D&D 5E Ok I have to ask..... what's with the Paladin hate on here?

[EvanNave55]

Nearly every paladin related comment I've seen on these forums have been either by lowkey, or others teasing/making a joke about/referencing him because he's been a frequent poster on these boards and his hate of paladins has become infamous.

Then there is the occasional comment relating to the lawful-stupid paladins of older editions as well, but yeah I've mostly just seen reference/jokes regarding lowkey's abhorrence of paladins (especially of the dex-rapier wielding, gnomish variety)

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[ArchfiendBobbie]

I almost want to see someone write up a paladin oath centered dex-rapier wielding, gnomish paladins who vow to not advertise they are paladins. Call it the Lowkey Oath.

 

[Oofta]

You're my hero.

Nah, Sir Stabs-A-Lot and his faithful steed Dawg are the heroes, I am but a humble messenger spreading his dual-rapier-wielding holy word.

 

[corwyn77]

Nearly every paladin related comment I've seen on these forums have been either by lowkey, or others teasing/making a joke about/referencing him because he's been a frequent poster on these boards and his hate of paladins has become infamous.

That might be true but when we had the "only one will survive" class vote, there were a number of people, not just Lowkey, block down-voting the Paladin for an early exit.

 

[ArchfiendBobbie]

That might be true but when we had the "only one will survive" class vote, there were a number of people, not just Lowkey, block down-voting the Paladin for an early exit.

That doesn't necessarily indicate dislike of the class. I know I block downvote on the racial feats thread to help protect a feat, not because I actually hate them.

There's always the possibility it was downvoted for strategy reasons.

 

[MoonSong]

A friend is playing one in a game now, and he’s been a lot of fun to interact with. (Vengeance Paladin) Paladins in this edition have definitely arrived at the position they needed to be long before now - holy warriors for all faiths.

pming said it better than I could:

Hiya!

I have no idea if/why people hate paladins. They are one of my 2 tied-for-first classes if I ever get to play. (Paladin and Magic-User...or "Wizard" in 5e parlance). I like the challenge...RP for Paladin, and "try-not-to-die" for the Wizard.

I've found that people who report to 'dislike' Paladins are the same type of people who dislike "level limits", "class/race limits" and who insist that Alignment is based on the PC/NPC's point of view. Not sure why that is, but I'd guess it's just a result of being brought up some particular way (actual Player).

I've DM'ed players way back in 1e who brought in their paladins from other games. Usually they end up making a new character after about 20 minutes of play due to them basically being Lawful Evil and me saying "POOF! You are now a Fighter". I'd get arguments, then I'd explain, then they'd "get it". Then they'd make a new PC...but not a paladin. They played a paladin for the power, and they used that power to lord it over everyone else...PC or NPC. Once they realized that they couldn't just kill random people on the street who detected as evil (or that even trying to detect evil on everyone they meet was Chaotic), they quit playing Paladins. Sure enough, their new PC would usually be a CN or TN Fighter, or maybe Cleric. Funny thing is...they'd play these new PC's just like they were trying to play their Paladin. Huh. Go figure?

I love paladins! I really enjoy playing the LG or NG characters. Hell, I recently played a Lawful Thief in BECMI (sort of a "DM-PC", because we are going to trade of DM'ing every couple months). He died, , but he was fun to 'play'.

As it stands...I'm not nearly as keen on 5e paladins. They don't seem "paladin'ey" enough. They seem like "magical fighters". Probably because of the archtypes that are not 'LG'. I would have rather WotC called them "Holy Warriors" in 5e, and then made "Paladin" a separate class that had all the normal 1e 'trappings' (LG, Limited magic items, etc). But that's me, and I'm a die-hard 1e/HM'er.

^_^

Paul L. Ming

And pming, I was this close to giving you XP, but it goes against my principles to upvote wizards. Just so you know, nothing personal, except totally personal but not in that way n_n

 

[Lanefan]

Paladins in 5e are not restricted to the Lawful Good alignment any longer, they can be any alignment they like.

Have any of you seen or designed or heard of Paladin Codes of Conduct or similar for alignments other than LG? For LG it's easy to base such a thing on the medieval Code of Chivalry, but for other alignments...???

Lanefan

 

[Tinker]

I did one for CG back in 2e, taking the official Paladin code and substituting freedom and suchlike for the LG concepts, and LE things like oppression for the official CE things to oppose.

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[The Crimson Binome]

As some people have identified, there are two distinct issues here:

1) Some people dislike the baggage associated with the class, because they know people who have played a paladin poorly in the past.

2) Some people dislike the specific mechanics in 5E, because they don't work well with the rest of the system. Smiting twice per round wrecks pacing (both of that one fight, and of the entire day), and +5 to all saves for the entire party wrecks bounded accuracy.

And though it hasn't been repeated much in this thread, I think some people have another problem:

3) With all of the lore-related changes in 5E, it doesn't really feel like a paladin anymore. If you're chaotic neutral, or championing the causes of nature, then that's just completely the wrong mental image from a knight in shining armor which has always been the core class identity.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

And though it hasn't been repeated much in this thread, I think some people have another problem:

3) With all of the lore-related changes in 5E, it doesn't really feel like a paladin anymore. If you're chaotic neutral, or championing the causes of nature, then that's just completely the wrong mental image from a knight in shining armor which has always been the core class identity.

That's the reason to me. I'm only 27 so I never had the chance to play OD&D or AD&D, but if IIRC, paladins were like Fighter+: you were more powerful than a regular fighter, but needed high stats and had some rigid restrictions in term of roleplay and party. In short: you had stronger power at a high cost. With the modern mentality on classes balance, they wanted to make paladin equal in power with a fighter and no longer needed the ''high cost'' to justify more power, so they dropped the restrictions. We ended up with a class without heavy RP restriction (that's great) but without any defining trope to justify its differentiation with a fighter. They say in the fluff that paladin gain their special power thru, honestly, really mundane things: a deep belief in a cause, faith in something vague or a rigid moral-code. I feel the flavor/trope is too all-over the place to justify his own class in 5e, a little like the UA Mystic which left you with the question: so, after all that, what's a Mystic?

I'm working on a Nentir Vale setting book using only the Basic Rules only, with each classes having archetypes related to in-setting stuff and made Barbarian (Wrathbearer), Rangers and Paladins Fighters archetype, keeping their main features has archetype abilities. This led me to tighten the lore around their main features and let the vaguer fluff to the player's choice (ex: a Wrathbearer is a fighter that channels his rage to enter a trance-like state in combat. Now, if they come from savage lands, are dwarven battlerager or just an angry dad from Harken is left to their taste.