Code of Conduct for Paladin of Erevan Ilesere

[Vlos]

Heylo all,

I am allowing a player to run a alternate Paladin in a upcoming campaign (actually its a ongoing campaing, he is just bringing in a new character). He is planning on bringing in a multi-classed character that is a Paladin of Erevan Ilesere (Elven God of Mischief, change, rogues).

In that I have said we need to come up with a code of conduct I will hold him to. So What I am looking for from EnWorld is what would a Paladin of Erevan Ilesere code of conduct be?

Note: I am not looking for Rules of game, that is I am not looknig for what powers they do or don't get, but more role playing terms. Like protecting innocents, protecting the woods.

Code of Conduct:
- Protect all Sylvan life
- Protect the Woods
- Protect all those who are obviously out manned, even in a losing battle?
---- To what extent ? Life? Evil ? Good? Lawful?
- Say a prayer at dusk
- Drink a glass of fae wine in honor of fallen foes
- Those who are greedy and cruel need to be taught a lesson



What little information I have on Erevan Ilesere (highlight by me):

Erevan Ilesere
Alignment – Chaotic neutral
Worshippers alignment - NG, CG, N, CN

Erevan Ilesere (AIR-eh-van Ill-eh-seer) is the elven god of mischief and change. As such,. He is a fickle and unpredictable deity who specializes in shape-changing. The Trickster's following is not as large as most of his fellow elven gods for Erevan is too unpredictable for most elves. He is the main god of elven rogues and miscreants as well as many young elves who seek a life of adventure and danger. Some members of the small sylvan races, such as pixies, sprites, and leprechauns, also revere Erevan but most such fey beings revere the deities of the Seelie Court. He is a woodland lover and will always wear green somewhere upon his body. He also has a weakness for fine wines.

The Trickster often seeks the company of similarly inclined powers of other pantheons like Brandobaris, Garl Glittergold, and Tymora, as his fellow Seldarines are somewhat tired of his mischief making. His closets companion is Avachel Quicksilver, an aspect of the draconic power Hlal. The Trickster and Quicksilver are almost never separated and their adventures are legendary among younger elves who dream of emulating the duo's daring exploits.

However he is fiercely devoted to the Seldarine, and is also highly protective of the sylvan races and often champions the underdog. He may be mischievious but the greed and cruelty of gods such as Beshaba and Mask offend him.

Priests of Erevan are totally unpredictable. They have minimal duties, oppose settled interests, and delight in upsetting the rule of the law, powerful people and generally creating mayhem. These clerics and druids pray and meditate at dusk.

 

[jerichothebard]

Well, unless you are departing from the "must be Lawful Good" type of paladins, I don't think this God would HAVE paladins. I mean, look at the list of alignments for His priests... Lawful isn't among them. So I'm not sure it matters...

On the other hand, if you are allowing him to play a chaotic style warrior of good, then I'm not sure they NEED a code - that's sort of the point of the Chaotic end of the alignment axis; you do what seems best at the time.

jtb

 

[Vlos]

OK, Unearthed Arcana has alternate Paladins and Dragon magazine did an article on alternate paladins, which for the most part gave the class powers. And UA gave CG as an example. So what I am looking for though is if you have a Paladin of CG for a deity, what code of conduct would a paladin follow, and more specifically what code of conduct would a paladin of Erevan Ilesere have?

If they allow CG Paladins, which by UA rules, suggest its possible, it seems they would have some code that they need to follow otherwise they are just CG warriors with special powers. Now these shouldn't be strict rules in the sense of ceremonies, but rather "actions" that they do (or are compeled to do).

For example Erevan Ilesere is highly protective of the sylvan races, so therefore his paladins should always protect sylvan life. How they go about this could be totally chaotic. For example, grabbing the threatend target and teleporting to another area of safety, or luring the attacker away from the victim and into a cave where theres a dire bear's sleeping with its cubs and then waking the bear and running off to leave the attacker to deal with the angry mother.

But in any case he has the Paladin has to protect Sylvan life as one of his codes of conduct.

PS: If I can't come up with one my player will not be happy because I will not allow him to be a paladin without one which will wreck his character concept.. And yes I am going to hold him to it.

