High Charisma=Obsessed with sex?
- Thread starter Gellion
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Barastrondo
First Post
Joshua Dyal said:
There's a long field between being celibate and being a Casanova, though. I would think that the usual argument is that the more casual the sex, the more "chaotic" the behavior. You really have to figure out at what point the character is no longer being socially responsible (certainly the paladin who knocks up some poor tavern wench and then goes off to die in a dungeon is being irresponsible!), and paladins by nature shouldn't be irresponsible. Of course, at that point you get into the gray areas of how players define responsible behavior toward sex, and disagreements are sure to erupt.
Whether it's "right" or not, it's certainly easier to play a paladin who plans on waiting for marriage (if they have any plans of marriage at all), as you're less likely to wind up arguing over it. And that's not a bad thing.
To return to the original topic, the longest-running PC bard I've ever seen parlays her Charisma into "likeability" — she's the peasant girl from the small rural village who is lovely and attractive, and wildly popular, but she's by no means a vamp. She's more of a romantic, and therefore tends to get crushes on men that she would love to be courted by, but she always chooses poorly (men who are in love with someone else, druids who are more animal than human at heart, etc.). Very romantically timid, actually; but it suits her upbringing.
I've seen the "Charisma = Lots of Sex for Me" phenomenon, but it was mostly in high school and college. These days I tend to game with players who assign high Charisma stats to their characters because they don't want to miss out on (or sabotage) all the fun negotiations with NPCs and monsters and stuff.
The_Gneech
Explorer
Joshua Dyal said:
Well, the tradition of combining celibacy with spiritual devotion has to do with the concept of sex being a distraction from "higher" pursuits. It's also related to the objections raised to having men and women mix in the military (or, for that matter, for gays in the military). Certainly if the paladin is actually "sex obsessed" they're headed for trouble -- obsession in general is bad for paladins!
Sex can have lots of consequences besides pregnancy -- there's tangled emotions, broken hearts, potential for deriliction of duty, just for starters -- and most of them are inconsistent with being lawful good. (Not necessarily with being good in general -- but definitely with being lawful good.)
Now, assuming the paladin courts his lady fair (or lad fair, as suits the paladin in question), marries them according to the customs of the land, and provides for them as a proper spouse is expected to, then by all means there's nothing wrong with Starting the Holy Whoopiee Machine. (After all, who's better suited to raise healthy, good-minded children than a paladin, right?) But that's not what Casanova was about, was it?
(Suddenly I have this image of Mary Poppins as a paladin of the goddess of love. I'm strange.)
Anyway, that's my $0.02 on the subject.
-The Gneech
Desdichado
Hero
Well, Casanova was a bit of an exageration -- but celibacy does not equal lawful good by a long shot. I had in mind someone more like Aramis (or was it Athos -- I get the two confused) from the Three Musketeers.
The idea that sex interfere's with the pursuit of spiritual matters is a gnostic/catholic holdover from the real world and doesn't necessarily have any bearing on a fantasy world.
And paladins aren't on a quest for spiritual perfection to the same extent that certain clerics would be (not that that class really represents that idea either) -- after all, violence would equally be a distraction.
Paladins, to my mind, are the frontline soldiers of lawful good. They are not necessarily attached to a religion, they are not necessarily attached to a spiritual quest for anything, they are just out there in the trenches trying to make the world a better place. They've got a code of behavior, but sexual proclivities aren't necessarily a part of that code; in fact, it's simply assumed by most players that it is. No description of the code I've ever seen in any sourcebook mentions it at all.
The idea that sex interfere's with the pursuit of spiritual matters is a gnostic/catholic holdover from the real world and doesn't necessarily have any bearing on a fantasy world.
And paladins aren't on a quest for spiritual perfection to the same extent that certain clerics would be (not that that class really represents that idea either) -- after all, violence would equally be a distraction.
Paladins, to my mind, are the frontline soldiers of lawful good. They are not necessarily attached to a religion, they are not necessarily attached to a spiritual quest for anything, they are just out there in the trenches trying to make the world a better place. They've got a code of behavior, but sexual proclivities aren't necessarily a part of that code; in fact, it's simply assumed by most players that it is. No description of the code I've ever seen in any sourcebook mentions it at all.
The_Gneech
Explorer
Joshua Dyal said:
Hey, I didn't say it was valid, I just explained what it was, since you seemed to be asking.
You wanna have randy paladins, then by all means, go ahead! No skin off my nose.
-The Gneech
Desdichado
Hero
The_Gneech said:Hey, I didn't say it was valid, I just explained what it was, since you seemed to be asking.
You wanna have randy paladins, then by all means, go ahead! No skin off my nose.
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