, I do think any DM would have to be a fool not to start cooking up something that could (not necessarily would) be revealed over the course of the campaign. Maybe Gaulstaff is the last living descendant of the great prophet Bob. Maybe he was switched at birth with the man who is now on the throne. Maybe he's Darth Vader's son. Maybe the deity in question just likes the cut of Gaulstaff's jib. Part of the point is that Gaulstaff has no idea what the reason is, or if there even is a reason. He just knows he's been Touched, and now he has to decide what he's going to do about it.

Again, this is outside the RAW but, IMHO, a great character pitch.

 

[Voadam]

Why did George Burns pick on John Denver? Why is Neo the One? Why is any Chosen One chosen?

Now, that said, I do think any DM would have to be a fool not to start cooking up something that could (not necessarily would) be revealed over the course of the campaign. Maybe Gaulstaff is the last living descendant of the great prophet Bob. Maybe he was switched at birth with the man who is now on the throne. Maybe he's Darth Vader's son. Maybe the deity in question just likes the cut of Gaulstaff's jib. Part of the point is that Gaulstaff has no idea what the reason is, or if there even is a reason. He just knows he's been Touched, and now he has to decide what he's going to do about it.

Again, this is outside the RAW but, IMHO, a great character pitch.

That's fine for why he is picked, not for why the rules that otherwise apply don't for this guy.

 

[Voadam]

Why would you feel the need to make a global-level rules change just to allow one (hopefully) interesting character? What's gained by doing that?


The scenario I outlined involved the god teaching a lesson about grace.

What's musterious about my scenario?


What answer would you need beyond a player saying "I'd like to play this character. I think it neat. Its not unbalanced vis a vis the mechanics"?

Because I have no problem with "I want to play a variant of the standard" but I generally dislike "I want to play the only variant of the standard and have the rules apply to everyone else".

And as I said before there are lots of interesting RP possibilities if the paladin power stripping prohibitions are removed and the code is a religious and social expectation only. There can be overzealous paladins, fanatical ones who tip over the edge, ones with some really bad traits but who are overall good, ones who infiltrate the order but are actually agents of others, ones who are evil and use the order for their own ends, and still have the majority be paladin archetypes or striving to be so. This seems a nice reason to accomodate both the character concept of the lecher who is redeemed by his blessing, and the other concepts I could use in the world.

I don't like the concept of a LG god saying "To be a paladin of mine, you must do X, Y, and Z, you are a blessed paragon of good smiting evil and never do A, B, and C, unless you are this one guy who can do evil, violate the code, and be right there with the rest of you among my blessed who will be smited if you do these things." The point of that would seem to be to test whether others become jealous, whether they accept the apparent unfairness of the god's will because it is the god's will. I can kind of see that as a RP theme, but it is not the kind of thing I generally use as a theme in a campaign.

Part of it would also be a dislike of that kind of model of only grace and faithfulness being good, your own good and evil actions are irrelevant for moral considerations and the automatic judgment of irredeemable (other than the redemption through grace) evil.

As for the balance, the mechanics of a paladin with no rp restrictions are balanced against the other core classes, that I have no problem with. However another PC who wants to play a paladin as well who must live with the threat of power removal for rp actions while your paladin doesn't is not exactly balanced unless the other player never really risks losing their powers because of the way they rp and the turns the game takes. It could be an interesting RP situation, but I could see it easily leading to resentment on the part of the other player paladin.

 

[Mallus]

oops. removed so I can reply to the post directed at me.

 

[Mallus]

Part of it would also be a dislike of that kind of model of only grace and faithfulness being good, your own good and evil actions are irrelevant for moral considerations and the automatic judgment of irredeemable (other than the redemption through grace) evil.

There's alot to dislike in that model. That's why I think its interesting to explore.

As for the balance, the mechanics of a paladin with no rp restrictions are balanced against the other core classes, that I have no problem with. However another PC who wants to play a paladin as well who must live with the threat of power removal for rp actions while your paladin doesn't is not exactly balanced unless the other player never really risks losing their powers because of the way they rp and the turns the game takes. It could be an interesting RP situation, but I could see it easily leading to resentment on the part of the other player paladin.

I agree completely. I did mention that I wouldn't even consider playing this guy in a group with another Paladin, unless the other player was cool with it.

You can see my problem with following the RAW, right? We agree that the character opens up a number of interesting roleplaying possibilities. Why let the RAW get in the way of that, assuming the rest of the group is okay with it?

 

[John Morrow]

That sticky wicket is a problem with the whole grace paradigm... I don't intend to solve that one here...

Well, it's difficult to avoid that sticky wicket when you pick a character concept that addresses the sticky parts.

And I want to play out that transformation. Why is that bad?

Not bad if you play the transformation. Bad, in my opinion, if your character is still the same ol' sinner after 20 levels.

But isn't that how grace works?? Its not a mutually beneficial exchange...

This goes back to that sticky wicket...

Yes, exactly. So maybe we don't disagree. If it works better for you to say his paladin abilites are "on loan", that's fine, it might even be a better way of stating it...

Fair enough, then. If the character transforms or ultimately stlides back out of grace, then I think it could be interesting.

Fantastic character concept for D20 Modern. Consider it stolen. Bravo!

As a villain NPC or PC?

Define 'the start'? How many levels? It defeats the whole purpose of this character to immediately resolve his issues, and/or handle the bulk of his transformation offstage.

Well, the concept you've described is pretty far to the sinning extreme so I would see that particular level of sin lasting very long at at. That doesn't mean he'd have to immediately resolve all of his issues but I'd think the more wanton and open sinning would drop off pretty quickly. Even your example historical personage didn't sin openly and casually ask people to excuse it, to my knowledge.

Basically, I'm not telling you that you can't play this character however you want. If you're willing to play it and a GM is willing to run it, then by all means go for it. I couldn't stop you if I wanted to and even if I could, I wouldn't. You asked for opinions and I'm giving you one.

Simply put, I think that either the character's faith needs to transform him (not necessarily overnight) into less of a sinner or you're diving right at that sticky wicket and need to think about it. Your early descriptions talked more about the paladin sinning than about his faith transforming him. If your idea is to play through the transformation, then yes, that could be interesting.