NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Archangel" data-source="post: 256867" data-attributes="member: 4537">Personally, I do not think that evil is accepted by any civilized culture.  Some justify their acts (religion, revenge, self-defense, "he was MORE evil", etc.) so as to make them not evil.As an example, using the "intent" method of abjucating Detect Evil, take the following two examples:a) Joe Bob is sneaking up on a lady to kidnap, rape, an kill her. All because of the need for some sort of perverse physical pleasure.  His greed for sex, power, riches, etc. drive him.b) Jim Bob is a religious fanatic.  He is entirely convinced that a group of people's very existance is evil and a threat to his eternal peace.  He grabs a couple of assault rifles and murders men, women, and children.Example a) would detect as evil, even though the result was less a travesty in the public eye.  He had personal greed a gratification as his motivation.  Any civilized culture would punish this individual (unless he had a real good lawyer).Example b) would not detect as evil, even though the result caused great grief to many people.  In his heart he was not acting out of greed (he may not have even acted out of malice).  Does it make it right? No.  In fact many, many people would be exclaiming the evil of this person.  But, others (who also believe that the group in question is evil and a threat) would treat the man as a hero.  You see, evil acts are not always seen as evil if the reason if easily justifiable to the masses.  These are the "necessary evils" that people talk about.  We see it in our world all the time (sometimes on the receiving end, sometimes on the inflicting end - unless you live in Switzerland and are neutral - oo how I envy the Swiss).  Anyway, I can justify and condemn the same act based on my perception of the person committing the act.I believe that this interpretation of the use of Detect Evil is necessary, or else the PCs in many cases would detect as evil (if call an act evil, it is still evil when the Paladin does it - such as killing).  If you want to judge acts and not intent, and you decide that killing is not evil, then you may have creatures that are normally evil due to the intent of their killings no longer detecting as evil (especially if killing is their ownly evil act).Now, to be fair a DM shouldn't say that all the villains are acting out of benevolent religious feelings.  Evil individuals still do evil acts with evil intent and therefore detect as evil.I believe that I have begun to ramble now, so I shall bid you farewell.</blockquote>

Verification