cohort: "caused death of other followers"

[jgsugden]

The law handled this situation a long time ago.

They came up with a concept (which I've simplified a bit) that says that you can be held liable for damages if you:

1.) Did something that helped create the situation that inflicted the damage,

2.) If your action was done at a point where a reasonable person could foresee that the end result would possibly be the damages that were inflicted, and

3.) That there were actual damages performed.

If we applied the standard here, what would we need to see for a character to be the cause of his followers death if:

1.) The character gave an order, performed an action or otherwise interacted with his followers,

2.) That interaction was something that the character knew would endanger his followers, and

3.) If the followers died as a result of that interaction.

So, if a paladin was walking across the countryside (ith his cohort and followers)and they were suddenly hit by a fireball from a wandering kobold sorcerer, the paladin should not be seen as the cause of his followers deaths. Walking across the countryside is not likely to cause the death of his followers.

If, on the other hand, the paladin asks some of his followers to go into the 'Temple of Nasty Evil' with him, the paladin should be seen as causing his followers deaths if a reasonable person would expect his followers might die during that trip into the Temple.

There is still alot of room to argue, but this narrows the field a bit.

These are not the only interpretations of the official rules, but they work pretty well as an interpretation of the rules.

 

[Winternight]

... Followers should be asked to do things appropriate to their abilities. ...

If you as a DM feel the Leader is being a little reckless with the followers, you have options that do not include hitting him with a penalty to the Leadership score. The simplest choice is to increase the time it takes for the Paladin to recruit new/replacement followers/cohort. Roleplay it out to get your point across.

I think I use this,
he really loved the followers and made nice counters for them ( each with stats and name ..)
He didn't wasted them.
Thanx
BTW nice Avatar you have,

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

I think I use this,
he really loved the followers and made nice counters for them ( each with stats and name ..)
He didn't wasted them.
Thanx
BTW nice Avatar you have,

You are welcome.

Thanks! Compliments to you on your stealth avatar.

 

[Saeviomagy]

The law handled this situation a long time ago.

...
...
...

These are not the only interpretations of the official rules, but they work pretty well as an interpretation of the rules.

It's also a highly inappropriate law to be applied for the times, not to mention the fact that it's almost completely ignored in the real world for most purposes.

When was the last time you heard of the army being sued for sending troops to war and having casualties?

 

[Wraithdrit]

This law is not intended for use in military matters, but is used all the time in criminal proceedings.

 

[drnuncheon]

Remember that this isn't a legal matter - the Leadership rules are not there to say 'by law you may not have more than X followers if you have caused the death of one or more of them in the past year".

Instead, it's meant to reflect the fact that people talk. You get a reputation. If your reputation as a leader is that you order your followers into suicidal situations, people aren't going to want to follow you. If your reputation as a leader is of a warrior with good tactics, then people are going to follow you even if you have some casualties - because hey, casualties are expected. Adventuring or war or whatever is a nasty business.

J

 

[Wraithdrit]

drnun,

Agreed. I was replying to Saeviomagy's post above.

I think you hit the nail on the head though. Its all about reputation. Would you go work for a guy that was known to be one of only five guys that comes out of a dungeon of doom when he takes 40+ people in with him every time? No.

But a good spin doctor might be able to prove how awesome Lord Suchandsuch is by being the tough enough to survive. Heh. He needs a press secretary.

 

[jgsugden]

It's also a highly inappropriate law to be applied for the times, not to mention the fact that it's almost completely ignored in the real world for most purposes.

When was the last time you heard of the army being sued for sending troops to war and having casualties?

Nobody said anything about someone suing the paladin. Now you're just being silly.

Perhaps I should have been clearer. It is a tool that formalizes the common thought process we go through when assigning blame by breaking it down into the steps that we gloss over in our mind. It just breaks down common sense into easy to follow rules. Want to see it in use by a pair of fantasy peasants?

*****

Bob: "Hey, Jimbo, Wass'up? ... errrr, I mean, Hail and well met, good Jimbo! What hast thine prickly ears uncovered this fine day?"

Jimbo: "Shut up, dude. They're on to us. I hear that some paladin is looking for help. I hear his name is Paldin the Golden."

Bob: "Dude. No way! Paldin the Golden? Didn't you hear about what happenned to the last guys that hooked up with him?"

Jimbo: "Nope. I sure didn't, Dude."

Bob: "Totally bogus. He takes them into someplace called 'The Temple of Nasty Stuff and Smashed Up Followers'. Dude, they all went in with smiles on their faces, too!"

Jimbo: "Dude! No way! What idiots. So, like, how many went in and how many came out?"

Bob: "40 Dudes enter. 5 dudes exit."

Jimbo: "DUDE!"

Bob: "Totally, Dude."

Jimbo: "I hear that some Priestess of Aphrodite is looking for a few good men. Think we should try to get some of that action, Dude?"

Bob: "I don't think she has leadership, Dude."

Jimbo: "Dude. Does she need it?"

******

Jimbo used the analysis I mentioned, but did it in lay-Dude terms. He found out that Paldin gave an order (for his men to go into the Temple). Just by the name of the place he knew that it was obviously dangerous for the followers, so he knew that the decision to send the followers into the Temple endangered their lives. Finally, he knew that many of the followers died. This had an effect on his decision to follow Paldin. The rules I provide just make it easy for a DM to provide consistent answers. Players, like the law, want consistency.

And, FYI, although many legal 'scholars' consider the concept of proximate cause to have been born in the US case of Palsgraf v. LIRR in 1928 (look it up on the internet ... it is actually a funny case), it actually predates legal use by centuries as a philosophical tool. Heck, Palsgraf wasn't even close to the first use of it in law, either. So, although it was adopted and is most commonly formally used by the law in modern society, it is very appropriate for a fantasy setting that replicates 14th to 16th century existence as a way of making a decision.

Use it if you want. Ignore it if you don't like it. It was presented as an option for consideration.

 

[S'mon]

I agree that the important thing is to look at it from the potential follower's POV. If the potential follower is a Warrior and the PC Leader of 100+ occasionally has a few losses here and there, that's probably acceptable risk. If the PC has a reputation for losing all or most of his followers on suicide missions, that should be a hefty penalty to recruitment. If he has a reputation for sending his men in to melee the trolls, then fireballing them (I had a player do this!), I'd put his Leadership probably to 0.