Coup de grace... A moral stand point...

[Kyramus]

I would consider an evil act in killing when
1) they beg mercy (truthfully, not lying to get an upper hand)
2) already caught, tied up, helpless (and someone else mentioned the thought of interrogation, and the one comminting the act doesn't acklnowledge this nor try to figure it out)


I have to reread the alignments in the PHB, the SRD doesn't compile each indibidual alignments. I'm pretty sure certain alignments would follow the course of "hurt when talking isn't enough, maim if hurting isn't enough, kill if maiming isn't enough, etc".

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

Historically, the term coup de grace referred to knights killing their mortally wounded foes quickly (usually with a dagger through the chinks in the armor) so as to spare them the pain of slowly bleeding to death/dying of their wounds. That is why it is called a "blow of mercy."

The catholic church at the time dissapproved of slaying helpless foes like this but it was IIRC generally accepted among the knightly classes.

Now, the knights couldn't stabilize people by rolling a 15 on a heal check no matter how badly they were off nor could most medieval priests cure wounds with a prayer and stave off death that way (tales of the saints notwithstanding). Consequently this is a different situation than in D&D but it's still worth considering the history of the word in this discussion.

 

[RigaMortus]

Re: Re: Coup de grace... A moral stand point...

The best solution is to avoid the problem altogether, by having mooks die as soon as they hit 0 hp.

The only problem with this is when you want to interogate an enemy. "Why did you attack us? Who are you working for? Where are the hostages?"

Coup de grace= Blow of mercy

If that knocked out goblin is around when the ogres come looking for food, it will be less painfull to instakill him then let them much on him.

But you can not simply assume something like this will happen.

The biggest misconception is that you must kill your foe to get XP, and that simply isn't the case. You just need to triumph over your foe. Even running your foes off earns you XP. When a player realizes this, they are less likely to just kill everything they run into.

I am fully aware that all you need to do is "defeat" your opponent in combat to get XP. I was just making a statement that killing is rampant in DnD and that you ARE in fact rewarded by the death of an opponent. What if, for example, a Paladin gets no experience for the encounter if he coup de graces a foe or allows one of his "allies" to do so? It would be an interesting house rule at the very least. Or, give the Paladin MORE exp for preventing such an act.

Oh, and not every case of "running your foes off" would or should give you exp either. What if the party runs into their arch-nemesis? A battle ensues and the arch-nemesis gets away. They have several more encounters where they battle arch-nemesis and his minions and he continues to get away each time. Should the party get experience for this enemy after every encounter they run him off at?

Another example I can take from my own campaign. The party of level 4 - 6 characters just had a run-in with a legendary evil level 20 Wizard. The party had something the Wizard wanted, the two Paladin's in the party (me and my friend) didn't think we should give it up, at first. Well my Paladin friend was about to hand it to him because he felt that it would be wiser to give him this item rather then have this evil wizard mad at us and leveling the whole town while he tried to kill us. Before we could give it up to him, he grew impatient and Power Word Stunned my friend. His henchman grabbed the staff (the object he was after). As he did so, I thought to myself "I really don't want this evil guy to get the staff. He will only use it against innocent people later on. If we can't have it, neither shall he." With this thought I went to Sunder it but failed in doing so. The evil Wizard got a bit more peeved at us and cast Weird which affected almost the entire party (some were actually smart enough to run away earlier in the ecounter). Well, luckily for our Aura of Courage because that was the deciding factor in most of our survival rates. We did have one party member die however. Anyway, after the spell was cast the henchman teleported them both away. Now should we get exp for a level 20 encounter? After all, we did drive him off. We defeated the ecounter. True, the DM threw us a bone. Be could have had the wizard stand there all day until we all died. But the point is still there. Oh, and I am aware that techncially according to the Exp table you do not get exp for such high encounters. But lets say the CR of the encounter was still within range for us to get exp. It seems kind of cheesy to me to get exp for something like this.

Ok, that last paragraph was less about "getting exp for a fleeing foe" and more about "I can't wait to tell you what happened last session". =)

 

[hong]

Re: Re: Re: Coup de grace... A moral stand point...

The only problem with this is when you want to interogate an enemy. "Why did you attack us? Who are you working for? Where are the hostages?"

That's a different situation though, because here the players are _specifically_ asking if there's anyone left alive to interrogate. So the default is for bad guys to just drop, but if the players (or the DM) want otherwise, that can also happen.

Basically, unless you want to deal with moral dilemmas, they shouldn't happen.

 

[RigaMortus]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Coup de grace... A moral stand point...

