Is this monk still Lawful?

[ARandomGod]

Sure it will. How could it not? Are you suggesting that knowingly and willingly violating laws is not chaotic? Isn't that the definition of chaotic? Lawful people care about the laws. That's their nature.

Oh! More fun. I'll take it a step further and suggest that NOT knowingly and willingly violating laws is chaotic. That's right! You have to slap a chaotic alignment infraction on anyone who switches law-sets based on something as random and chaotic as where they are at the moment. Anyone who abandons or directly contradicts the laws he's bound to can't be lawful, and if you're following ALL the laws everywhere you'll be forced to occasionally do just that.

Of course, willingly and knowingly violating your OWN laws is not lawful. But you sometimes have to willingly and knowingly violate the laws of some different lands/cultures. Or you're just not lawful.

Unknowingly violating a law? Impossible for a lawful person in his own culture/land. Possible in a different land, but that doesn't really matter, does it? Those aren't real laws or cultures, that's all barbarian lands. Heathens. Of course, out of general respect for Law a lawful person might try and follow local laws he knows about that don't contradict his own. But that's a matter of preference and cultural awareness.

 

[moritheil]

Non-evil? Well, Definitly non-good, but whether or not it's evil depends a lot on the intent. And don't forget that a neutrally aligned character can do plenty of evil without becoming evilly aligned.

1. I don't agree with your initial assertion. Certain acts are objectively evil because the DnD alignment system is objective. Animating undead is a classic example of this, although many DMs house-rule it otherwise.

However,

2. I strongly agree that neutral characters can do evil things without suddenly becoming evil. I think it's a point that's been overlooked for most of this discussion. Of course, if they do exclusively evil things, then that's different. I think that people are dragging real-world morality into the DnD alignment system, and that is responsible for the confusion.

 

[ARandomGod]

1. I don't agree with your initial assertion. Certain acts are objectively evil because the DnD alignment system is objective. Animating undead is a classic example of this, although many DMs house-rule it otherwise.

However,

2. I strongly agree that neutral characters can do evil things without suddenly becoming evil. I think it's a point that's been overlooked for most of this discussion. Of course, if they do exclusively evil things, then that's different. I think that people are dragging real-world morality into the DnD alignment system, and that is responsible for the confusion.

I still say that intent will have a lot to do with whether it's an evil act. But given that you assign all act a good or evil descriptor, and no acts are given a neutral descriptor, I have to assign giving someone a disease (for any reason) as evil, but with (a LOT) fewer evil points than killing someone (for any reason). And, of course, if you do both at the same time the results don't stack! They're the same time of 'bonus' after all. (heh)

However, given your statement number two, it's pretty easy to agree with you overall. Starting out that all things have either a good/evil/or neutral (because some things just can't be slotted either way) value attached to them, people seem to overlook the 'neutral' alignment as someone who can and does and NEEDS TO do evil acts. If you're claiming to a neutral alignment and you do exclusively neutrally or goodly valued acts, you're behaving as a good alignment and need your alignment changed.

 

[cmanos]

unless he is violating a personal code or law of the land, he is still lawful. He would tend to slide towards evil though.

 

[werk]

Right, it's completely lawful to use an item that produces a randomly generated effect...

Can we continue the discussion assuming the monk is evil? If he is evil, it then becomes a real debate of law vs chaos instead of good vs law.

 

[Scion]

Right, it's completely lawful to use an item that produces a randomly generated effect...

You mean like every weapon, or even every roll, in the game?

A lawful character should only be allowed to take 10, and when he cannot take 10 then he should take no action at all.

After all, combat is a chaotic place, better not get into combat.


This is definately going to push him towards evil eventually, he could avoid it. But I have seen nothing here to imply 'chaotic' acts.

Even if he was to walk down the street infecting every child he saw that still is not a chaotic act. Heavily evil, but chaotic?


We have a problem with this because of our various societies. Since societies like to continue they generally push the view that anything which goes against the laws is Evil to some degree. So, 'Unlawful' many times gets the view of 'Evil' by society. There are of course differing degrees of this, but it is there.

D&D works differently, the axis are seperate for a reason. As such because of our backgrounds it becomes 'very' difficult to tell the difference sometimes, and so everyone places their own view points on it. Which means that two people could have completely different views on the matter.

