Is Animating Dead Evil?

[Morrow]

Why is it that in a thread about Good and Evil, no one ever bets on when someone will mention puppies... *shrug*

Well, puppies can be loud, messy, and irritating, but I most people wouldn't go so far as to call them evil.



Morrow

 

[Rashak Mani]

In Forgotten Realms they have those Good Elven Liches.. but FR isnt a good example of balanced approach to anything...

As for myself I had a Lawful Evil... with much more emphasis on the Lawful part... Wizard/Cleric. We were surrounded by werewolves and I was flying... the group ran but the Paladin got kind of surrounded. I saw a group of dead villagers from some kind of ritual... and didnt think twice about it... Raise Dead (2nd Ed). The Skeletons delayed the werewolves enough for me to get the paladin to safety.

Guess what ? The Paladin wasnt to happy about being saved that way ! Ungrateful whiner...

 

[KidCthulhu]

Well, puppies can be loud, messy, and irritating, but I most people wouldn't go so far as to call them evil.Morrow

To tie this all together, one of the arguments often raised to point out how evil is is not always as evil does, Hitler was apparently very fond of and gentle and kind with his dogs. Puppies and Hitler in one sentence! Extra geek master points for me.

All those who abuse dogs are evil, but those who are nice to dogs are not necessarily good.

 

[Galfridus]

This discussion has gotten started on PirateCat's storyhour, but I think it's something that should be thrown open for everyone. In PC's game, a powerful undead creature has shown up, claiming to be an ancient holy man from a good church. He detects as undead, but not as evil.

I believe the crux of the discussion centers on whether the use of Animate Dead is always evil, and also whether undead are always inherently evil. Can a life be prolonged through necromancy, and the prolonged not be evil?

Go to it.

If you go by the rules, the answer is pretty simple: Animating Dead is not always evil (arcane); not all undead are evil (revised skeleton; ghost). You would need to house rule the Detect Evil text to stop them from showing up, though.

For games like PC's, though, the rules are really only a starting point. The question of whether animating undead is evil comes down to a DM call; if a good cleric animates a good soul for good purposes, is that a bad thing? Saying yes requires a house rule, but so what.

Clearly, one could animate a good person and get a creature which follows the tenets of good. The question becomes: are there innate properties of being undead that are evil?

IMC, infusing a body/corpse with negative energy is Evil. Even if you do it to a good creature, there will be a taint of evil eating away at it; in the long run, such creatures would probably become evil. Thus, a good wizard who creates unintelligent undead is OK, but if he starts making intelligent undead his alignment will probably decay in the long run. But this is one particular interpretation; I could easily see negative energy being considered just another energy with no innate goodness or evilness. I could also see those b-----ds in the White Kingdom as coming up with "negative energy Lite": all the animating power, less than 1g of Evil per serving. That's not to mention the possibility of powerful divination magic at work.

Anyway, since Aleax clearly is a) undead and b) does not register on Detect Evil, something is up. Either there's a spell screwing with divinations, Piratecat has house ruled Detect Evil, or (heaven forbid) he forgot that aspect of Detect Evil. I suppose you could go find a skeleton somewhere and see if it Detects as evil as an experiment.

If it were me, I would be pulling out the most serious divination magics I could lay my hands on. Either that, or slip a evil/cursed magic item down Aleax's tunic when he's not looking. "See, he's evil now!"

 

[Sir Osis of Liver]

I generally look at the subject this way, Animateing mindless undead is definately not evil, the spirt has fled and now it's just a shell. Intelligent undead are a whole nother matter, if the "victem" is unwilling to become undead it's evil, if it's self-inflicted on the other hand it's not. I keep my opion that simple, as it allows for non-evil necromancers ect.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

I, personally, see no problem whatsoever with certain undead types being good - liches and ghosts mostly, but why not the occasional vampire? I don't think prolonging your exisitance through undeath is any more inherently evil than prolonging your life through other magic: longevity potions (I know they're not in 3e - yet), wishes or miracles for instance.

Here's what everyone seems to be overlooking: the method by which one becomes undead.

In the case of both liches and ghosts, there are ways to become a lich or a ghost without tapping the negative plane.

But this argument isn't about whether all undead are evil... I believe the question was whether animating undead was evil.

But most undead arise as a result of having their former shell taken over by a malevolent force from the Negative Energy plane-- whether by having their own soul sucked away to the negative plane and replaced, or whether some spellcaster opens a conduit to let that energy in.

