My Paladin killed a child molester (and now my DM wants to take away my powers!)

[DM-Rocco]

But, this argument has become pretty recursive by now, hasn't it?
We agree that the paladin should retain his paladinhood.
We agree that there may have been a better solution.
We do not agree that there necessarily was a better solution.
I can live with that.

Raven Crowking and Agemegos, not to step on your toes, or to drag this forum onto another 28 pages, but I am assuming that in this quote that Raven Crowking is speaking for you and he in this matter in hopes of trying to wrap this up.

I get the feeling that many people think the Paladin was in the wrong and should lose his powers, myself included.

I started out with the position that the Paladin was justified, but I can't get over the fact that he killed the man in cold blood, no warning, nothing.

If he would have warned the man, a completely different story. If he would have at least warned him I could come over to your way of thinking. I would still think it is wrong, but I would be more inclined to agree. The reason I would still have my doubts, even after warning him, was because you as a Paladin should have a morale code that should not allow you to a) kill a man without announcing cause and b) there is no honor in killing an unarmed man (see my earlier posts on page 25).

Anyway, I know that doesn't help the situation, but I just didn't want you making a statement that everyone agrees that he should keep his powers, since there are a lot of people who don't think he should keep them.

Although, I am sure you are referring to the discussion between yourself and Agemegos.

 

[Agemegos]

I did not state what was the best/worst legal outcome. I said "At best, your examples would have only been as effecting in protecting the girl from further immediate harm, which is not the same this as protecting her from further harm."

You did, and I think you are wrong. At best, my examples would have protected the girl from all harm just as effectively as what Vindicator's character did. It is only at worst that the rapist makes a comeback: and the paladin can do something about that if necessry.

Excepting that an argument has been put forward, repeatedly, that the risk in doing so is very high. The risk is that the watch does nothing, and the little girl is raped again.

If the Watch does nothing, the paladin can step back in.

The risk is that forty brutish friends of the rapists beat the crud out of the paladin when he calls out, and the girl is raped again.

They can still do that when the first guy is dead, can't they?

Your examples assume that calling the watch is as effective as killing the miscreant.

No, my examples assume that if the Watch fails the paladin can make good their deficiency. The paladin can even conduct his own investigation and trial if there is no watch. Whereas if the 'rapist' turns out to be the role-playing client of a prostitute with a Hat of Disguise (or any of the other scenarios) the paladin can't superglue his innocent victim's head back on.

I can live with that.

Fair enough.

 

[Agemegos]

I started out with the position that the Paladin was justified, but I can't get over the fact that he killed the man in cold blood, no warning, nothing.

I agree that that is a breach of the paladin's code (though I note that many people with more modern sensibilities do not). But a paladin doesn't lose his or her powers for just any breach of the code. According to the PHB he only loses them (1) for a willing evil act, (2) associating with evil characters, (3) changing alignment away from Lawful Good, (4) or a gross breach of the paladin's code.

1) I do not believe that by D&D standards is is evil to kill a person whom you honestly believe to be evil. And if you honestly believe that you are doing so to prevent a heinous crime I think that by D&D standards the act is Good. And if you turn out to be right in both beliefs you are safe as houses. Backstabbing is not itself Evil by the definitions in the PHB.

2) Associating with evil charcters simply doesn't come into it.

3) Alignment ought not to be judged on a single act, especially one performed under emotiional stress, but only on a consistent or at least general tendency of behaviour.

4) I do think that killing an unarmed man by stabbing him in the back without warning is dishonourable, and that killing a suspect out of hand without considering the possibility of a defence is disrespectful to authority and so forth. A lot of people have said that they disagree. But I agree that this act was a breach of the Code. Even so, the question remains whether it was a gross one. 'Gross' is not specifically defined for this purpose, and so we all have to draw the line where we see fit. Very likely our opinions will differ. I take into account that it is a grim and gritty campaign, and I think of some of the things that the real Templars and Teutonic knights and other crusaders actually did: herded all the Jews in a city into their synagoge, barricaded the doors, stacked fuel around it, and set it on fire; massacred the whole population of a city after it had surrendered on the grounds the "God will know his own"; tried to cheat a widow out of her house, and when she resisted, cut her fingers off; burst into a cathedral during a pontifical mass, and shot arrows into the altar to intimidte the bishop into giving their order property; fought with one another in the streets over the right to strip the corpses of pilgrims who had died; deposed a Christian king and installed a puppet to get access to more property. In a grim and gritty campaign there will be people doing this sort of thing. If I call it 'gross' to kill a red-handed rapist in a moment of rage I am soon going to run out of superlatives.

Your mileage may vary.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Raven Crowking and Agemegos, not to step on your toes, or to drag this forum onto another 28 pages, but I am assuming that in this quote that Raven Crowking is speaking for you and he in this matter in hopes of trying to wrap this up.

I get the feeling that many people think the Paladin was in the wrong and should lose his powers, myself included.

You are quite right. I didn't mean to imply any form of consensus among any other parties. Given the subject matter, real consensus seems unlikely.

RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

You did, and I think you are wrong. At best, my examples would have protected the girl from all harm just as effectively as what Vindicator's character did. It is only at worst that the rapist makes a comeback: and the paladin can do something about that if necessry.

