Is Domination Evil?

[kirinke]

ok... to end this discussion.

domination is at best chaotic neutral and at worst down right nasty, depending on what you want to use it for. paladins and clerics of good alignment should stay away from it like the plague and DM's should monitor its use (cuz it can quickly lead to evil).there is no easy way around it. Domination is evil and if you're good and use it, watch out.

 

[Hypersmurf]

there is no easy way around it. Domination is evil...

Do you mean apart from when it's "at best chaotic neutral", or then as well?

-Hyp.

 

[Trickstergod]

ok... to end this discussion.

domination is at best chaotic neutral and at worst down right nasty, depending on what you want to use it for. paladins and clerics of good alignment should stay away from it like the plague and DM's should monitor its use (cuz it can quickly lead to evil).there is no easy way around it. Domination is evil and if you're good and use it, watch out.

A highly unsatisfactory ending, that.

All right, let's see my weighing in on this...

Is Dominating someone evil?

It all depends on the individual doing it in the first place, and the person they're doing it to, primarily.

One mark of an evil individual, in my opinion, is hypocrisy. Those who say one thing and do another wish others to sacrifice, but will not do so themselves.

As such, an individual who highly praises freedom, and will rail up and down against those who would oppress him, then makes use of powers of domination breaks into hypocrisy, and from there, starts tending towards a darker nature.

Conversely, forcing people into doing things they don't want to do also isn't the best course of actions. If, for example, you know that someone would rather die than live a slave, by turning them into a thrall or puppet of some sort is a worse act than simply killing them may be. If someone's motto is, "You may take our lives, but you may never take our freedom," and the individual with mind-controlling powers lets that someone keep his life, but not his freedom, that also starts tending towards actions of a darker nature.

On the other hand, if someone values their life more than their freedom, than casting a finger of death upon the individual when you could just as readily turn them into a thrall makes for the more evil act, if you know which they value more.

Going along the lines of what one would prefer to suffer through again, I would say this: Your average Lawful individual is willing to compromise their individuality for the benefit of the many, whereas your average Chaotic individuals are willing to risk their lives for their freedom (particularly well witnessed amongst stereotypical Chaotic Evil individuals, who tend towards excessive amounts of violence - they'll act however they damn well please, and will fight those who would deny them that).

As such, I would give more leeway to a Lawful individual who makes use of dominating powers than one of a Chaotic nature.

All told, though, it really depends on just how one makes use of their ability to dominate others. The powers themselves usually aren't evil, but the way one uses them.

But, a lot of that's already been gone over. Namely, I'm still refuting the idea that Chaos is just evil-lite, and that Law is good-lite, which seems to be cropping up here and there in this thread.

 

[Plane Sailing]

In any game that I run domination would be no more or less evil than any other spell would be which doesn't have an [evil] descriptor.

In other words, while the use of Eyebite is *always* evil, domination - in the context of D&D as opposed to 21st century western world in which I live - is only ever as evil as the purpose to which it is used, *just like any other spell*.

Sleep can be used for good or evil purposes
Charm person can be used for good or evil purposes
Suggestion can be used for good or evil purposes
Fireball can be used for good or evil purposes
etc. ad nauseum.

In straight D&D terms there is no in-game reason why domination is evil.

In any given campaign domination may easily be considered unlawful (i.e. against the laws of a particular nation) of course.

Cheers

 

[jmucchiello]

In my book of enchantment, I posit the existance of a goddess of obedience (control, guidance and slavery, too). There is a prestige class (based on the monk, no less) therein that has part of its entry requirements that the candidate has gone through a ceremony in which he submits to a dominate person spell cast by a priest of the goddess and forced to perform some action on the goddess' behave. Is this use of domination evil? After all, the person being dominated has done so of his own free will. (The goddess in question is LN.)


(I love a good plug.)

 

[Kahuna Burger]

In my book of enchantment, I posit the existance of a goddess of obedience (control, guidance and slavery, too). There is a prestige class (based on the monk, no less) therein that has part of its entry requirements that the candidate has gone through a ceremony in which he submits to a dominate person spell cast by a priest of the goddess and forced to perform some action on the goddess' behave. Is this use of domination evil? After all, the person being dominated has done so of his own free will. (The goddess in question is LN.)


(I love a good plug.)