 

[Nyaricus]

Cool Idea!

hello all,

well, i have to say that this is an interesting character concept, so much so that i yanked out my Faiths and Pantheons and Unearthed Arcana and have sat down to write a few ideas and such for you. First off, i like your idea of a Paladin of a deity of rogues. I wouldn't do it IMC, but it definitively has a lot of potential.

In Unearthed Arcana, A Paladin of Freedom's (CG pally) Code of Conduct states "must be chaotic good in alignment . . . respect individual liberty . . . help those in need (so long as t isn't for lawful or evil deeds) . . . and punish those who threaten or curtail personal liberty"

and your CoC looks like this:
Code of Conduct:
- Protect all Sylvan life
- Protect the Woods
- Protect all those who are obviously out manned, even in a losing battle?
---- To what extent ? Life? Evil ? Good? Lawful?
- Say a prayer at dusk
- Drink a glass of fae wine in honor of fallen foes
- Those who are greedy and cruel need to be taught a lesson

Also, other things to consider from the book Faiths and Pantheons are: clerics pray for spells at midnight ("where darkness covers their mischief"), there’s a monthly midnight gambol (where worshippers sacrifice beautiful objects [mostly not their own] dancing, wine drinking, tale-telling, and endless prank-playing), clerics commonly multiclass as rogues or sorcerers (although rogues fit your character concept better), worship of Erevan is not permitted to occur in the same place twice and Erevan himself is described as "incapable of remaining still or concentrating on a single task for any extended period of time." that said, here is how you should work a CoC for your players Elven Paladin.

Erevan's Code of Conduct
-must be chaotic good in alignment
-must pray at midnight (incl. drinking a glass of wine in his honour, and to get spells)
-help those in need, so long as it is not for lawful or evil ideals
-never worship or pray for Erevan Ilesere in the same place (if you are in a prison or otherwise held in one place for long periods against your will, you must try to escape until your death, less that dishonour you)
-be ever-loyal to you fellow elves (not Drow) and sylvan creatures and help protect those places where they dwell (esp. forested areas)
-whenever a situation occurs where it seems as the hand of Erevan has played a role, drink a glass of wine in his honour (this may include feats of spectacular luck, etc)
-respect personal liberty, no matter what the race or creed, except those who are overtly evil or lawful or those who break a part of your code of honour

anyways, hope this helps you a bunch for your Elven Paladin, and gives you some ideas at least if you don't you use it as is. enjoy

 

[Spatzimaus]

To sum up what he said, I'll link to the Hypertext d20 SRD site. IMC, we've used a variant of this rule ever since 3E came out.

Really, an LG alignment just doesn't fit with this god at all, so if you want a Paladin, you'd need to allow the CG variant. The code of conduct doesn't need to be too drastically changed; the Paladin's "lawful" rules (respect legitimate authority) is simply replaced with rules like "protect personal liberty". Most of the other rules (no poison, protect innocents) can be viewed as part of the Good alignment. Now, that being said, a CG alignment is much easier to play than an LG, in my experience. One of the big drawbacks of the Paladin class is that an ultra-lawful philosophy just doesn't match well with the "kill all the bad guys, loot everything that's not nailed down, and bring a crowbar for that" attitude most adventuring groups favor; a CG Paladin shouldn't have nearly as many problems with that.

Since this is the House Rules forum:
One of the ways we altered this IMC was to tie fewer things to the good/evil axis. In the core Paladin, everything's Detect Evil, or Smite Evil. Even with the three variant Paladins, the good ones share abilities (Turn Undead, Remove Disease, Lay on Hands) and the evils share the opposites. So, for instance, we changed the Smites to be Smite Law or Smite Chaos. This reduces the Paladin's power a bit, although the Lawful types tend to come out ahead (CE and CN seem much more common than LE and LN).
We also removed the disease aspect entirely. Instead, the Paladin picks one domain; this domain can be one of his god's, or it can be the new Purification or Contagion domains. Divine Health (immune to disease at level 3) is replaced by the domain's granted power; the Purification domain power is immunity to disease, for instance. Instead of getting "remove disease X/week" abilities, the Paladin can simply swap any of his existing spells for the domain spell of the appropriate level, in the same way a Cleric swaps for heals.
We also rewrote the Mount rules, skewing them more to the law/chaos axis as well.

Anyway, point is, playing a CG Paladin variant is actually pretty fun, and works well overall. It's just a LITTLE overpowered at times, unless you make the code of conduct more restrictive than what an LG deals with.