If the Watch does nothing, the paladin can step back in.No, my examples assume that if the Watch fails the paladin can make good their deficiency. The paladin can even conduct his own investigation and trial if there is no watch. Whereas if the 'rapist' turns out to be the role-playing client of a prostitute with a Hat of Disguise (or any of the other scenarios) the paladin can't superglue his innocent victim's head back on.

I think the assumption that if the Watch fails the paladin can make good their deficiency is very much based upon campaign, DM, circumstances, and so on. There is nothing that makes this automatic.

The worst case scenario is that the rapist is the Duke, and the paladin is beheaded.

Of course, we can also reasonably assume that if the paladin reached 5th level in this DM's campaign world, the player has a reasonably good idea how likely the role-playing client scenario is. Or the Duke scenario. Not absolute, but pretty good. If the paladin was created at 5th level, though, the player may be making assumptions based upon other campaign worlds.

Again, if the DM wants to alter what is required of paladins, that's great. In fact, given the current version of the game, I applaud it. Just tell the player so that he can act accordingly.

RC

 

[Greyhawk_DM]

The difference In my opinion is honor. Striking an unarmed, defenseless, unknowing, obviously weaker foe from behind is not honorable. I wouldn't say you have to take him to the authorities, or that you have to accept his surrender to you but you can not go around smiting people from behind.

So striking an unarmed, defenseless and obviously weaker foe from the front is more honorable? I don't agree. The PHB defines honor as not lying, not cheating, not using poison, etc. This was a case of Justice pure and simple...
One definition of Justice is...the act of determining rights and assigning rewards or punishments. The paladin determined the person was commiting an evil act...as defined under the PHB the paladin is supposed to defeat evil. And under the code of conduct the paladin is help those who need help (provided they do not use the help for evil or chaotic ends), and punish those that harm or threaten innocents.
The child was definitely an innnocent, the man was and had been commiting an evil act and therefore the paladin adminstered justice. To not administer that Justice would not have been honorable and would go against everything the paladin stands for. I for one as a DM would have stripped the paladin of his status if he had not done what was done.

 

[Zimri]

That he define his honor over other things than his way of fighting?
OTOH
Would it be honorable
to let a murder kills somebody, because you wouldn`t attack him in the back
or better
let a demonfpollower sacrifices an innocent soul to demons, because yo don`t attack him from behind?
Would you let a comrade in arms go down, because you refuse him help because this would be "dishonrable"

If something is attacking a comrade of mine he is

1) engaged in willing combat and there has yet to be a fight my group has been involved in that all of the attackers were not FULLY aware of my presence.

2) The girl had already been raped, any comrade an enemy is still fighting is not already dead.

3) Apparently you have missed me saying numerous times how I would have stopped the rape from happening while maintaining the paladin's honor and saving the girl from the trauma of having a dead body fall at her feet spewing blood all over her and the head falling in her lap to sneer, leer, and gaze at her another time.

4) Though the girl had already been raped she had not yet had a dead body fall on her, cover her in blood , and a lifeless head land in her lap.

5) The girl wasn't being killed, he had kept her around and nothing says he didn't want to keep her around for even more trysts.

6) A grapple or a punch would have worked just as effectively, a grapple would allow you to keep him from attacking the girl or using her as a hostage AND allow you to remove him from the room.

7) It may very well be matagame knowledge that the CHARACTER didn't have but the DM WARNED THE PLAYER

8) Killing from behind IS DISHONORABLE. Paladins are supposed to be honorable. And yes you give that honor to everyone because honor isn't something you do it is WHO YOU ARE. And yes everyone means DROW, ILLITHID, ORCS, And Dragons.

Actually it's not even "from behind" as I don't much care if you do it from the front if they aren't aware of you (blind, deaf, unconcious)

So you walk into a village and see an orc sleeping. orcs are usually evil so you detect and it is. You should kill it because well orcs are evil and this one will do something bad.

 

[Zimri]

So striking an unarmed, defenseless and obviously weaker foe from the front is more honorable? I don't agree. The PHB defines honor as not lying, not cheating, not using poison, etc. This was a case of Justice pure and simple...

Yeah see in my world that etc. includes attacking an unarmed foe from behind. I would have no problems with the paladin tossing the guy from the room walking over to him making sure he faced him and saying "for crimes against (insert deity here) I sentence you to death by beheading. Make piece with whatever god you wish" *slice*

One definition of Justice is...the act of determining rights and assigning rewards or punishments. The paladin determined the person was commiting an evil act...as defined under the PHB the paladin is supposed to defeat evil. And under the code of conduct the paladin is help those who need help (provided they do not use the help for evil or chaotic ends), and punish those that harm or threaten innocents.

Justice ,Sir, does not cloak itself in shadows and silence. Justice does not skulk or slink around corners. Justice is not done in backrooms of seedy bars.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

He needed killing.




Paladin did nothing absolutley nothing wrong.

 

[SirEuain]

I am not arguing that you should pull punches for paladins.

I am arguing that, where you have not made the rules clear, you should allow some leeway to take the fact that you haven't made the rules clear into account.

And I'm arguing that, to a certain extent, this isn't necessary. A paladin who unwittingly but directly aids evil is going to get the unwilling breach smack-down from me. I think that Violator's paladin's actions justify this - he had every sign that more people were involved, but either didn't notice or didn't care. Had he not used excessive and lethal force, it wouldn't be an issue.