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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Aenghus" data-source="post: 6316406" data-attributes="member: 2656">The scorched earth of the paladin battleground exists because of the dichotomy between the black and white absolutes of the theoretical LG paladin code and the messy human subjectivities of actual players, actual DMs and actual games. The extreme penalties for disagreements yanks the middle ground out from under the debate all too often. And disagreements are in my experience as often genuine as they are due to misbehavior from the involved parties. I think making the punishment "all or nothing"  is a recipe for disaster, and the many, many tales of disaster seem to back this up. I actually like the shiny paladin concept, but it is viable in suprisingly few campaigns, as it's so easy to sabotage by a combination of campaign tone, rejection by the other players and mishandling by the DM. Conventional LG paladins don't belong in grimdark worlds except as victims or objects of derision. They aren't a good fit for old-school loot-everything gaming unless played in a jokey "see no PC evil, hear no PC evil" style (which is reasonably common AFAIK).</blockquote>