DM's Quest: Turning a Good PC Bad

[Halivar]

I'm turning bad... and one of my campaign's PC's is coming with me. But I need advice on pulling it off.

I'm running a low-level campaign (level 4) with a wizard (NG), a thief (CN) and a cleric of Pelor (CG), a girl played by a girl. No fighter, so I decide to provide one. I give them Delia, a LE princess of an opposing nation that worships Hextor (the land they're in is called Hieronea, you can do the math).

Anyhow, the original intention was that Delia, having lost all of her people to a CE lich-lord, begrudginly joins the PC's as a means of avenging her lost kingdom. So the PC's come across two great armies dead on the ground. One has sigils of Hextor, the other is undead, and Delia is the only one standing, but she drops.

The cleric of PELOR (as in... GOOD), sees a girl in black (and before she notices any Hextor sigils), says, "She's evil! Let's go kill her and take her stuff!" Oh.... yes... I get the idea. I scratch out LE on Delia's sheet and replace it with LN. The thief successfully convinces the cleric that they need a fighter.

Since then, Delia has done nothing to the cleric of Pelor other than look menacing and wear black and be helpful at every opportunity. But the cleric refuses to heal her in battle, and actively plots against her. She also is growing resentful of the shine the rest of the group is taking to Delia.

So now I'm going to turn this cleric of Pelor bad. I have some clerics of "Hieroneous" contact our cleric friend about a secret meeting. Our cleric lies to her group, saying she has to visit a sick friend. At the meeting, she meets the paladin prince of Hieronea (or so she thinks). All I have to do is say, "Picture Collin Farrel. He sort of looks like him, but in shiny, beautiful full plate." Hook, line and sinker. The "paladin" plays on the cleric's hatred of Delia, and eventually asks her to plant a dagger (with one-time true strike and Power Word, Kill) in Delia's back at a future date (when the adventure climaxes) and give him a powerful relic. He also asks her to lie to her group about the knife and the meeting. She eagerly agrees. By this point, I think she's ready to sell her soul to Orcus for St. Farrel (the blackguard, had she bothered to cast detect evil). Even though it was a private meeting, I let the other players sit in and listen. The looks on their faces was priceless; they couldn't say anything but they were absolutely incredulous, while the cleric is beaming with happiness ("Oh yes... now she dies...").

At the climax, if the cleric kills Delia, the paladin will show up in pitch black armor riding a nightmare and thank our cleric friend for defeating the group, since he's been the BBEG they've been questing against all along.

Now, my fiendish plot can be averted in several ways, so none of this is deus ex machina:
1. She can always cast detect evil on Delia. But she won't. The visual stereotype is firmly in place.
2. She can always cast detect evil on the blackguard. But she won't. He looks like Collin Farrel, so he has to be good, right?
3. She can always notice that LG clerics of Hieroneous asked her to lie, and a paladin asked her to lie and stab someone in the back to steal an artifact. Red flags all over the place.

But I need more. How can I more firmly entrench this cleric into a web of evil, deceit, and treachery? I've never run a campaign so focused on character development before. What would you do?

 

[LuYangShih]

I would realize the player is not really acting against alignment. CG characters will not work with evil people unless absolutely neccessary, and even then I doubt they would actively aid them. I would also stop trying to punish my players if they do not do what I want. First, the villianous fighter was LE, but because they were going to kill her, you changed it. Now, because you think the player shouldn't have taken the actions she did, you invent an entire plot to corrupt her character.

Have you considered the situation from her point of view? The party is working with an agent of a wicked god, out of no other apparent reason than convience. Most people in her position would resent it, and feel the party would eventually be led down the path of evil because of such influences. Indeed, a Paladin in your party would be forced to either remove Delia by force, or leave the party to its own damnation. Associating with evil leads to evil. Now, agents from a trusted organization her deity is allied with appear, and offer a possible solution to the problem.

Can you really blame her for taking them up on it? At worst, she is guilty of being naive in this matter, no more. Chaotic characters are unconcerned with matters of honor, unlike Lawful characters, so the method of execution for this admitted follower of Hextor is well within the bounds of her alignment. By the way, I would question the validity of anyone masquerading as priests of an enemy God. If anything would be sure to attract the direct wrath of a deity, that would.

