D&D 5E Missions and Moral Compass

[EzekielRaiden]

A variety of adventures are relaxing in a tavern.

A hooded figure approaches them, asks for their help, and offers a reward.

The adventurers say "but that would be WRONG!" and decline the offer.

Have you ever seen that happen?

I have not, but I almost did it myself once. I decided that even a Paladin (which I was playing...more or less) would be willing to consider taking a shady job as long as he didn't know it wasn't a clearly evil act. I was playing B/X at the time, and I know such games are gritty and dangerous. I suspect the DM didn't think we would actually go all the way through with it, but given that my character was new and...a bit alien, shall we say, he didn't think it worth the risk of angering the shady men asking for the group's help. If it turns out he'd aided in the assassination of the local ruler (which is a distinct possibility), he'll search for atonement, if I ever rejoin that game. It's gone on hiatus.

However, in almost every other game I've played, since I like Paladins so much? Yeah, I'd totally say, "But that would be wrong. Begone." If that led to inter-group strife...that would certainly make the evening interesting.

How would your table respond, if the hooded quest-giver asked them to recover a Dragon Mask... and was an agent of the Cult of the Dragon?

I would be absolutely opposed, but that's because (most all of) my Paladins worship Bahamut, and are thus pretty much diametrically opposed to anything the Cult of the Dragon wants. My most-recent group would pretty much be guaranteed to oppose it; with a wise and noble Paladin (of Bahamut), a freedom-loving Fighter, and an "assassin of evil things" Thief, we wouldn't really be keen on helping the Cult of the Dragon. We might be shrewd enough to double-cross them, though, because double-crossing organizations that are known to commit atrocities is hardly a sin.

What if the hooded quest-giver asked them to protect tree-cutters as they entered further into the Quivering Forest, and that meant defeating Seronalla the Whisperer and the elves, pixies, sprites, etc. of the Forest?

Are the tree-cutters taking trees to which they have a legitimate claim, and needing protection from "eco-terrorist"-like people trying to oppose their rightful business? I might consider it, though it would be a very distasteful business and that, alone, might make me say "no." If they are invading someone else's land to steal their resources, I would absolutely say "no," but again might try to be shrewd enough to double-cross.

What if the hooded quest-giver wanted the PCs to act as "fifth column" support of a Mulmaster army invading Phlan, or vice versa?

Neither employer, from what I can tell, is honorable or even particularly legitimate, despite being actual cities (mostly due to being Hives Of Scum And Villainy since they're under Zhentarim control). Any such invasion would, almost surely, be an unjustified (or even outrightly evil), regardless of which side was proposing it, and sabotaging one side would simply mean leaving its citizens open to being preyed upon by the other.

So...again, no, I probably wouldn't accept. If I were playing a CG character (unusual, but not impossible, for me) I might try to "play both sides against the middle" to help overthrow the corrupt leadership, but as a low-level Paladin (and therefore LG), I'd have to accept the highly unfortunate fact that there's pretty much nothing I can do in that moment for either city's unfortunate citizens.

Edit:
I'll generally echo what the others have said, in that this sounds (to me) like an issue of conflicting DM and player expectations. I almost invariably play Lawful Good characters because that's what I feel comfortable with; I may play Neutral or Chaotic Good on occasion, but my behavior will often begin to lean lawful as time goes on (a notable exception being my "orc marine/pirate," who could be NG, CG, TN, or CN!) I make no bones about wanting to play a "high fantasy," "Paladins & Princesses" kind of game--I prefer to be the knight in shining armor, or at least the knight in armor that cleans up nicely, hah!

If my DM legitimately expects such a character go along with underhanded, evil, or morally dubious plot hooks, then *at least* one of us isn't paying attention, isn't communicating effectively, or both.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

A variety of adventures are relaxing in a tavern.

A hooded figure approaches them, asks for their help, and offers a reward.

The adventurers say "but that would be WRONG!" and decline the offer.

Have you ever seen that happen?

How would your table respond, if the hooded quest-giver asked them to recover a Dragon Mask... and was an agent of the Cult of the Dragon?

What if the hooded quest-giver asked them to protect tree-cutters as they entered further into the Quivering Forest, and that meant defeating Seronalla the Whisperer and the elves, pixies, sprites, etc. of the Forest?

What if the hooded quest-giver wanted the PCs to act as "fifth column" support of a Mulmaster army invading Phlan, or vice versa?

Even better, I've seen a PC accept an intelligence-gathering mission from freedom fighters, take the payment, and then go to the bad guys and offer to sell them information on an active threat (the freedom fighters) and help them catch the threat.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

This is why I like to provide lots of quest hooks, because sometimes the "single quest hook that starts off an epic chain of events!" just isn't that interesting.

So while the party may be kicking at a tavern and are approached by a hooded figure, some other things are true:
There's many other people in the tavern, some of whom are making an effort not to be heard, while others don't care who hears them (each of these is a quest hook which requires the players to engage the NPC, instead of the other way around).
There's a board of "honey-dos" near the entrance, perhaps someone just nailed up a new one, or not.
The barkeep is a trusted figure in town who is known for always being in with someone who needs something done.

