D&D 5E Is he evil?

[GreenTengu]

I don't think it's a matter of justifying the PC's actions. For me, it's a matter of innocent until proven guilty; remember that in the case of murder you must establish guilt beyond a shadow of a doubt. The OP's description of events left a lot out. We don't know whether they were in a frontier town or the heart of civilization. We don't know who attacked first, nor have we been made aware of who used lethal force first. We don't know how the fight got started.

What we do know is that there was a bar fight. The bouncer engaged the PC with a sword at some point during this brawl. A few moments after the bouncer surrendered the PC killed him.

Were there extenuating circumstances? We don't know. I'm not a lawyer, but if this PC were to be tried in a modern day court (presumably in absentia, since we are lacking his testimony of events) given only the evidence that we have been given, I suspect that more likely than not that you'd end up with a hung jury. The specifics of an event matter, and in this case all we can do is speculate (or make assumptions) about the particulars.

Now, as I've said previously, I don't believe that morality and legality are directly correlated. However, murder is an act where the two tend to be in line with each other. Obviously, just because the PC isn't found guilty in a court of law doesn't mean that the PC is free of moral responsibility, but it does suggest that there exists at least the possibility for this to have been a non-evil act.

Personally I believe that any killing of another sentient being, whether you can justify it or not, is evil. It might be considered a necessary evil, such as when killing to protect innocents, but that doesn't make it good in my book. Heck, I think that most killing of even non-sentient living creatures is evil. Squashing that spider that was minding its own business? Evil. Not your soul will burn in hell for all eternity evil, but still evil. I catch and release whenever I can for that reason. That doesn't however make mine an objective truth. At best, it is my truth, purely subjective. If an objective truth of good and evil exists, the definition of it is presumably the domain of an unknowable higher power.

Let's see here...

Let's say the PCs were as much in the "right" as possible.

The PCs were at a bank and someone attempts to rob it. The PCs attack the robbers and there is a big fight. The security guard comes running in, pulls out his gun and tells everyone to stand the hell down because at that point he doesn't know who are the robbers and who are the vigilantes.

The PCs then beat up the guard too and when they have him down and surrendering, they shoot him in the head.


And here you are playing defense lawyer for the person who shot the security guard in the head for doing his job-- claiming extenuating circumstances and using special pleading to try to justify it.


What I am saying is that if it was an NPC Orc who had taken that action, you would not hesitate to label him guilty of being evil and enact the death penalty.


Killing the law enforcement who are trying to keep the peace in an act of vengeance or power just because you were, potentially mislabeled, a miscreant is not just Chaotic-- it is evil. A Chaotic good character may have chosen not to fight at all or at least fight only until the authority trying to intervene can be spoken to and negotiated with.

And, yes, a bank guard and a bouncer are in fact equivalent-- both are private security hired to protect a place where crimes are likely to occur. Even if you have all the respect in the world for one institution and none for the other, the jobs are functionally and ethically equivalent.

 

[Fanaelialae]

Let's see here...

Let's say the PCs were as much in the "right" as possible.

The PCs were at a bank and someone attempts to rob it. The PCs attack the robbers and there is a big fight. The security guard comes running in, pulls out his gun and tells everyone to stand the hell down because at that point he doesn't know who are the robbers and who are the vigilantes.

The PCs then beat up the guard too and when they have him down and surrendering, they shoot him in the head.


And here you are playing defense lawyer for the person who shot the security guard in the head for doing his job-- claiming extenuating circumstances and using special pleading to try to justify it.


What I am saying is that if it was an NPC Orc who had taken that action, you would not hesitate to label him guilty of being evil and enact the death penalty.


Killing the law enforcement who are trying to keep the peace in an act of vengeance or power just because you were, potentially mislabeled, a miscreant is not just Chaotic-- it is evil. A Chaotic good character may have chosen not to fight at all or at least fight only until the authority trying to intervene can be spoken to and negotiated with.

And, yes, a bank guard and a bouncer are in fact equivalent-- both are private security hired to protect a place where crimes are likely to occur. Even if you have all the respect in the world for one institution and none for the other, the jobs are functionally and ethically equivalent.

We don't know with certainty that the bouncer was keeping the peace. That's an assumption, as it was not something the OP stated. I'll grant you that it's a reasonable assumption and even likely to be true, but that doesn't make it a fact. Therefore, the possibility exists that it is a false assumption.

