Is killing a Goblin who begs for mercy evil?

[Viktyr Gehrig]

A Paladin would not be the King's executioner
It might be legal to execute a forger but it's unlikely that a Paladin would agree to do so.

Why not?

 

[Epametheus]

That sounds EXACTLY like the citizens of that country we're always in border skirmishes with, so I guess we can put them down with impunity as well, right?

If the rank-and-file citizens of that country we're always in border skirmishes with are raiding our villages so that they can eat our flesh, then damn right. I'm not quite sure what you were actually trying to argue there.

As they're normally written, goblins, orcs, gnolls, derro, and the like have free will, but they are normally brought up to be utterly terrible. To them, mercy is a weakness to exploit, not a virtue to be honored. Some of those creatures, like hobgoblins or duergar, may actually have personal codes of honor and actually mean it. But most won't. Most probably wouldn't offer to surrender, either - if they don't give a damn when others try to do it, why would they expect differently?

If you run a campaign where those races are just neutral, don't really actively prey on other sentient creatures, and are misunderstood due to relentless propaganda, then sure, you'd be in the wrong to refuse surrender from one.

Likewise, hauling off and attacking a "monster" settlement that's actually living in peace and leaving its neighbors alone (ro even trading with its neighbors) is at best a chaotic act, if not an outright evil one.

But as normally written, most of the monster races form into what amount to bandit clans and enclaves, and launch raids on any of their neighbors at any time. The closest you can reach to peace with them is managing to hurt them badly enough that they'll stop attacking you. At least until their numbers recover...

 

[N'raac]

Notice, this is respect for ALL life, not a respect for "only neutral and good creature's lives"...

BINGO

"He would not be concerned with your life."

"No, he wouldn't. But if we stoop to their level, we are no better than them."

This is a good one, thank you for this scenario...

When we consider the Lawful Good alignment, so much emphasis gets put on the Good part. There are a lot of conflicts the DM can throw at us where doing the Good thing is not the Lawful thing, and vice versa. More often then not, the choice is made on the side of Good.

Your example is a great scenario where I think picking the Lawful option is the right thing to do.

Sparing his life would be Good.
Not sparing his life would not be Good, but it also would not be Evil. His crimes were obviously heinous enough to warrant a death penalty. Unless he is dying for an unjust reason (something silly, like being executed for cheating on his wife). But since you did not go into detail as to what he was convicted of and why he got a death sentence, I will assume it was just.

I think this demarcates an excellent point. The Paladin would, one must assume, not agree to serve a regime which itself is neither lawful nor good. If the laws of the kingdon allow unjust executions, then the Paladin simply cannot serve that kingdom.

A Paladin would not be the King's executioner
It might be legal to execute a forger but it's unlikely that a Paladin would agree to do so.

In such a regime, I would not expect the Paladin to serve that unjust law. To the first point, however, when the King asks the Paladin and his adventuring party to deal with the marauding Orcs plaguing a nearby village, how is acceptance of that mission not "being the King's executioner"?

Depends, killing a Demon or Devil could well qualify as good.
Killing to defend others could well be a good act. (If you kill an evil high priest as he's about to sacrifice a baby for instance)

Demons and Devils become a bit of an odd case. Are outsiders "living beings" to begin with? Killing them here just sends them back there. I would typically (some games may differ) classify them as manifestations of their alignment. They are Evil made manifest, and not "life".

To the second issue, the killing itself is not a good act. It is outweighed by the protection of innocent life, so the act as a whole becomes "good". A "more good" act would defend the inncocent without taking a life. But we live in an imperfect world.

Based on my reading of Detect Evil the 'evil intent' means that a non-evil creature with evil intent radiates evil as if it was an evil creature rather than 'automatically detects as evil' so a low powered creature doesn't detect as evil irrespective of intent.

I can definitely read it that way as well. But then I look at the context. These are 1st level spells. The Paladin gains this ability at 1st level. If it is nimpossible to Detect Evil on any being of less than 5 HD, in any way shape or form, what is the point of L1 characters having access to these abilities? Why not swap it with Divine Health - he won't ne using Detect Evil at L1 anyway, except to discover an Evil far too powerful for him to realistically deal with.

