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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 6080503" data-attributes="member: 27780">Dragon Issue 306: April 2003part 7/9Paladins of Greyhawk: Despite the many many articles we've got over the years to humanise paladins, they still get accusations that they're boring and all the same. You know what's a good way of making things less generic and stereotyped? Include a whole bunch of subdivisions, each with their own substereotypes that add too and sometimes replace the main one. It definitely works for White Wolf, and it can work for D&D too. Yup. It looks like our last regular Greyhawk article'll be devoted to the paladins of various gods, and just what flavouring this choice adds to the squeaky clean vanilla boys of team good. I can think of far worse ways to end this, so lets look at them individually, take our time on this. Mayaheine's paladins tend to be optimists, feminists, and general champions of minorities and the downtrodden. Well, she is a new god, with a still growing following. That does tend to make people more hopeful that they can make a difference, change the world for the better where so many others have failed. Perfect adventurer material too, as they do tend to be more socially progressive than the average NPC. Murlynd's paladins are of course gunslingers and experimenters in using technology to make people's lives better. Of course, like tinker gnomes, people may be rather afraid of their methods, which doesn't help general adoption, but that's just what you have to deal with in a world stuck in a medieval mindset. The greatest good is not achieved just by killing things, and lawful good technician is an entirely valid paladin archetype. Pelor's paladins are pretty much the standard stereotype, giving their life for the cause and specialising in healing and turning undead. Someone has to be the straight man everyone else is compared too, and I guess they fit the bill. Rao's followers, on the other hand, are all about the clever tactical solution to a conflict, studying the situation and then making a move that'll solve it quickly and with a minimum of risk and collateral damage. If that means avoiding combat altogether, all the better. Not that they're cowards or dishonourable. But lawful good definitely does not mean dumb or lacking in charm or humour in this case. St Cuthbert's tend to be common sense, working class sorts, fond of a good drink and smoke when not out bashing the skulls of the unfaithful. So while closer to the vanilla stereotype than most of these, they also remind us that not all paladins are rich, and they're definitely not detached from the reality of the social problems ordinary people face. If anything, knowledge of those will just make them fight all the harder to stamp out chaos and poverty and improve the plight of the common man. Sometimes it's the subtle differences that bring a character to life, not the big ones, and this article has certainly given us plenty of different examples of that.</blockquote>

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