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Message: <blockquote data-quote="3catcircus" data-source="post: 1512743" data-attributes="member: 16077">I had already been DMing a campaign for quite a few sessions, with the PCs on the Moonshae Isles - I had adapted some of B1-9 (Castle Caldwell portion) and UK modules The Sentinel and The Gauntlet, with a backstory for them being in the Moonshaes to find a missing Imam of Tyr (the party's paladin was leading the effort, since his patron deity was Tyr.)  While investigating the skulk situation, they ran into the underground lair of some Xvarts (I know, they aren't canon Forgotten Realms creatures - so sue me...)  Anyway, during the battle, the paladin killed fleeing Xvart females carrying babies in their arms - his justification was that they were calling out warning to other Xvart warriors to come aid the ones already present.Later, the group discovered the remains of a village razed by (IIRC) gnolls.  The gnoll chieftain was still alive - instead of taking him prisoner, they slew him.I felt that while the 2nd event was a gray area, the first event was clearly a violation of what a paladin stands for - and I refused to award full experience points for the encounter, as well as making the paladin lose his powers until he atoned.The entire group howled their outrage at me not giving them the xp for killing innocents women and children.Now - is that a case of being a difficult DM?What about the case of a different campaign, where the party was deciding who should guard some magical stones?  The lawful evil hexblade bashed the party's sorcerer (who had 3 hp) in the head with a rock, knocking him unconscious to prove the point that the sorcerer should not be the one to guard them as he was too vulnerable to even a simple mugging, let alone any serious threat.  He immediately healed the sorcerer afterwards, but he *was* played like an evil character.  The sorcerer howled protests that the hexblade should have been arrested (there was no law-man around to witness the event, having taken place in a hallway in an inn in Triboar.)  I didn't penalize the player for having his character attack an "innocent" person in this case because it was something that his character would do, being lawful evil.  This same character (the party was guarding a caravan) tried to third-party negotiate with another character to not work directly for the caravan, but to be a sub-contractor to him, with the intent of cheating him out of an equal share of pay... So, even though the character was played as an utter bastard, everything he did was in keeping with the character's alignment and character concept.Does applying this seemingly-double standard make me a difficult DM?  Or do you think I was justified in my ruling in both cases.</blockquote>

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