Furthermore, I would also say Pelor would not take kindly to anyone trying to corrupt one of his faithful, particularly if she has a great degree of power. I would expect at least a few visions, or a friendly warning from her superior at the church. If the agents of evil can have such a direct influence on the characters, so can the agents of good.

 

[Maerdwyn]

Yup.

In addition to what LuYangShih said,

Noticing a party's tendancy to act based on the appearance of NPCs and using it to trip them up for the sake of a good and challenging adventure: cool.

Deliberately setting out to punish a character because he doesn't behave like you want him to towards your NPC: not so cool.

Just make sure you're doing the former, and not the latter.

 

[Halivar]

Oh, believe me... I'm not out to punish anyone. The goal of the campaign, of course, is for the players to win, and for the BBEG to lose. And I'll make sure that happens.

But in the meantime, the other players in the group have learned that Delia, despite her background, has no real allegiance to Hextor other than family tradition. Others in the group have pointed out to the cleric that Delia herself has never done anything evil at all. Heck, even the NG wizard finally decided that Delia is at worst neutral. Delia even let the group keep her share of the gold.

Right now, I do not believe the cleric warrants an align. change at all. Yes, a CG cleric would want to kill a LE fighter. That's good common sense.

But it's past that now. The tone of the conversation goes like, "I don't care if she's never done anything evil. I don't like her because of her attitude." Now you guys gotta admit that's a much different matter than a simple good vs. evil deal. Now it's personal. And, as we all know, emotions change everything. Alignments, too.

As for Pelor not being appreciative of such an alignment change, that's a good though. So far I like taking a hands-off approach with deities, but that's very possible.

 

[Harlock]

That's a great plot! It would be a really cool campaign but you are singling out a single PC which can cause some wonderful resentment. Having one PC basically "ruin" the campaign for everyone else by giving the BBEG exactly what they want fosters nothing but a distrust between players and DMs and helps to create a player vs. DM attitude.

Rather than scratch out LE and put LN (shame on you!) you simply should have let the cleric kill her, face the repercussions from the party and possibly from her god, depending on how you run them (meaning is it evil to strike down a weakened opponent without even trying to determine if they are evil, disguised to survive, conscripted, etc). I genuinely hate DMs that change things because the "players would ruin my game". I'm not saying you said that, but I have heard it before from DMs and I have experienced it first hand as a player. Fudging HPs to make a tougher battle/climactic ending is one thing, but focusing on one player and not taking them aside and saying, "Look, you're not acting the way I think good should be played, here's some examples.... Here's how I think you can resolve it. Do you have any input or think I am off-base?"

Doing all of this to one player simply because s/he almost killed a pet NPC is kind of rough. How far does it go? If she figures out what you are trying to do (and maybe she already has and resents it so has a plan of her own...) and announces your plot, do you then change it on the fly because it was too easy? If s/he solves the mystery and knows who the bad guy is do you change the bad guy to LG this time? Change him from Blackguard to real Paladin and just keep him in the shiny armor? After all, that's all the player's have seen, maybe he lost his way and comes to a realization later. Chugga Chugga Woo Woo! As a player if I ever found out my DM were doing something like this, I'd quit that group in a heartbeat.

 

[Eldorian]

Woah, look at these nay sayers! Corrupt her! Blind, silly clerics. I see a wonderful opertunity for plot.

My advice is not to reveal the bad guy until after he has gotten the cleric to do some more evil stuff.. each slightly more evil than the last, and then have Pelor abandon her! FUN! =) Make her find a new patron, like Erythnul. Btw, who does the blackguard serve? Can you make him the son of an incubus, or is he already statted out?

For some ideas on more evil things to have the cleric do.. how about raiding a comunity of usually neutral humanoids, like lizardmen, they have a reputation of savagery. But here's the catch, the lizards are lead by a druid, and have been doing a grass roots struggle against some evil allied overlord of the blackguard, maybe even himself. Or maybe he's trying to get a black dragon ally, and the black dragon is being plagued by lizardmen. That sounds pretty cool.

Eldorian Antar

 

[Halivar]

Good points, Harlock.