That's a different situation though, because here the players are _specifically_ asking if there's anyone left alive to interrogate. So the default is for bad guys to just drop, but if the players (or the DM) want otherwise, that can also happen.

Basically, unless you want to deal with moral dilemmas, they shouldn't happen.

Well this wouldn't be a moral dilemna, it would be more of a time-constrant. Someone you intend to question is lying there bleeding to death while you are trying to deal with the rest of the enemies. You only have 1 to 9 rounds (he could be at -1 or -9) to get to him and stabilize him. What fun would it be if all you had to do was wait until the battle was over and pick and choose which of the fallen enemies you want to interrogate because you know they are all unconcious at 0 HP?

Also, would you be stating this at the beginning of the combat round? Mr. DM, I intend to question some of these people so could you make sure Bad Guy X, Y and Z stay alive when we drop them, and make sure all the rest are dead? Thanks.

 

[Zaruthustran]

I just wanted to get everyone's consenus on the moral aspects of coup de gracing a helpless foe. Specifically, if they are unconcious or bleeding to death. Does anyone see this as an evil act?

It's not an evil act.

But is it an un-good act? Well, it depends. In last night's game the party was jumped by thieves. The thieves were *not* evil (the paladin did her Detect thing), they were just defending their turf. So after we cut them down, we went around and bound the wounds of the dieing. These guys were defending their home territory against invaders; it didn't fee right to let them die (the party is Good).

Now, what if those thieves were orcs? We'd probably let 'em die. Orcs are Evil. Evil must be defeated.

-z

 

[hong]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Coup de grace... A moral stand point...

Well this wouldn't be a moral dilemna, it would be more of a time-constrant. Someone you intend to question is lying there bleeding to death while you are trying to deal with the rest of the enemies. You only have 1 to 9 rounds (he could be at -1 or -9) to get to him and stabilize him. What fun would it be if all you had to do was wait until the battle was over and pick and choose which of the fallen enemies you want to interrogate because you know they are all unconcious at 0 HP?

I put it to you that the fun of combat (the whole point of having it in a game, in fact) lies in kicking the sh*t out of bad guys, not in rescuing them.

If you _want_ to rescue one of them, sure, go ahead. As a DM, if my players asked "are any of them still alive to question?", I would say, "one of the guys looks like he's still alive, but barely. You can make a Heal check to stop him dying." Then I'd let the players do what they want. Unless the combat has gone more than 10 rounds since the last bad guy dropped (which isn't likely), this isn't going to break anyone's suspension of disbelief.

Also, would you be stating this at the beginning of the combat round? Mr. DM, I intend to question some of these people so could you make sure Bad Guy X, Y and Z stay alive when we drop them, and make sure all the rest are dead? Thanks.

If you insist on being stupid, there are no guarantees.

 

[RigaMortus]

Re: Re: Coup de grace... A moral stand point...

Now, what if those thieves were orcs? We'd probably let 'em die. Orcs are Evil. Evil must be defeated.

But this isn't necessarily true either. What if one of those Orcs turns their life around later in life. what if that Orc you let died was destined to become an ambassador for his people and make a long lasting peace treaty between the Orcs and Humans? Are all Drow evil too? What about Drizzt?

There are extreme cases.

"Many who live deserve death, and some who die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Do not be too eager to deal out death in judgment. Even the very wise cannot see all ends..." - Gandalf the Grey.

 

[kreynolds]

Re: Re: Re: Coup de grace... A moral stand point...

Hey k...
Do you have some kind of morale rules that you use to decide when a foe(s) turns tale and runs?

Nope. Three out of the five DMs in our group use Morale rules for their NPCs and monsters, though I don't think there are actually any rules. I'm pretty convinced they just pick high or low and roll a d%.

Myself and another DM, we don't use Morale rules. Basically, we just use common sense. We try to put ourselves into the shoes of the monsters or npcs, and unless the monster or npc is really that stupid, they're probably not gonna stick around, knowing they are gonna die. This, of course, only matters if escape is even possible. You're better off fighting a wolf out in the open, because just maybe, he'll give up and take off. Back him into a corner and he doesn't have any other choice, meaning he'll do whatever it takes to go around you, or through you for that matter.

 

[hong]

Re: Re: Re: Coup de grace... A moral stand point...

But this isn't necessarily true either. What if one of those Orcs turns their life around later in life. what if that Orc you let died was destined to become an ambassador for his people and make a long lasting peace treaty between the Orcs and Humans? Are all Drow evil too? What about Drizzt?

D00d, you are thinking WAY too hard about the game. Stop thinking.


Hong "who should put his 3rd law into his sig" Ooi