D&D 5E Paladin just committed murder - what should happen next?

[FrogReaver]

It's questions like these that almost become logic puzzles, of the type, "Can a Deity Create a Rock so Heavy She Cannot Lift It?" or "I always lie."

Can a Paladin kill himself? Because Paladins, by their nature, are terrible, terrible beings; yet, by killing a Paladin, hasn't that Paladin done the world a solid, and therefore become not-Paladin?

....it hurts the brain.

Anything can be justified with the greater good argument.

 

[Imaculata]

Big difference though. You were sacrificing yourself to save others. As presented, the OP's paladin had no option to save the NPC.

The paladin could have sacrificed himself to save the npc.

Of course, if he lost the dragon could still eat them both. But that was the exact same case for my barbarian. It's pretty similar.

 

[Oofta]

The paladin could have sacrificed himself to save the npc.

Of course, if he lost the dragon could still eat them both. But that was the exact same case for my barbarian.
It's pretty similar.

I don't see it at all the same. The NPC is not able to get away under their own power. The paladin says no, the dragon breaths killing the NPC whether they make their save or not. Even if the PC is not dead the first round, it won't take the dragon more than a round or two to mop up.

That's how I would have interpreted the situation.

 

[Imaculata]

It's not an act of mercy if the party taking it is punished for taking. It's an act of cruelty then.

When I throw a dragon at my players, the dragon doesn't usually offer a way out. It is a battle to the death and if the players lose, they die. So in that respect, the dragon offering a way for the paladin to escape with his life is merciful (although a cruel act on the part of the dragon).

I don't see it at all the same. The NPC is not able to get away under their own power. The paladin says no, the dragon breaths killing the NPC whether they make their save or not. Even if the PC is not dead the first round, it won't take the dragon more than a round or two to mop up.

My party members were not able to escape either, so it is pretty similar. If my character would have been killed, then my party members would have died all the same. But the paladin was given an option to either save himself or die heroically... he decided to live. My character decided to die bravely without being given an ultimatum.

 

[Nagol]

When I throw a dragon at my players, the dragon doesn't usually offer a way out. It is a battle to the death and if the players lose, they die. So in that respect, the dragon offering a way for the paladin to escape with his life is merciful (although a cruel act on the part of the dragon).



My party members were not able to escape either, so it is pretty similar. If my character would have been killed, then my party members would have died all the same. But the paladin was given an option to either save himself or die heroically... he decided to live. My character decided to die bravely without being given an ultimatum.

This wasn't a party situation. It was a PC against an adult dragon -- none of whom have a CR as low as the PC's level.

Killing a character is quick and by 7th level, recoverable. Forcing a fall is neither. It sets up the player to make a choice to retire or live with something he didn't intend to play and may not enjoy.

 

[Imaculata]

This wasn't a party situation. It was a PC against an adult dragon -- none of whom have a CR as low as the PC's level.

That is irrelevant. It doesn't matter if it's one dragon against one player, or one dragon against a whole party.

When I run a dragon encounter, that dragon will try to kill the player(s), and it will be a fight to the death. The dragon doesn't offer an ultimatum for the player(s) to escape with their life when they're losing... but maybe I should, because it is a pretty cool idea, and fitting of an intelligent and cruel creature like a dragon.

Fights in D&D don't always have to be fair. Sometimes the CR of a monster will not be a fair challenge for the players, like with a dragon. A fight with a dragon should be deadly. The game isn't called Dungeons and Dragons for nothing.

 

[Celebrim]

Like with my other response, the guard on the tower has a chance to do good.

sigh I have just been flagged with a 5 yard penalty for unnecessary Godwin, which I had considered fair since I feared it would be when I made the play.

But now I would like to ask for a review of the call, because it can't possibly be unnecessary argument ad absurdum, if in response someone takes up your Godwin and says, "That's actually not even absurd."

