Detect Evil

[Gnimish88]

On the other hand, I think it would be interesting to make a D&D kingdom where it was illegal to be evil. A paladin/cleric run theocracy, for instance. Detect evil is routinely cast on all visitors, and evil people are sent to the "Inquisition" for testing (to make sure there's no trickery, like Misdirection spells, that is getting them to arrest a non-evil person) and "cleansing" (become good, repent your evil ways, or die). Such a kingdom had great adventure potential - especially if the ruling cleric/paladin caste has been infiltrated by evil people with the approprate items and spells to throw off the ubiquitious detections. These infiltrators would be manipulating the theocracy to condem innocent good people to death, despite the safeguards.

Actually, in the novel 'Villians by Neccessity', the forces of good are rounding up all evil-doers and converting them by magic to good people. The downside of this is that the world is sliding out of balance toward its own destruction. It raised some very good questions about the morality of those considered 'good' who take a black and white view of the world.

 

[MerakSpielman]

It all seems to boil down to how the DM visualizes evil in his campaign. I'd make a person detect as evil if they were just generally a nasty person. Most participants of the show Surviver would detect as evil because they go around betraying each other, backstabbing, and lying. Not to mention that they're doing all of this for the basest of motivations - Greed.

Other DMs wouldn't say they were evil because they aren't murderers (or something of equal nastiness).

Also, it should be noted that paladins are very poorly designed creatures for maintaining justice in a city. Paladins are designed for going into the Dark Places of the world to smite the horrible evils that lurk there. They're adventurers, not magistrates.

 

[DarkMaster]

It all seems to boil down to how the DM visualizes evil in his campaign. I'd make a person detect as evil if they were just generally a nasty person. Most participants of the show Surviver would detect as evil because they go around betraying each other, backstabbing, and lying. Not to mention that they're doing all of this for the basest of motivations - Greed.

Other DMs wouldn't say they were evil because they aren't murderers (or something of equal nastiness).
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Don't agree with the Survivor thing. They are not evil, they are simply not lawful, I don't think any of the contestant is hoping or planning to hurt physically or emotionally someone intentionally.

 

[MerakSpielman]

Don't agree with the Survivor thing. They are not evil, they are simply not lawful, I don't think any of the contestant is hoping or planning to hurt physically or emotionally someone intentionally.

That's my point though: different opinions from different people.

The cast of Survivor is largely coniving backstabbers. I strongly believe that were there not rules in place forbidding the use of violence, they would cheerfully engage in it. As long as it doesn't break a rule, and it still helps them reach their materialistic goal, they're willing to do it. That's Lawful Evil to me.

 

[DarkMaster]

That's my point though: different opinions from different people.

The cast of Survivor is largely coniving backstabbers. I strongly believe that were there not rules in place forbidding the use of violence, they would cheerfully engage in it. As long as it doesn't break a rule, and it still helps them reach their materialistic goal, they're willing to do it. That's Lawful Evil to me.

Our conversations bring an interesting concept that could be map in the game. We both have our perception of their act, as the PC have theirs on the various PC, NPC around them. But God, or whatever you beleive in knows what are their real motivation, even if there is no God and that nobody or nothing can tell their alignement for sure(maybe except themselves), they have an alignement.

In a role playing that absolut information is held by the DM which incarnates the NPC and the gods. What they reflect is subject of interpretation by the PCs like in the real world(what we are doing about the survivor cast). But the difference between the two world is that some people in the fantasy world have access trough spell to that information. If a paladin would go on the set of Survivor, he could tell us out of all doubts who is evil and who is not, independantly from their actions and from his own interpretation. When you think about it, this is an amazing power, you gain a knowledge that is only accessible to God. On earth there is nothing that can reveal that information.

 

[MerakSpielman]

On earth, there is considerable debate among different religions on whether evil or sin exists at all.

I wonder, in a D&D world, if the different religions disagree with each other about what, exactly, the results of Detect Evil really mean.

There will be rules and laws about whether information gained by divination is admissable in court. These rules could vary from kingdom to kingdom. After all, why are lie detecters not admissable in court? Because there is a possiblity for error. Possiblity for error exists with divinations, especially considering the number of spells and items that can give false results. A misdirection spell here and there, and innocent people can be "guilty" of being evil. If such a person were happened upon and instantly executed by a passing paladinbot, it would result in instantaneous loss of paladinhood. Sorry, you killed a helpless innocent.

Also, how far can you trust the people in charge of casting the divinations? Who watches the watchmen, as it were? Are they above the law, considered incorruptable? An Amulet of Nondetection will go a long way towards hiding corruption within their ranks, and all you really have is their word on what the results of their divinations were. What if they're lying? Do you have people with divinations watching them? What about those people? There's just no way of assuring that such a system is working.