That's what the cleric spell is doing, really: raising evil spirits to inhabit fallen bodies. Whether they were your friends or not in life is irrelevant, you're packing them full of negative energy to get them up and moving again. Don't have any illusions about the force that's inhabiting them having anything to do with who they were in life, or what your current intentions are.

That's why the EVIL descriptor is part of the spell. Whether you're a cleric or a wizard, and regardless of your good intentions, it's an evil act.

Wulf

 

[Pheonix]

I don't agree with the idea that evil spell=undead detect as evil- Here's my view. Skeletons are listed as neutral, yet they are created (typically) through use of an evil spell (meaning spell listed as evil in the PHB).

I thought that the errata changed skeleton and zombie alignments to any evil...?

 

[Bronz Dragon]

Sir Aleax.

With all the rules disscussion that's been going on, I think most people are missing the actual point: Aleax may DETECT as evil, but his intentions may not be so.

If the skeleton truly believes that it is Aleax, it will behave as if it were lawful good, right? Just because it has a pulsating miasma of pure negative energy pulling on its bones to make it walk doesn't mean it's going to suddenly start squishing people randomly and tossing little kittens up in trees (is there anything more evil than a cute little kitty stuck in a tree?)..

Just food for thought...

 

[Ziggy]

Trying to be a bit more precise.....

The D&D 3E rules state:

• Animating Undead is evil (Evil descriptor in spell)
• Not all undead are evil (Skeletons, Ghosts, Zombies - no official errata for the MM yet)
• All undead will be detected as evil by the spell Detect Evil
• How undead interact with Protection from Evil is unclear, either similar to Detect Evil or by alignment.

Logically this creates some paradoxes, I prefer to houserule this to be:

• Animating Undead is evil (no need to change this).
• Not all undead are evil (Even if WoC wants to errata Skeletons and Zombies (see my rules thread), there are still Ghosts)
• Undead will be detected as evil using Detect Evil only if their alignment is evil (similar for clerics of evil deities).
• Undead interact with Protection from Evil (and similar spells) depending on their alignment.

There are good arguments both for and against undead as evil (see other posts in this tread), but in the end it all boils down to:

1. The DM must decide if undead are inherently evil (IMHO this is mostly a world-defining question, not a moral one).
2. The DM/players must decide what the moral stance of the world/characters are on Animating Dead (a moral question, partly depending on the world definition).
3. The DM must decide whether alignment depends on belief, on actions, on inheritance/genes/race; or maybe a mix of all (a world-defining question).
4. The DM must decide if Detect Evil and other spells that interact with alignment should be houseruled.
   [/list=1]
   
   .Ziggy (list freak)

 

[Nyarlathotep]

Hmm.. where is the errata that lists skeletons as evil?

I was under the impression that skeletons and zombies had a neutral alignment because they lacked intelligence, essentially being automatons. Being incapable of independent thought, they have no more alignment than say a sword (non-intelligent of course) would.

As for Sir Ghouleaux, it's kind of hard to apply the core rules to the situation. Apples and oranges really.

Now for idle speculation...
I would suppose that if a diety wanted to embody the spirit of its avatar/proxy/representive/saint of rotting treachery into a corpse, who's to say it's wrong. The special circumstances of his 'ressurection' could result in an undead creature that wasn't evil. It may be the diety's intention to cause this sort of division in the church, who can discern the intentions of a god?

I still support Malachite though, you just can't trust filthy undead creatures. Even ones who claim to be sent as an agent of your diety. Especially ones who claim to be sent as an agent of your diety. Since there doesn't seem to be any divine guidance coming, perhaps a small side trek by loyal members of the Emerald Chapel could be sent to the Outer Planes, seek out the divine realm of Aeos and seek answers there.

Unfortunately time seems to be a pressing issue. It could take years for a group of paladins to return from Aeos's realm (if they returned at all) and even then organized religion isn't always the most sane of beasts, so there is no guarantee that anyone would accept the paladins story (unless a divine agent accompanied them - but even then...).

Maybe the best way to deal with the problem is the direct one. Perhaps Malachite should martyr himself - of course he would have to succeed and that might be tough, but I have faith in the DoD. Sure Malachite would be damned as a heretic, but sometimes dishonor and disgrace are the price you pay for the safety of the church. Kind of like Judas, from "Last Temptation of Christ" or even better, Neela from "God-Emperor of Dune".

He'd have to ensure that there was someone who could take over as a strong interm leader while the menace of the White Kingdom is put down (sort of like Churchill in WWII). There are many other problems with this, the largest being that you've all played since then...

Cthulhu Fhtagn!