I choose to conclude these abilities have some impact, even at L1, and as such that "there is evil here" includes low level evil, and evil intent. That, however, opens up another can of worms. Even a Good person can commit an Evil act. A Detect at the wrong time may not provide the full picture. EVEN A PALADIN could intend to commit an evil act, then pull away at the last second and remain a Paladin. And only a Paladin is so constrained that the commission of even a single evil act will taint him.

Look, if you're the DM, the rule is simple: don't be a jerk. If the player of the Paladin is making an honest effort to do the right thing all the time, and he can make even a halfway decent argument for why what he did was the right thing, he is playing a Paladin properly and in accordance with the rules. Taking away his powers because you don't agree with his interpretation of Lawful Good is being a jerk; don't be a jerk.

First, I think the player should be advised that the DM considers the proposed action an evil act. The player may not, but in a world where evil is black and white, the Paladin should know the difference.

Second, in my view at least, there are no "Paladin's Dliemmas" that can cost the Paladin his status. If there is no right answer, then there can be no wrong answer.

Third, if you want Good, Heroic characters, then adherence to their morals must be rewarded, not penalized. It's easy to set the scene that the characters are in open warfare, and their Evil foes will use the vilest of tricks to achieve their ends. Shooting on sight is clearly not Good, but failure to do so is suicide. In such games, Heroic characters who remain true to the absolute ideals of Good are cannon fodder - they have no hope of survival, much less success. So we have two choices. Accept that the setting requires, at best Neutrals with Good tendencies who wish for a better world, or water down the standard for "Good" to allow it to mesh with a world that does not allow the ideals to succeed.

If your game is one where sparing Gollum means Evil Wins, then it is one where a Good character such as Frodo cannot thirve, so expect your players to learn not to play such characters.

I'm not so sure about that. If the Paladin's king orders him to be the royal executioner, what kind of act would it be for the Paladin to refuse the orders of his king? Hint: Not a Lawful one...

I liken this example to the deserter of The Wall in Game of Thrones.

Lets say that the person being executed was conscripted to be a solider to guard "the wall". He was a petty thief, and his choice was "die or pledge your life guarding the wall." He chose to live and guard the wall.

While at the wall, he comes face to face with horrible monsters. Rather then stand and fight, he cowardly turns tail and run, deserting his post. Deserting your post is an act of treason. Treason is punishable by death according to local laws.

So lets say we have a deserter/traitor about to be executed. Instead of Eddard Stark, we have a LG Paladin that was ordered by Eddard, his king, to do the beheading (all of the "the man that passes the sentence swings the sword" aside).

What does he do?

If the punishment does not fit the crime, then he must refuse. The Paladin must be both lawful and good, but a single Evil act removes his paladinhood, so it is pretty clear which is expected to prevail should the two conflict. Perhaps this means the setting is one where a character cannot remain true to the ideals of Good and survive/succeed.

If the rank-and-file citizens of that country we're always in border skirmishes with are raiding our villages so that they can eat our flesh, then damn right. I'm not quite sure what you were actually trying to argue there.

In such case, it does not matter whether the other country is Goblin or Human. We simply assume they cannot be reformed and should be killed on sight, their babies slaughtered so they never grow to avenge their parents.

If the Dwarves defile the ElvenWood for wood for their fires, the Elves are justified in killing Dwarves on sight.

As they're normally written, goblins, orcs, gnolls, derro, and the like have free will, but they are normally brought up to be utterly terrible. To them, mercy is a weakness to exploit, not a virtue to be honored. Some of those creatures, like hobgoblins or duergar, may actually have personal codes of honor and actually mean it. But most won't. Most probably wouldn't offer to surrender, either - if they don't give a damn when others try to do it, why would they expect differently?

I like the mention of Orcs. Last I looked, half orcs were a valid PC race. Slaughter all the children in that Orcish encampment, and a future PC is potentially slain. If they do not have free will, how is it that they are viable PC's?

