Do paladins work in most games?

[Nightfall]

Isn't that what we been saying?

 

[doghead]

The whole reason the player picked a paladin was to try and coax the party to be more good. It is not working.

Then perhaps the paladin character, IC, should just walk. Then get on with the game with a new character.

I've had a number of my characters leave a group for a number of reasons. One Cyberpunk Nomad dropped out after making a big score. He wanted to spend his time and money supporting his clan. He poped up as a NPC at times. Sometimes, they reappeared. One made an appearance as a "another" character. The current party was an offshoot of the character's original party, so they knew of his old character, but didn't make the connection between the two. Another (not mine) slipped away with a kewl artifact that we had discovered, and he didn't want to share. He was a sneaky git, so we all kicked ourselves for not having been more careful, but congratulated the player on having engineered his theft and escape so well. Then he took a new character and we got on with it.

In a game I DM'ed, there was a Witch-hunter who really lacked the "conviction" to be one. So I shunted him out of the class, into a more generic fighter class. (I am not usually so authoritarian, but we had discussed it a couple of times, and the player realised that his character needed to change but had been unable to bring himself to it) The player was a little unhappy at first, but after some discussion, he agreed it was approapriate, and decided that IC, that the character needed to withdraw and seek spiritual guidance. In both cases the players ended up feeling proud of the way they had played the character, and that the character had been enriched.

I suppose my point is that leaving the party need not be seen as negative. I don't remember alot of what else some of the characters mentioned above did, but I remember these incidents quite fondly - as you can see.

 

[Nightfall]

Dog,

That would be the most logical suggestion. Just get a new character and worry about the old one later.

 

[Rashak Mani]

Funny we have had many badly roleplayed Paladins but nothing as disruptive as has been described. Paladins do tend to be played like fanatical vigilantes from what I have read in many threads... which clearly defies what "Lawful" stands for.

If your paladins are played with this dam what the rest think ala bush and they expect everyone to conform to their morality its sure hard to play a fun game. Now if a Paladin is a bit more balanced the interaction with a less than virtous PC might make for great roleplaying. Paladins should know that others don't follow such a strict morality... I was a rogue with dubious morality in the same group of a strict paladin and those were some of my best gaming moments. Did we work together even so ? Of course...

 

[Nightfall]

Rask,

I think for me the most disruptive has been monks, mainly because of one guy, that if he felt like being chaotic, he did so. Didn't take any penalities cause the Dm was like "Well you deserved it!". In any case I do agree with Dog's and mine previous statement, get the player to make a new character. Don't necessarily trash the old one, just get a new one.

 

[ThoughtBubble]

It's all a matter of fitting the character to the playing style. I could see a paladin all about kicking evil's butt, and getting more power so he could kick even more butt. As long as the player (and the DM) are wiling to let the paladin exisit in the game as it stands, it can all work out.

Now, the instant the DM calls the paladin's player on having his character working with the mostly amoral party, then there's a problem. Likewize, if the paladin's getting upset because the party's kinda amoral, then there's a problem.

It's all about making sure the new guy fits the tone of the game.

 

[Nightfall]

Which obviously to us it seems his paladin won't fit in this game but possibly one with a higher moral standard, possibly even an ethical one.

 

[Sir Whiskers]

I think it really depends on the players and the party. A lot of people are only interested in killing things and taking their stuff they want to be able to do anything and not be bound my strict rules of conduct a paladin really won't fit into that group. Role play is often secondary to all of this...(snip)

The current party with most of the same players is very different most of the party is only interested in either getting powerful items or lots of personal power and I think this is the reason the paladin is just not working...(snip)

Sometimes certain character concepts don't work in a particular game and trying to make it work often just creates friction. I have come to believe that just allowing any class and any alignment in can cause to much conflict and while some conflict can be fun to much just becomes to disruptive.

Just my two cents:

I've noticed that paladins tend to work best in high fantasy games, with a fairly stark Good/Evil flavor. The more the campaign adds shades of gray, the more disruptive and out-of-place a paladin character tends to be. This is not true of every group - a few would enjoy the roleplaying possibilities. But I think most would quickly run into problems, as the paladin would have one agenda and the other characters a very different one.

 

[Haradim]

Now if a Paladin is a bit more balanced the interaction with a less than virtous PC might make for great roleplaying.

It usually seems to just lead to more trouble though.

And it becomes quite difficult to justify why a Paladin would ever be around people who were acting in a way that would raise his ire (or worse, are Evil/outright criminal people), even if the players are mature enough to avoid sending the campaign down in flames over the matter.

 

[ThoughtBubble]

Yeah. You pretty much got it Nightfall. However, it's more of a person to group thing than it is a character thing. In the last group I was in, the annoing and seemingly amoral character would have gotten more tolerance out of the LG paladin I almost played, as opposed to the NG (almost true neutral) bard I went with instead.

I'm not saying that the paladin archetype isn't difficult, but it's still a person vs group issue. Especially if the player knew that the party was somewhat amoral.