Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 9469689" data-attributes="member: 42582">I'm pretty sure that this D&D Beyond entry for paladin is the 2014 version: <a href="https://www.dndbeyond.com/classes/4-paladin" target="_blank">https://www.dndbeyond.com/classes/4-paladin</a>So you (and others) have had 10 years to prosecute this particular case. Why is it only turning up now? If no one noticed for 10 years, that suggests that it is not, in fact, a major concern.I also noticed this text on that page:The most important aspect of a paladin character is the nature of his or her holy quest. Although the class features related to your oath don’t appear until you reach 3rd level, plan ahead for that choice by reading the oath descriptions at the end of the class. Are you a devoted servant of good, loyal to the gods of justice and honor, a holy knight in shining armor venturing forth to smite evil? Are you a glorious champion of the light, cherishing everything beautiful that stands against the shadow, a knight whose oath descends from traditions older than many of the gods? Or are you an embittered loner sworn to take vengeance on those who have done great evil, sent as an angel of death by the gods or driven by your need for revenge? . . . How did you experience your call to serve as a paladin? Did you hear a whisper from an unseen god or angel while you were at prayer? Did another paladin sense the potential within you and decide to train you as a squire? Or did some terrible event—the destruction of your home, perhaps—drive you to your quests? Perhaps you stumbled into a sacred grove or a hidden elven enclave and found yourself called to protect all such refuges of goodness and beauty. Or you might have known from your earliest memories that the paladin’s life was your calling, almost as if you had been sent into the world with that purpose stamped on your soul. . . . When you reach 3rd level, you swear the oath that binds you as a paladin forever. Up to this time you have been in a preparatory stage, committed to the path but not yet sworn to it. Now you choose the Oath of Devotion detailed at the end of the class description or one from another source.So it seems to me that the authors of the book have squarely addressed the relationship between the paladin's origin fiction, and the mechanical structure which gives a new player a bit of time to explore some basic class features before making a choice about how they specialise and focus. And if someone wanted to vary that fiction a bit - eg to have had their PC swear an oath form the outset, with the 3rd level and subsequent features simply coming "on line" for whatever reason they do (just as an AD&D paladin has some abilities, like turning undead, calling for a warhorse, and spell-casting, that don't come online until later levels) - there is ample room to do so.I think it's much more important to affirm a contradiction and declare the class unplayable!</blockquote>

Verification