I felt changing the align. was ok because they hadn't actually met her or interacted with her; at the time, she was an unkown. Killing her wasn't going to ruin the game at all, I just saw an opportunity for some character "development." As for the pet NPC problem, I understand your concern. I hate pet NPC's. Of course, I have every intention of letting the cleric kill Delia whenever she wants. Delia is quite disposable in this plot, since she's just an auxilliary NPC.

Also, the paladin being a blackguard was fleshed out fromt eh very beginning, and I have no intention of changing that. If the cleric uncovers the plot (detect evil in the same room as him is all it takes), they still have to quest to kill him, so the game continues, with the PC's being a bit better informed.

BTW, I never stepped in to keep the cleric from killing Delia. The other players did that.

 

[cptg1481]

Fluid Decision Making is GOOD!!!

Ok, so you had a great plot idea in the middle of a session, I play a fluid game too….I often change stuff if I get an idea inspired by the dynamics of the game. I sometimes change things to the player’s advantage and sometimes the changes make the challenges I had in mind already a little harder.

I find it odd that some out there would quit a game if they found out a DM was changing things from his original idea based on how the players react. Isn’t that what he’s supposed to do? I mean if you want a static experience then play a CRPG, no fluidity there. Action – reaction…what movie was that from anyway, stuck in my head for some reason. Anyway, I make NPCs to challenge the party both mentally and physically. Sometimes I find after first contact that the situation/encounter is way to hard and I change it a bit on the fly, and other times I change it to make it harder. It has to work both ways. What I write in my notes is not in stone and is mutable.

I think that your idea and changes were a great way to bring depth to your game; it will make the party role play out some strife, some intense thought provoking conversation and the best part is some soul searching on the part of the holy person etc. As for the persons god stepping in I’d go the opposite way; wouldn’t the god want to have the faith of his worshipers challenged so he could separate those of weak faith from the strong. It is almost a major theme in any of the religions in the real world and I’d say very appropriate for a world where many gods compete for souls.

Anyway, I like it I do the same thing in my game but tend to use humanoids that are assumed to be evil in ways where the party may be able to get help from them if they don’t shot first and ask questions later.

 

[Harlock]

As I said, I like the plot idea and I am not suggesting a plot set in stone. DMs HAVE to react to players all the time. But, I base that on player actions, not my metaplot. I believe in rewarding players for clever thinking. For instance, let's say the party is supposed to figure out who in the Church of Good God X is selling everyone else out to the bad guys. If your players luck out and find all the right clues really fast and use some creative ideas to obtain information, do you suddenly change who the traitor is? As a DM I say not no, but heck no! Reward the players for their skills, heap on the praise and then adapt as a DM. So you're forced to come up with some more ideas for the rest of your campaign or even that night's adventure. Great! That's a fun challenge to a DM. It's just a matter of perspective is all. I am a player-centric DM. I believe the story is completely about them. They are the earth-shakers and groundbreakers from level one on up. Granted, that's not good for all genres (horror springs right to mind, where being minute and insignificant is part of the challenge and roleplay experience) but I woul never punish a player without a warning either in game or out. In the case stated by the OP I'd go so far as to have the Cleric wake up one morning with something feeling not quite right. If she asks more and does some in character introspeciton I'd grant more clues... a veil between her and Pelor that didn't exist before, maybe only healing spells work and only on other people, not herself, as a reminder to serve others before yourself and to put away the vanity. Also, I think it would be important to touch base OOC and determine if she thinks this is within her alignment. See what her justification is. Still, I cannot put enough emphasis on this part: don't single her out and make her the fall guy. Players do hate that unless that was the style of play agreed upon before the campaign started. There's a lot of genre exceptions within here, and as always YMMV, but I would really suggest talking to the player outside of the game and just trying to get a feel for what she is thinking. As I said, this has the potential to turn into player vs. DM and that's never a good thing.

 

[Camarath]

I personally do not think killing someone based solely on their appearance is in any way clever thinking. A PC scheming to murder another character sounds evil to me. I think giving the player the chance to indulge the dark desires of her heart is a good thing. I do think you should give the PC a bit of very subtle warning nothing as drastic as losing spells or healing, I think vague feelings of misgiving should be enough. Let your subtle warning firmly entrench the player in her chosen course of action then slowly up the warning level till in the end she knows full well what she is doing is wrong or at least not good but does it anyway. Don't force evil on the player let her chose it for herself.