To me this is down to the player's expectations of the GM. If the players have their PCs parole the prisoner instead, what will the GM do? If the GM has all paroled prisoners break their word to the PCs, then no wonder the players stop playing their PCs as decent people!
Two issues seem juxtaposed here. The first is whether the characters are "decent people" who do not cut the throats of their prisoner, but spare his life, perhaps set him free, etc. The second is whether that decency has positive, neutral or negative in-game consequences. If the GM has the consequences of Good behaviour consistently be negative - the prisoners break their word, return to attack the PC's, warn the Big Boss, etc. - then it is quite understandable that players will gravitate away from Good alignments in his game. If people generally attack spellcasters on sight in the GM's world, and it is common for dead magic zones to make magic useless, I expect players will similarly gravitate away from wizards and sorcerers in similar fashion. This GM penalizes those character choices.
Second is whether the characters are
decent people - ie of Good alignment - because the players say they are. That is, they routinely kill the prisoners, torture townsfolk for information, etc., rationalizing that it is all for the Greater Good - do they get to declare they are still Good, and we all accept that because this is the player's character, so the player gets to dictate whether they are good? Or do the cosmological forces of Good see through such rationalizations and they are not Good, however loud and long they may protest because the character's actions speak louder than the player's words?
4e is set up with multiple barriers to your poison scenario, including the rarity of poisons, and their magic-item style cost. The player of a paladin who wants to immobilise a target, instead of spending 250 gp on a 5th level poison, can spend that on some other item that will enhance an attack.
He has access to the poison. He chooses to use it. Does he, or does he not, gain a mechanical action? Is the use of poison deemed "honourable" because the player says it is so, or is it not?
The only way I can see this poison issue coming up in any regular way is a paladin being in play alongside an executioner assassin. If a group have worked out how to make that viable for them - along the lines of a superman-batman team-up - then go for it. It shouldn't be any more overpowered than the paladin teaming up with a fighter, so it's not as if the player of the paladin has a reason to angle for a poison-using buddy rather than someone else.
Crossing company lines, I am reminded of an Avengers issue where Thor states that they have won the day, but the actions of a teammate have robbed the victory of all honour. If my character is an honourable warrior, truly concerned with fighting a fair fight, is that consistent with continuing to work with this poisoner, or with conveniently stepping out of the room so my less honourable "friends" can torture the prisoner without offending my honour. Should my honourable character also suggest, before leaving, that they be careful THIS TIME so the prisoner does not
accidentally fall down the stairs, run into a door, slip and skin themselves with a knife then pour salt in the wound, apply a red-hot brand to their genitalia, set their own hair on fire or suffer any other clumsy misfortunes similar to the last dozen prisoners I left them alone to interrogate?
It is both. A dishonourable tactic is being employed to achieve a desired end. The desired end is benevolent, the tactics used to achieve it less so. Is developing a vaccine that can cure cancer benevolent and honourable? Is testing it on homeless people a benevolent and honourable means to achieve that end?
Is the defeat of the evil tyrant a good, and benevolent/ objective? So does that justify mandatory military service for all members of our Good nation between the ages of 16 and 35, with draft-dodging or desertion punishable by death to maintain military ?
In our world, we can have endless debates, but Good is not a cosmological force which directly influences our world. And if Good is a cosmological force, then it has an answer to these questions.
If the player sincerely believes that the action declared is honourable, then who is deciding that in fact it is "less than honouable"? And why is that other person's decision authoritative?
Those posters who are indicating that the Paladin would not use a
less than honourable tactic such as this in their games appear to be deciding it is less than honourable. They keep telling us that examples posted of alignment issues would never happen in their games, not because the actions can be justified as being within the parameters of Lawful or Good behaviour by a sincere player, but because their players would never stoop to such machinations, and would never claim a character taking such actions is honourable, good, etc. Hence the hive mind - we all agree what is appropriate, or at least acceptable, for a Good or Lawful character, in which case mechanical alignment would never really come up.
Who is judging that the character is out of alignment?
The tangible cosmological forces of Law, Chaos, Good and Evil which, as they are not PC's, are managed by the GM.
If the player makes that judgement, then s/he can rewrite the character sheet appropriately. If the GM would play the character differently, OK - the GM can remember that next time s/he is a player in the game. In the meantime, let the player play his/her PC.