As a matter of fact, if it had been an NPC orc I would still give them the benefit of the doubt. Just the kind of guy I am. My characters frequently attempt negotiation as a first course of action with other sentient creatures, even ones presumed to be "evil". My DMs tend to give their evil NPCs a level of nuance beyond "crush kill destroy". I do the same when I am DMing. Granted, if the foe proves unwilling to talk the vast majority of my characters would have no issue with ending them.

Suppose the scenario was like this. The PCs are at the bank and someone attempts to rob it. The PCs attack the robbers and there is a big fight. The security guard comes running in, pulls out his gun and starts shooting because he realizes that he can probably take whatever is in these guys' wallets without anyone noticing before the cops get here, and there will be no legal recourse for the killings since he was simply doing his job. The PCs prove too much for him and he throws down his gun, but one of the PCs (admittedly a real loose cannon) realizes that this guy is a dangerous sociopath who won't likely have charges pressed against him (because he was just doing his job) and decides to shoot the guard in the head rather than give him the chance to harm anyone in the future. That makes it a chaotic good act since the PC is acting in accordance with his conscience.

Keep in mind that I never said that the act wasn't evil. I've simply stated that the possibility exists for it to have been a non-evil act. Whether it was or wasn't can only be factually determined after learning the particulars of the situation, which we are lacking. This is why law enforcement investigates the details surrounding a murder, such as the motive, rather than stopping once they've established the killer's identity.

 

[Captain Panda]

The answer is simple. Yes, the act was evil. The character in question is a murderer, and unless there is context that was omitted, being an unrepentant murderer makes you evil.

 

[Corwin]

The answer is simple.

Three-and-a-half hundred posts suggests otherwise.

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

Three-and-a-half hundred posts suggests otherwise.

Nah, man, the answer is simple - it's agreement on what the answer is that isn't simple.

 

[Captain Panda]

Three-and-a-half hundred posts suggests otherwise.

People being wrong in volume doesn't mean the act wasn't evil. It still was. If it was something that happened outside of the context of a game and people saw what was described on tape I suspect the issue would be much less debated; as it is a game we're discussing, people have a much harder time actually putting the ethical failure here into perspective.

 

[Corwin]

People being wrong in volume doesn't mean the act wasn't evil. It still was.

You may be right. It may even be that you are *likely* right. But you saying so doesn't make it so. Unfortunately, your opinion on the matter is no more definitive than anyone else's in this thread.

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

...people saw what was described on tape I suspect the issue would be much less debated...

Much like it would be less debated (though I'd wager still debated, rather than not debated at all) if people saw what happened at the table with as much detail as would be present "on tape", rather than having numerous blanks to fill in as desired while hearing one side - and not even all the detail possible of that one side - of the story, described after the fact.

...perspective.

Perspective is the exact reason there is a disagreement going on in this thread.

One perspective is that this was a cold-blooded execution of a non-threatening individual delivered after the clear conclusion of a bar brawl.

Another perspective is that this was a heat of the moment retaliation against a foe that brought a tool of killing into the mix and thought nothing of it, but changed their tune as soon as their lethal weapon was in the hands of their intended victim, falling to their knees and asking the person they just attempted to kill - because that's what coming at someone with a sword looks like to said someone - to give them better treatment than that which they seemed intent to give.

 

[Celebrim]

...to give them better treatment than that which they seemed intent to give.

Yes, but that is what Good aligned characters do by definition.

There is a great scene in the sixth or seventh episode of Firefly where we really get a clear indication of who Malcolm Reynolds is underneath the roguish veneer. He's just been bushwacked and shot by people he'd agreed to a deal with, and fortunately, they don't aim very well. They leave him for dead, but he draws a hold out pistol stands up (while bleeding to death) and orders them off his ship. Now the tables are turned, and the Captain of the other ship says, "You'd have done the same if the situation was reversed." And while holding the pistol on him, Mal says, "I've already proved that's not true."

GOOD ALIGNED!!!

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

Yes, but that is what Good aligned characters do by definition.

Not in D&D, it seems, since D&D has always allowed the "good guys" (with Good alignments) to arbitrate which species of intelligent life are morally acceptable to kill on sight.