Lawful Alignments and Classes

[Telas]

The interpretation of alignments can cause some headaches between players and DMs. Without attempting to define specific alignments, I have an idea regarding two classes whose abilities depend on alignment: Paladins and Monks.

Both must remain Lawful, and Paladins must remain Good. These are subjective terms, and everyone's got their own interpretation of alignment. Normally, this doesn't much come into play: "OK, I'm probably slipping into a Neutral area with this, but..." However, with these two classes, a few missteps can cause loss of class status.

To avoid the hearbreak of lost classes, I will be asking all Monks and Paladins to write down their "Code of Honor". Codes of Honor should acknowledge factors such as deity/religion, race, culture, and national origin.

Codes of Honor must be written so as to address specific situations, such as missile combat, hostage situations, poisons, missile weapons, disease as a siege weapon, mercy for those who ask for it, prisoners, definitions of "fair" and "unfair", and to what extent (if any) that the end justifies the means. Vaguely written Codes will be rejected.

This way, there's no "Paladins wouldn't attack Orcs in the daylight" or "Monks can too use poison" argument. Your Code of Honor is laid out, and if you violate it, you lose your abilities. As usual, the degree of transgression determines the degree of ability loss.

Thoughts? Concerns? Criticisms?

Thanks for any comments,

Telas

 

[Shin Okada]

My way of doing is "don't think too much about alignment".

 

[Hypersmurf]

Hmm... I'm going to put this in General.

-Hyp.
(Moderator)

 

[Crothian]

Sound slike a good way to avoid arguemnets down th road.

 

[Telas]

Hmm... I'm going to put this in General.

-Hyp.
(Moderator)

Thanks. Sorry about improper placement.

For clarification: What caused me to do this is a monk who wants to use poison. I assumed, but never specified, that poison was a Chaotic act, or that it was prohibited. He's running an "urban monk" flavor, so he doesn't have any deity or monastery to guide him. I'm not really stuck (I AM the DM, after all), but there is some confusion about what is and isn't allowed.

Telas

 

[Li Shenron]

It's been discussed before, and I think that a code of conduct is a better guideline than just "LG" or "L" for these characters. Samurai's code of bushido is a (simple) example about the fact that being Lawful is eventually the consequence of acting according to your code, rather than the reason why you behave that way (which is instead a relatively common player's behaviour with Paladins).

Naturally, the code will need some kind of approval or, I'd prefer, some kind of discussion with the other players as well, to see if it falls in the alignment's general area.

Otherwise you could also lessen the alignment restrictions, as long as the resulting character fits your campaign and the group's taste. For instance, the idea of all monks being lawful came from the equation that martial arts & meditation techniques require serious dedication and discipline. Granted than a lawful mindset is more likely to provide discipline, it makes no sense that a chaotic person could never have any sort of discipline. Lawful and Chaotic cover very different little thing (loyalty to associates, adherence to law of the state, tradition vs progress, lying, cheating, gambling, drinking, acting stealthy or openly, supporting freedom or control...), and a Lawful character doesn't necessary have to be lawful on every single thing, and viceversa.
If you've heard about Bruce Lee's philosophy behind "Jeet Kune Do" (his style): I think I heard from a documentary that while he used to say that discipline & dedication was absolutely necessary, he also said that adaptation and flexibility was necessary as well. He took many things from other martial arts styles and mixed them together, he started teaching to western people and making kung fu movies, all things which were very much against chinese martial arts traditions (and legends say that brought the rage of many chinese lobbies against him). These don't sound to me lawful attitudes at all from one of the best "monks" known to us

 

[Snapdragyn]

Stop hacking my brainwaves, man!

Seriously, I've been tossing this exact idea around lately as the one really difficult piece of alignment to eliminate from D&D (I figure the 'protection' series could just be 'protection' -- no 'from' anything).

As for poison, I always thought of it more as evil -- to the extent that I swore it was a rule until someone pointed out there's nothing that says that. Now I'm convinced this is one of those things my brain randomly drags up from my old 1e days without remembering that little break in my gaming (& a few changes in the rules) from then to 3.5.

I'm not yet the 'Denny Crane' of rules lawyers, but there are days....

 

[shilsen]

I've always thought that the single biggest factor in alignment debates in-game is a dissonance in the expectations of DM and player(s). So one of the simplest ways to prevent them is to make sure you're all on the same page, and I think your idea for using codes of conduct is a good move to that end. Just make sure that the player and you work out the code and its ramifications (since no code can be exhaustive enough to cover every situation a game will throw up) together and you're good to go.

 

[fusangite]

Great idea! I thoroughly endorse this idea. A properly written-out code also allows the paladin's or monk's code to conflict with the rules observed by mainstream society, something that games often have trouble doing when a character is non-specifically lawful.

 

[Telas]

As for poison, I always thought of it more as evil -- to the extent that I swore it was a rule until someone pointed out there's nothing that says that. Now I'm convinced this is one of those things my brain randomly drags up from my old 1e days without remembering that little break in my gaming (& a few changes in the rules) from then to 3.5.

Ditto. However, from the SRD: The purchase and possession of poison is always illegal, and even in big cities it can be obtained only from specialized, less than reputable sources.

Definitely not lawful good....

Everyone else: Thanks for the responses. I'm emailing the Monks in the party today regarding this.

Telas