 

[DarkMaster]

Well I never said anything about judging the people I just said that the person casting the spell has the absolut information that the DM knows, it kind of a way for the player to look into your notes if you want. Then what you do with that information is entirely another issue.
In my world paladin are very hard to play because being evil is far from being enough to shorten the existence of someone. They are always stuck figuring out ways to incapacitate their opponents. Since I play only two of my player ever played paladin,one in the first edition, was quite young so the paladin was basically an improved fighter, and one in the second edition, which was fed up of all my restrictions. The only place he had fun is when they went to hell, or similar places.

 

[Wolffenjugend]

I thought D&D had a definite moral stance to it? There IS a good and there IS an EVIL; they're tangible forces. That does away with all the moral ambiguity. The detect spell detects those people who have evil alignment; it doesn't matter if they're good tomorrow or yesterday, at the time of the spell being cast the target is evil. Once you start debating what constitutes evil then you open up a huge can of worms b/c there no longer is a true definition other than "it depends."

The real question is whether being evil is a crime in and of itself. If it is in your campaign, then lock the evil people up. If it's not, then wait for them to commit an evil act.

Of course, you have to remember it works both ways and if all the evil people are being locked up then all the good people will be too (by the evil people) and you'll probably be in a state of global war.

 

[DarkMaster]

I thought D&D had a definite moral stance to it? There IS a good and there IS an EVIL; they're tangible forces. That does away with all the moral ambiguity. The detect spell detects those people who have evil alignment; it doesn't matter if they're good tomorrow or yesterday, at the time of the spell being cast the target is evil. Once you start debating what constitutes evil then you open up a huge can of worms b/c there no longer is a true definition other than "it depends."

The real question is whether being evil is a crime in and of itself. If it is in your campaign, then lock the evil people up. If it's not, then wait for them to commit an evil act.

Of course, you have to remember it works both ways and if all the evil people are being locked up then all the good people will be too (by the evil people) and you'll probably be in a state of global war.

usually law are more based on the law/chaos axis than the evil/good axis

 

[CyberSpyder]

In the case of the reedemed serial killer, The moment he reedemed his alignement would have switch to neutral. Your alignement represent your current state of mind not the one you had in the past. Obviously I don't allow people changing their alignement without a good reason. It requires something big to change it.

Leaving aside the fact that you are responding to a situation described specifically as being a facet of alignment being caused by one's actions...if alignment is merely a state of mind, why does it require something big to change it? Presumably even an evil person can have a sudden revelation and seek to turn his life around - if alignment is dependent on current state of mind, he should, be all rights, immediately detect as good.

If it is also partially dependent on your actions, then why would the redeemed serial killer's alignment immediately switch to neutral when he's done nothing yet to make up for slaughtering all those human children?

Sounds like you've been reading spawn

No, it's just a pretty obvious connection to make. Morality is a consequence of freedom of action. If one's moral nature becomes 'fixed' at a certain point, it can only be because one no longer has freedom of action. If you still have freewill in an afterlife, then, one can only conclude that you can become evil (or good, if already evil) in the afterlife. Spawn is that comic with the spiderman-like guy, right?

Anyway, all this talk about detecting evil as if it were some outlandish fantasy notion ignores the fact that it's pretty easy for people who actually believe in evil to figure out what's what. I know what I think is evil. Muslims know what they think is evil. Hindus know what they think is evil. Puritans knew the people they thought to be evil, etc etc. Obviously, there were sometimes mistakes made--in this case, I'm not talking about the "there's nothing wrong with that" mistakes but rather the "he seemed like such a nice man/I'd always assumed that he was like..." kinds of mistakes--but, by and large, I suspect that such knowledge is about as accurate as Detect Evil is in a world full of cursed items, misdirection, Undetectable Alignment, Nondetection, Mind Blank, etc spells.

You miss the point. In reality, there are many different standards for judging evil, and most people don't agree on those standards. The people who hold the standards are aware that theirs is not the only standards, and even though they think their standard is 'correct,' they also know that it is possible to misjudge.

In the D&D cosmology, however, there is a universal, objective standard for determining evil, that cannot be wrong short of magical interference. Fortunately, it is also possible to tell when there is magical intereference, through 'detect magic.' A wise state would conduct periodic 'evil checks' through the city, and round up those who detected as evil. Those people would then be checked for magic, and divested of any magic on their belongings. If they then did not detect as evil, they would be freed. If they still detected as magical, either holding them in a cell for a few days or a couple of Dispel Magics would clear up that problem, allowing someone to determine their true alignment. They could then be dealt with appropriately - imprisonment and attempted rehabilitation in a kind state, or execution in a pragmatic state.

This, of course, is going from the assumption that evil is defined by outlook. If it is defined by past actions, then the above would not be an effective way of preventing future suffering - the person plotting to blow up the city would not be caught, while the now-clean recovering drug addict who once did some terrible things would.