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Message: <blockquote data-quote="CruelSummerLord" data-source="post: 3471096" data-attributes="member: 48692">After skimming the many, many posts on the goblin issue, I have to say a few things.  1) The paladin was not stripped of his paladinhood, he was just denied spells for the day.  In the example, I meant to say that the paladin commited a MINOR sin in letting the goblins (who would, as I envisioned it, still have the females to take care of them) live.  I can certainly understand the perspective of posters who would just walk out if the DM revoked their paladinhood, but in this case, as I will say agian, he did not.  The player merely had to go without spells for a day because he sinned, just like any other character who receives divine magic had to.  That's all.  2) Comparisons with real-world morality in the case of the goblins are imperfect, I think.  In every case in the real world, the other creature is a fellow human, who may or may not have started the fight.  The truly vast majority of goblins, in D&D, spend their days fighting and killing.  Not all humans do that-many are farmers or traders, and would likely be quite content to live in peace if it weren't for the violent ones.  But in D&D canon, it's generally assumed that goblins will grow up to be killers, raiders and marauders.  In such a case, especially when the aggressors are not human (or nearly human, as is the case with dwarves, elves, gnomes and halflings), I can certainly see a religion distinguishing between humans and their kindred races, and the wicked races that are always trying to enslave and kill other beings, and who seem to delight in torture and slaughter.  In either case, comparing them to humans IRL is rather a stretch, IMO.  3) Getting back to the original subject I had in mind when I started this thread, I don't see anything wrong with making some places and societies place restrictions based on race or gender, so long as it's made clear to the reader or player that this does not apply in every part of the game world, and while some places may have restrictions and laws that are oppressive and discriminatory, others do not.  Besides which, ancient and medieval history have quite a few examples of women, for instance, transcending the gender roles one normally expects from a patriarchal society.  There's no reason why female PCs can't aspire to follow in the footsteps of Joan of Arc or Queen Bodeacia (I know I mangled that name-she was the Celtic warrior-queen who led British resistance to the Roman invasions), or Brunhilde (queen who played a major role in the history of the Carolingian empire in the tenth century).  Women clerics played roles in developing the medieval church, and widows sometimes held and controlled the estates of their deceased husbands.  All these things can be accomplished by female characters...and if they're done in a part of the setting that has restrictions on women, in some ways they're that much more meaningful.  All of the above, of course, can also apply to demihuman characters.</blockquote>

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