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Paladin just committed murder - what should happen next?
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<blockquote data-quote="FrogReaver" data-source="post: 7815297" data-attributes="member: 6795602"><p>In the general case it appears we are all in closer agreement than it would seem. On both the moral issue and the playstyle issue.</p><p></p><p>The points of disagreement are more about which cases this specific dragon encounter example falls under. It seems to me that there are a lot of details that could easily move it from one realm to the other.</p><p></p><p>For example, if the scenario isn't viewed as a no win scenario then just immediately acquiescing to the dragons request is very problematic. However if it is a no-win scenario where the only choices are either acquiesce to the request or you both die then the paladin chose the moral action.</p><p></p><p>With that said, there's one principle that hasn't really been discussed much in relation to the moral / not moral question. Moral decisions are always based on impartial knowledge. So the most important part of determining the morality of the paladins action isn't to look at it from the knowledge we have of the whole situation. Instead it's to look at the knowledge he had of the situation and what actions he could have taken to get more knowledge of the situation.</p><p></p><p>So in our example, the paladin is confronted with a dragon much to strong for him to fight and survive. The dragon gives him a verbal choice, "i'll kill you both unless you give me the NPC." At this point in the scene how can the paladin know that it's a no-win scenario? Is there any reasonable actions a person could do in this scenario to attempt to validate that it's a no-win scenario. Is it okay to give the NPC to the Dragon without attempting to validate it's a no win scenario first?</p><p></p><p>That to me is ultimate root cause of the paladins moral failure in this example, no attempt to validate that his situation really was a no win scenario before he gave the NPC to the dragon. It's also important to note that this moral failure exists whether it actually was a no win scenario or not and regardless of whether the paladin or his player believed it was a no-win scenario.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="FrogReaver, post: 7815297, member: 6795602"] In the general case it appears we are all in closer agreement than it would seem. On both the moral issue and the playstyle issue. The points of disagreement are more about which cases this specific dragon encounter example falls under. It seems to me that there are a lot of details that could easily move it from one realm to the other. For example, if the scenario isn't viewed as a no win scenario then just immediately acquiescing to the dragons request is very problematic. However if it is a no-win scenario where the only choices are either acquiesce to the request or you both die then the paladin chose the moral action. With that said, there's one principle that hasn't really been discussed much in relation to the moral / not moral question. Moral decisions are always based on impartial knowledge. So the most important part of determining the morality of the paladins action isn't to look at it from the knowledge we have of the whole situation. Instead it's to look at the knowledge he had of the situation and what actions he could have taken to get more knowledge of the situation. So in our example, the paladin is confronted with a dragon much to strong for him to fight and survive. The dragon gives him a verbal choice, "i'll kill you both unless you give me the NPC." At this point in the scene how can the paladin know that it's a no-win scenario? Is there any reasonable actions a person could do in this scenario to attempt to validate that it's a no-win scenario. Is it okay to give the NPC to the Dragon without attempting to validate it's a no win scenario first? That to me is ultimate root cause of the paladins moral failure in this example, no attempt to validate that his situation really was a no win scenario before he gave the NPC to the dragon. It's also important to note that this moral failure exists whether it actually was a no win scenario or not and regardless of whether the paladin or his player believed it was a no-win scenario. [/QUOTE]
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Paladin just committed murder - what should happen next?
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