By all means. And let the GM adjudicate the results, including the success or failure of the action (adjudicated by die rolls for the skills the GM considers appropriate to the DC set by the GM with whatever bonuses or penalties the GM adjudicates to be applicable) and the reactions of NPC's from urchins in the street through leaders of men to deities and beyond them to the cosmological forces of Good, Evil, Law and Chaos.
What is forbidden is the player playing his/her PC as s/he conceives of it - for instance, what is forbidden is a paladin exhibiting the player's rather than the GM's conception of honour, where those do conceptions differ.
You keep coming back to the player being prohibited from making choices, rather than the fact that his choices have consequences beyond his direct control. In my view, there are a wide range of possible choices with a given a alignment, nor does the occasional choice which might fall outside that alignment mean alignment as a whole has changed. You keep coming back to the Honourable Dwarf (you know, the one who conveniently left the room while his less honourable companions questioned the prisoner and **surprise** committed him to something, instead of just torturing the prisoner). Would he be less than Honourable to decide that the Justice of the Land must override the hastily and ill-considered commitments of his companions, which they had no Lawful authority to undertake? Or to carry out the promise made for him, but never again leave either of the two who made that ill-considered promise alone in an interrogation again? Or to keep his word, poorly given, and sever all ties with those who so cavalierly committed him to such an action? Some of those choices might be considered "disruptive" to the game, or they might be considered great role playing, depending on the group.
And how does not wanting to play with cheats or liars suddenly turn into playing with "only those who share the hive mind"? What hive mind? @
Hussar has expressly
disavowed imposing his view on a player's action declaration.
How did we become the ones that equated not playing with cheats and liars into only playing with those who share the hive mind? It seems you are deciding what everyone's arguments are, not just your own. Despite the constant protests that there is no "hive mind", both you and [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] have repeatedly claimed that no sincere player, and no player you game with, has ever, or would ever, play their character in a manner remotely similar to the examples raised where mechanical alignment would come into play. It seems like your groups are of sufficiently similar mindset - the "hive mind" - that serious disagreements on alignment interpretation would never arise in your games. Yet, somehow, despite the fact that these disagreements would never arise, somehow the very use of alignment would have radical negative implications for your games.
Adjudicating physical consequence fairly and so as to drive play forward, rather than stifle it, is (in my view, at least) at the heart of GMing once you move away from Gygaxian "skilled" play. This is true in framing a combat encounter - what is at stake if the PCs lose? - or in framing a non-combat challenge - what happens if the PCs don't extinguish the fire in the first 10 minutes of fighting it?
Someone a little bit upthread noted that some players would view powerful NPC's who disagree with the PC's conception of morality as at least an equal "stick" to the alignment rules. If their characters are jeered in the street, criticized for their actions, or arrested for their crimes, that's just the heavy-handed GM trying to beat them into submission and play their characters the way he wants them played.
There are extreme views on both sides. On the one side is the GM who considers each alignment can justifiably make only one decision in response to each choice they face, so he basically scripts the characters for the players - any deviation will be severely penalized. On the other side is the player who considers any negative consequence arising due to his character's choices being the mean micromanaging GM attempting to enforce his iron-fisted rule on the players. Somewhere between the two extremes lies a vast continuum of good gaming.
If the player sincerely thinks his/her PC is honourable, and the GM wants to introduce NPCs who disagree, that has to be done with thought and care, just like framing any other situation. The GM also has to be open to the PC persuading the NPCs that s/he is right and their adverse judgement was mistaken. (This is where social resolution mechanics can be helpful.)
OK, let's leave aside the difference between whether the character's behaviour was Good or Honourable or what have you and being a smooth talker who can persuade others to buy into his rationalizations. Do the players have to be equally open to the possibility that the NPC's persuade them that their view is right, and their adverse judgement was appropriate, such that the character will accept whatever consequences they feel are appropriate, or is this a one way street where only the NPC's views are subject to logic and persuasion?
Let's take that one step further, to the two player characters who disagree on whether torturing the mad bomber's sister is an acceptable tactic. They use their interaction skills, the social resolution mechanics are implemented, and one of the characters wins overwhelmingly. Is the other character now obliged to fervently believe that he was in error, and be grateful for being prevented from his inappropriate action and being set back on the True Path of Righteousness, regardless of how the player feels about the issue?
Does my character get to always be right because he invests lots of character resources into the ability to persuade others to see things his way, or is he just very good at pulling the wool over others' eyes? If the choice is mine, then I choose the former. And I do so in all sincerity because I envision my character always and invariably knowing, and adhering to, the moral right of any situation.