This example unfortunately doesn't help very much... not to be difficult, but you can find an odd example of just about any evil act being used in a consensual situation. Torture, rape, slavery, you name it, someone accepts it for fun, profit and a freaky webcam... The fact that its used as an initiation pretty much says it all.

I consider Domination to be roughly equivelent to both slavery and rape, in the vast majority of cases. My current localtion in "paddleboro" notwithstanding, these are imho evil. Playing at them, faking them, talking about them may not be evil. Changing the fundemental definitions of them by giving consent while still holding the trappings may not be evil. Using them in an initiation that the participant can back out of is probably not evil. But all those cases really aren't talking about the real issue, anymore than its terribly helpful to bring up S&M clubs in a discussion on whether rape is a war crime.

Kahuna Burger

 

[Vaxalon]

Domination can be used for good purposes. If you use it to make a criminal march himself to jail, for example, you've used a non-lethal means and that's a good thing.

Used gently, I don't see that it's any more evil than any other spell.

 

[Altalazar]

Hey, why not REALLY throw a wrench into the ethics discussion:

Is Domination evil if: The person dominated is a psychopath, who gets perverse pleasure out of torture, but who actually is tortured himself if he ever does something nice for someone. Then the person is dominated and FORCED to do NICE things for people he hates, which is the worst form of torture imaginable for him. Does it matter if the INTENT is to torture or if it is just an INTENT to make him do restitution?

 

[Gothmog]

Hey, why not REALLY throw a wrench into the ethics discussion:

Is Domination evil if: The person dominated is a psychopath, who gets perverse pleasure out of torture, but who actually is tortured himself if he ever does something nice for someone. Then the person is dominated and FORCED to do NICE things for people he hates, which is the worst form of torture imaginable for him. Does it matter if the INTENT is to torture or if it is just an INTENT to make him do restitution?

I'd probably still classify this as evil, since you are tormenting the sociopath, even though he is still evil. Good characters can use lethal force and inflict suffering in order to directly combat evil, but even if the goal was to make the evil character do restitution, he is still being tortured. And just because a character is evil is not a justification to do anything you want to them- they are still sentient creatures and have desires, goals, and free will, as twisted as it might be. This is especially relevant to good characters, who are to "be altruistic, respect life, and the dignity of sentient beings (PHB)", regardless of the alignment of the victim. Allowing torture to occur due to dominating the individual definitly is an evil act, even if the outcome might ultimately produce some good consequences. A character doing this sort of thing might get away with it once, but its not hard to imagine such a character wondering why he didn't dominate more people to make them do "good" and atone for their crimes. Repeated use of this technique is definitely evil.

Note: I am not saying to never play a character like this- in fact I have played two evil wizards over the years who have used this tactic along with modifying the memories of their targets to insure nothing was remembered, as well as illusions to drive targets into madness. However, such actions are hardly good, and at best on the shady side of neutral. If the character uses such actions for personal gain, to benefit himself at a cost to others, because he enjoys it, or just because "its easier"- that is evil.

 

[Altalazar]

I'd probably still classify this as evil, since you are tormenting the sociopath, even though he is still evil. Good characters can use lethal force and inflict suffering in order to directly combat evil, but even if the goal was to make the evil character do restitution, he is still being tortured. And just because a character is evil is not a justification to do anything you want to them- they are still sentient creatures and have desires, goals, and free will, as twisted as it might be. This is especially relevant to good characters, who are to "be altruistic, respect life, and the dignity of sentient beings (PHB)", regardless of the alignment of the victim. Allowing torture to occur due to dominating the individual definitly is an evil act, even if the outcome might ultimately produce some good consequences. A character doing this sort of thing might get away with it once, but its not hard to imagine such a character wondering why he didn't dominate more people to make them do "good" and atone for their crimes. Repeated use of this technique is definitely evil.

It could be the normal, legal punishment, however - in that case, it can be really hard to classify it as evil, because doing restitution is generally good. The torture aspect of it is a result of a particular individual characteristic of the criminal, NOT something inherent to the punishment.

To use a more obvious analogy - you could have a criminal who finds it ABSOLUTE TORTURE to be imprisoned or otherwise to have any sort of restricted freedom of movement - he always has to be moving from town to town or he's in agony - does that mean it is impermissible, evil torture to put him in a typical jail cell as punishment for a crime? He would, in fact, be experiencing the most intense torture, but if the intent is the normal one, to make him pay for his crime, it becomes hard to justify calling the punishment evil.