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Message: <blockquote data-quote="jefgorbach" data-source="post: 5278052" data-attributes="member: 28278">Detect Evil is pretty much a useless effect. The SRD states “A creature’s general moral and personal attitudes are represented by its alignment” Accordingly, the results of Detect Evil should be sketchy at-best in MOST instances simply because “evil” is a subjective opinion determined by one’s viewpoint/intent. For instance many people consider eating human flesh to be an evil act however the “Aghori (an ancient Hindu sect) maintain that eating the flesh of the dead provides a mystical guarantee of liberation from samsara–the birth-death-rebirth cycle–in a single lifetime.”(1) making it a “good” act from their viewpoint and thus such a person should not register to the Detect Evil effect, otherwise someone consuming a hamburger would register as “evil” to a cleric/paladin of the PETA faith.  Likewise, Jhaelen’s greedy businessman would NOT detect as being evil because he’s simply being a good entrepreneur following the accepted economic principle of supply-and-demand.Further complicating its use is the fact the majority of subjects have 10 or fewer hit dice so even if they DO consider themselves to be evil, barely register to the Detect Evil effect according to the spell’s guiding table, radiating a “faint” aura which fades within 6-36 seconds of the subject’s death, effectively limiting its usage to determining whether a questionable object’s aura suggests it was enchanted with a 3rd-8th level effect (moderate), a 9th level spell (strong), or is an Artifact/Relic (overwhelming). (1) <a href="http://factoidz.com/the-aghori-hinduism-cannibalism-and-immortality/" target="_blank">The Aghori: Hinduism, Cannibalism, and Immortality</a></blockquote>

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