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Message: <blockquote data-quote="John Morrow" data-source="post: 1924609" data-attributes="member: 27012">Unless the PCs were killing the Rat Queen in order to bring on the plague, I'd argue that they weren't Evil because their objective was not cruel or malicious.  Yes, that leaves the door open for the PCs to pave the road to Hell with good intentions but a Good PC would repent and try to correct their mistakes, perhaps by going after the King of Plagues.  I don't remember reading that Good has to be perfect.  It also isn't held responsible for taking unknown information into account.  If the PCs did know about this deal, than the solution is to go after the King of Plagues first and then go after the Rat Queen.  Good also also allowed to be patient and intelligent.Of course I'd also have to wonder why the Rat Queen would be doing something Good by holding off the plauges but that's a whole other issue.Remember that Evil is Evil.  There is no such thing as harmless Evil.  If it's harmless, it's because it hasn't figured out how to cause trouble yet but it's certainly working on it.No, because Good will never be motivated by cruelty and Good with never completely lose empathy with those who suffer because of what it does.Straw man.  Good characters smite those who are Evil.  Not only can they tell who is Evil by how they behave or what type of creature they are but they can also detect and know for certain.They will never be intolerant and vicious in the sense that they would become cruel or indifferent to the suffering of others.  That's just not what Good is.  That's what Evil is.  This is where the moral relativism comes in.  Good and Evil aren't simply two identical teams that will do the same thing to each other if given the chance.You are aware that the Inquisition was not nearly as psychotic as many people portray them to be.  They actually did follow procedures and there were very clear limits to what they could or would do to people.  Regardless, nobody is claiming that the Inquisition was Good by either modern standards or D&D standards (which has nothing to do with faith in a God or salvation).  I would argue that they were Lawful Neutral, at best, and illustrated the danger of putting Law before Good in the D&D sense.  The four corner alignments (LG, LE, CG, and CE) serve two masters and are always in danger of ignoring one master to serve the other.  That is why the one paladin in my game was given explicit orders that if he has to make a choice between being Good or being Lawful, he is to be Good, even if that means a loss of his paladin abilities.That people can change alignment says nothing about the alignments.  Alignments are not required to enforce a vice-like grip upon those within that alignment to keep them there.  That's what free moral will is all about.That's only true if you believe that Good and Evil are culturally defined.  That's not true in D&D and I don't believe it's true in the real world.  In fact, it pretty much cuts to the heart of the Golden Rule, the D&D alignment system, and sociopathic disorders.  If you care about other innocent people, you aren't going to hurt, oppress, or kill them (and this goes back to why Evil D&D monsters need to be redefined into a different class of being).  Why?  Because most sane people do not want to be hurt, oppressed, or killed, themselves.  If your culture revolves around hurting, oppressing, and killing innocent people, your culture is Evil, regardless of how you want to spin it.  In fact, I'd argue that most people who commit such Evil do know exactly what they are doing and will react defensively if confronted with their actions and the Golden Rule.  In fact, they often have their own internal critics, too.If you could show that the members of that society hated what they were doing, did it only out of necessity (rather than indifference or enjoyment), and looked for ways to end what they were doing, then I might buy the arguement that they were Good in a D&D or even real world sense.The point of reference for talking about morality in this particular case is the definitions provided in the PHB and SRD.  As for being a valuable member of the community, Neutral people will take the pragmatic approach of weighing their value to society just as they'll take a pragmatic approach to a lot of other things.  Good, on the other hand and in D&D terms, will not.</blockquote>

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