Much like playing the game actually. I know some people who like to have all of the rules spelled out clearly and directly. Any adjucation that is needed should be adjucated in exactly the same way unless it is specifically changed later. Whereas I also know others who use the rules as a general guideline. Stepping outside of them and/or doing something completely against them is no problem, it is expected. Adjucations are by the seat of the pants and fit more closely to what they want to have happened than any sort of continuity from the same decission before.

I would describe the first as lawful and the second as chaotic. But again I have known both sides to call the other effectively 'evil', mainly because they werent following the same type of path that they were.

Always interesting to watch

 

[moritheil]

I still say that intent will have a lot to do with whether it's an evil act. But given that you assign all act a good or evil descriptor, and no acts are given a neutral descriptor, I have to assign giving someone a disease (for any reason) as evil, but with (a LOT) fewer evil points than killing someone (for any reason). And, of course, if you do both at the same time the results don't stack! They're the same time of 'bonus' after all. (heh)

However, given your statement number two, it's pretty easy to agree with you overall. Starting out that all things have either a good/evil/or neutral (because some things just can't be slotted either way) value attached to them, people seem to overlook the 'neutral' alignment as someone who can and does and NEEDS TO do evil acts. If you're claiming to a neutral alignment and you do exclusively neutrally or goodly valued acts, you're behaving as a good alignment and need your alignment changed.

Interesting. I supposed the opposite view was true (torture and disease is more evil than killing, in general, because it involves prolonged suffering, although it is arguably not more evil than murder of innocents.) Paladins are required to kill evil beings; killing is not a fundamentally evil act in DnD. Sanctioned killing is a policy option commonly employed by the best examples of good in the multiverse (the deities of good that sponsor paladins.) Indiscriminate and rampant murder, on the other hand, is evil.

In real life, people who do some evil and some good are considered evil. In real life, amoral people are considered evil. But then, in real life, very few people are considered neutral by other people; people prefer to sort others into good and evil. In DnD, people who do some evil and some good are most often neutral, and amoral people are pretty much the definition of neutral. (Careful - I said amoral, not "amoral and unethical." A LN person would be highly ethical and at the same time amoral.)

Werk, I don't see why the monk should be assumed to be evil.

 

[moritheil]

Much like playing the game actually. I know some people who like to have all of the rules spelled out clearly and directly. Any adjucation that is needed should be adjucated in exactly the same way unless it is specifically changed later. Whereas I also know others who use the rules as a general guideline. Stepping outside of them and/or doing something completely against them is no problem, it is expected. Adjucations are by the seat of the pants and fit more closely to what they want to have happened than any sort of continuity from the same decission before.

I would describe the first as lawful and the second as chaotic. But again I have known both sides to call the other effectively 'evil', mainly because they werent following the same type of path that they were.

Always interesting to watch

I would describe the first type above as lawful and the second as neutral. Neutrals will stick with the rules in order to achieve a desired end, and discard them as soon as they impede progress toward that desired end. They neither care particularly for the rules nor for going against the rules.

On the other hand, I have seen people who LOVE to argue with DMs, flirt to make people uncomfortable, etc. and will do it not for actual gain, but just to mess up the orderly progression of a session and throw the place into chaos. They don't come to game so much as they come to ruin everyone's plans and create confusion. I would call those people chaotic, since they actively seek to disrupt order. (Most people wind up calling those people evil as well.)

 

[mvincent]

He can probably use the gloves without being unlawful, however ingnoring the concerns of his teamates, or being the cause of the uncontrolled spread of disease might be a different matter.

If you're concerned about balance, you could always nerf him with this information from the FAQ:
"a monk wearing gauntlets is using a weapon. A monk cannot use any of her special unarmed attack abilities (unarmed damage, stunning attack, and so on) when using a weapon. A monk can use her unarmed attack rate with a special monk weapon, but gauntlets are not a special monk weapon."

(i.e. the monk could still flurry with other parts of his body while gaining the strength bonus of the gauntlets, but the pestilence thing would be curbed).

 

[irdeggman]

Right, it's completely lawful to use an item that produces a randomly generated effect...

Can we continue the discussion assuming the monk is evil? If he is evil, it then becomes a real debate of law vs chaos instead of good vs law.

to add to scion's list

then no spellcaster should be lawful since almost all spells have a random effect (magic missile 1d4 =1 per missile, cure light wounds 1d8 +1 , etc.)