Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lord of Nessus" data-source="post: 7816121" data-attributes="member: 7015610">The Player and his character were given no reason to think that the dragon was open to further bargaining. Perhaps if the Paladin and the dragon had some kind of prior history where the Paladin knew how the dragon thought, it would've been reasonable for the Paladin to think that more bargaining was viable - but this was his first encounter with said dragon, and could only go on what he knew the stereotypical behavior of such would be - immediately cooperate or die. The Paladin, as far as he knew, had only two choices: 1) Give up the man and live himself, or 2) Don't give up the man, get attacked by the dragon, fight it, lose and die, and then the dragon still takes the man. Clearly the first choice is better than the second. There's a reason people hand over their wallets to muggers: if they don't, the mugger beats and/or kills them and still gets their wallet. The question was not "How can I win" but "How do I lose the least". If the DM wanted the Paladin to choose to bargain with the dragon, it was the DM's obligation to give the dragon a line of dialogue which clearly indicated that was an option. "Give me the man or die" is not such a line. The DM set up a situation where a win was possible, but only with knowledge the PC did not possess - that the dragon was more reasonable and cooperative than the typical evil dragon. (I'm curious as to how the DM intended the Paladin to satisfy the dragon in the winning scenario, given that the dragon was hungry - was the Paladin supposed to suggest an alternative meal? What if the PC doesn't know where one can be found - does he get penalized then, too?)Now, should the Paladin feel bad about his choice? Sure. But he was (as far as he knew) in a no-win situation. If the Paladin fought the dragon (which he believed he would have to to save the man), the Paladin would die and not be able to complete the world-saving quest - which would doom everybody including the man he was trying to save. As Spock would say "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one."</blockquote>

Verification