Here's another: the hooded quest-giver approaches them and starts to make his pitch, when suddenly a crossbow bolt sprouts from between his shoulder blades and he collapses. PCs have a chance to notice who fired the shot and to chase/catch/interrogate her.

 

[Riley37]

PCs hanging around in taverns awaiting quest-givers is a narrative convenience - highly implausible when you think about it, but useful if you just want to get the party started on a quest without a lot of lead-in.

If PCs go to a tavern with the intention of "we hang out until someone approaches us with a quest", then that's implausible... unless the setting actually has a convention in which taverns are also venues for hiring people for short-term high-risk projects. Which is no more implausible than, say, temples developing a standardized required donation for Raise Dead.

If PCs are in a tavern because they're travelling from one city to another and the tavern is the most reasonable place to eat and sleep between days of travel, then it can be plausible. There's a scene in "Fellowship of the Ring", in which a mysterious human stranger in a cloak approaches a group of four halflings, and it wasn't the most implausible scene of that story.

 

[Riley37]

I don't think this has every happened in one of my games. Part of my job as a DM is to come up with adventure that both the PCs and the players will be excited to undertake. Proposing a mission that they emphatically don't want to do would be a pretty spectacular failure on my part.

I'd say that's a failure if that mission is the *only story you have prepared*.

If you also have a story about what happens after the PCs say no, then I don't see how you've failed.

 

[miniaturehoarder]

Sure players get offered unpleasant missions, they don't always understand the mission is unpleasant until midway through.

A noble's daughter is kidnapped by an enchanter. The noble might not even know she went willingly. Alas the enchanter & Noble's daughter have take refuge with folks the enchanter thought he could trust, but realized too late they serve something foul. By the time the players fight to the enchanter, they may no longer be willing to believe any claims of innocence.

Village owes owes back taxes and a Noble the players want in good with sends them to collect. Village can't afford it because the fields were blighted by a druid. Players might then find out the druid didn't even blight the fields, rather that the blight is from a slumbering horror best not awoken but the villagers were stubbornly refusing to heed warnings and are farming every bit of field they can to turn a profit rather than just meet tax burdens.

 

[not-so-newguy]

Perhaps the (Q)uest (G)iver has a need for hiring the party specifically. Something that a clever player can use to exploit.

Examples:

1) The QG wants to defect to the other side. Maybe the Zhentarim?

2) The QG has a significant other (sibling, parent, offspring, lover) that knows the PCs. The QG misses this person and wants to give one last personal letter to him or her.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Ha! Moral dilemma?

Most of my players would deal with it like John Finnegan " If the cash is there we do not care!"

 

[Savage Wombat]

If you're a LG paladin and someone approaches you with a shady job - don't you now know about a potential crime against law and goodness that you should be thwarting? Would it be worth playing along just to find the other players and bring them to justice?

 

[Tony Vargas]

A variety of adventures are relaxing in a tavern.

A hooded figure approaches them, asks for their help, and offers a reward.

The adventurers say "but that would be WRONG!" and decline the offer.

Have you ever seen that happen?

Yes, though not often in most editions of D&D. In Hero System, for instance, sure.

Part of it is just that D&D has a long history of randomly assembled PC parties taking fairly arbitrary quests from complete strangers for money - it was just a generic way of getting to the good part: the dungeon.

Part of it is also how much the game rewards treasure vs 'rewarding' (or even punishing) moral/ethical behavior. In 1e, you got exp for acquiring gp, you got penalized for violating your alignment. In 2e the former was at least optional. In 3e, acquiring as much treasure as possible, particularly just the right magic items for your build, made you much more powerful, and, though there was a guideline for expected wealth/level, it was just a guideline, not an expectation, you still had to make getting the goods a priority in most campaigns, morality OTOH, mainly determined the name of the spell that did damage to your enemies without damaging your similiarly-aligned allies (Holy Smite vs Unholy Blight, for instance).

Similarly, in 1e or 2e, your character started out pretty fragile and you might go through several of them before getting one safely to 3rd or 5th level and finally getting some durability. That taught players to put survival before ethics or morality.

In 5e, alignment is less tightly coupled to mechanical effects, so you aren't as penalized for picking a more restrictive-seeming 'good guy' alignment, but magic items are potentially very potent, making you literally 'just better' than without them, and there's no expectation of getting them as a matter of course, so you need to make such acquisitiveness a priority - also low level characters are back to being very fragile, encouraging survival-first thinking over altruistic/heroic. On balance, that's very much like traditional D&D.

I'd generally expect players to not be too picky about missions, but it really depends on the player. The game may encourage a mercenary or survivalist attitude, a little, in it's mechanics and traditions, but the DM is free to change those mechanics, and players are free to buck those traditions.