All I can say is that if you find yourself in a guard tower at Buchenwald arguing to yourself that it's OK because you have a chance to do some small good while you perform your duties, and at least you are keeping yourself alive, you've fallen so far from the expectations of morality that if morality was a planet you would no longer be in the same galaxy.

This argument that keeping yourself alive is the greater good is in my opinion actually the core reason that the world is so evil. Very few people in the real world are so broken as to have the morality of the dragon. The vast majority of the evil in the world occurs because of the moral calculus that in D&D could be called neutrality. When confronted by evil, people think to themselves, "If I do something, there will be a cost to me. But there will be almost no chance that I can do any good. So the best thing to do here is just do nothing. Stand aside. Walk by. Say nothing. The greater good is keeping myself alive."

But a Paladin is not the greater mass of humanity. And the calculations of the Paladin are entirely different.

 

[Nagol]

The paladin could have sacrificed himself to save the npc.

Of course, if he lost the dragon could still eat them both. But that was the exact same case for my barbarian. It's pretty similar.

The wounded NPC is very likely to die BEFORE the paladin loses. Breath weapons are like that.

 

[Nagol]

That is irrelevant. It doesn't matter if it's one dragon against one player, or one dragon against a whole party.

When I run a dragon encounter, that dragon will try to kill the player(s), and it will be a fight to the death. The dragon doesn't offer an ultimatum for the player(s) to escape with their life when they're losing... but maybe I should, because it is a pretty cool idea, and fitting of an intelligent and cruel creature like a dragon.

Fights in D&D don't always have to be fair. Sometimes the CR of a monster will not be a fair challenge for the players, like with a dragon. A fight with a dragon should be deadly. The game isn't called Dungeons and Dragons for nothing.

Mangling a character rather than cleanly killing it is a cruel thing for a DM to do. Death is recoverable pretty simply and quick even when not recovered from. Having your levels stripped and replaced by others is not.

Presenting the sequence of "Here's a way out. Oh, you took it? The cost is the PC is mangled. Didn't I tell you that in advance? I thought it was obvious." is cruel, not merciful.

ETA

If I toss a dragon or high CR anything really, the critter is likely to work to the ruin of its opponents too. If a dragon thinks it wants to mug a guy with a sword and a wounded buddy, it's going to take a lot more than a stern look to make it change its mind. It's going to eat them both if the unwounded one puts up a protest.

Which means one of 2 things:
Either I use this situation because the environment is right for it and the PCs did a lot of things necessary to set it up (like leave two people alone inside an adult dragon's hunting ground) and it really is a no-win situation

OR

I screwed up badly expecting the single player involved to pull a rabbit out of his hat and his mind-reading powers failed him. Me fixing that screw up should cost me not the player.

 

[FrogReaver]

Mangling a character rather than cleanly killing it is a cruel thing for a DM to do. Death is recoverable pretty simply and quick even when not recovered from. Having your levels stripped and replaced by others is not.

Presenting the sequence of "Here's a way out. Oh, you took it? The cost is the PC is mangled. Didn't I tell you that in advance? I thought it was obvious." is cruel, not merciful.

ETA

If I toss a dragon or high CR anything really, the critter is likely to work to the ruin of its opponents too. If a dragon thinks it wants to mug a guy with a sword and a wounded buddy, it's going to take a lot more than a stern look to make it change its mind. It's going to eat them both if the unwounded one puts up a protest.

Which means one of 2 things:
Either I use this situation because the environment is right for it and the PCs did a lot of things necessary to set it up (like leave two people alone inside an adult dragon's hunting ground) and it really is a no-win situation

OR

I screwed up badly expecting the single player involved to pull a rabbit out of his hat and his mind-reading powers failed him. Me fixing that screw up should cost me not the player.

Just for the record, I agree with equating the staredown solution to pulling a rabbit out of a hat. It wasn't an obvious solution. It wasn't a solution that could have been figured out through good play or probing the situation. It was also a solution that could have easily escalated the situation and easily voided the dragon's previous offer.

That's a big part of why the OP's scenario was a big gotcha type setup.