If I am to take this position with free-willed Goblins, I must also apply it to the citizenry of any nation where they are born and raised to beliefs that oppose my own, must I not? Is it a Good act for the Paladin to wipe out those foreign devils, whether they are a different species (perhaps Goblin, perhaps Elf), worship a different God, or have skin of a different colour? The Orcs were raised in Orcish ways, and the Easterlanders were raised in the ways of Easterland. Both are Evil. Both must be wiped out to the last survivor.

But as normally written, most of the monster races form into what amount to bandit clans and enclaves, and launch raids on any of their neighbors at any time. The closest you can reach to peace with them is managing to hurt them badly enough that they'll stop attacking you. At least until their numbers recover...

The game can certainly be played on the basis that the only good Goblin (or Easternlander) is a dead Goblin (or Easterlander). The Paladin may well find himself in combat with such creatures, evil or neutral, and have no choice but to take their lives for the greater good. When he starts to consider it moral to take their lives, or even enjoy taking those lives, I don't see him as that heroic paragon of virtue he may see himself as.

 

[TarionzCousin]

This sort of thing is why I don't play Paladins any more. Unless the DM and I agree before the game begins on what constitutes an "evil" act, this just cause problems. Alternately, the DM could never have this situation arise, but then the Paladin is overpowered--as his weakness/drawback will never come into play.

Of course, when I'm DM'ing, this is the sort of thing I love to throw at the Paladins. In my opinion, if you are playing a Paladin you are somewhat asking for these sorts of dilemmas to be included in the game.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

Has the Goblin Village done anything evil yet?

No?

Then the paladin doesn't have to wait to see if he will lose his powers by killing a surrendering goblin - he already has.

As mentioned above - Good is respect for all life, not only that fraction of life that agrees with you.

The Auld Grump

 

[prosfilaes]

If a goblin knows how to say "I surrender, don't hurt me," in common, it probably learned that from a victim that it then killed and ate (or killed by eating).

So basically if they can speak your language, they deserve to die, if they can't, then we don't care what they say?

My group handles this sort of thing as "a Paladin can refuse to accept a creature's surrender."

While goblins are free-willed, a normal goblin is raised to view nearly anything that isn't a goblin as prey.

If goblins are free-willed, then they can choose non-evil. If they can choose non-evil, then a paladin can not kill on sight. I don't particularly have a problem with paladins killing enemy combatants who try and surrender. But people who haven't raised arms against the paladin or his party, that's a different matter.

I can't accept as any sort of respect for life the broad attack on any "normally evil" creature. And I do have a problem with the impression I've got in D&D that if humans encroach on elf land, and the elves kill a few, the elves are isolationist but good; but if goblins or orcs do the same, it's because they're evil.

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

If goblins are free-willed, then they can choose non-evil. If they can choose non-evil, then a paladin can not kill on sight. I don't particularly have a problem with paladins killing enemy combatants who try and surrender. But people who haven't raised arms against the paladin or his party, that's a different matter.

Or if they'd raised arms against innocents. But otherwise, I absolutely agree with you. Paladins don't have to accept surrender, and they don't have to offer quarter or even declare hostilities-- but they're not allowed to make pre-emptive strikes. They don't get to just up and kill someone unless they know that the targets have done something wrong.

 

[was]

As a DM, I have my paladin players write out their honor codes before hand. I do chime in with a few suggestions here and there, but leave it largely up to the character to define it. I find that there are much fewer arguments about code violations with this method.

 

[N'raac]

As a DM, I have my paladin players write out their honor codes before hand. I do chime in with a few suggestions here and there, but leave it largely up to the character to define it. I find that there are much fewer arguments about code violations with this method.

Seems like a good approach for consensus, and for individualizing Paladins. There's still a need to ensure the Code of Honor is reasonably restrictive and consistent with the ideals of LG.

"I vow to make my own decisions and follow no one else's orders"

or

"Enemies deserve no mercy and shall receive none"

would be grounds for some revision.

Good players would likely come up with some solid, and diverse, codes of honour.

 

[was]

Good players would likely come up with some solid, and diverse, codes of honour.

or be severely injured in a hail of d20's by fed-up fellow players.