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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Hashmalum" data-source="post: 619010" data-attributes="member: 9450">(Neat, nested quote tags work.)I should have been more specific in my original statement. Not all uses of poisons are morally equivalent. One very important reason that evil people like poison is that you can poison someone's food or otherwise harm or kill someone in such a way that is very difficult to trace back to you. Evading responsibility (possibly allowing someone innocent to take the blame) and legitimate punishment for one's actions is the very soul of evil. It isn't very lawful either. Poison gas applied over a wide area can poison the soil and water if it is a poison that doesn't biodegrade quickly--and that's morally problematic as well. There's also the problem of accidentally catching innocents in the cloud as well, but that's the moral peril of any sort of area attack--fireball, scattershot from a catapult, or what have you.On the other hand, although poisoning a blade or arrowhead is definitely not chivalrous, it isn't any more morally problematic than anything else that increases the lethality of the weapon (such as using a vorpal weapon). Using a more lethal attack is morally problematic for the sole reason that killing a person denies them the opportunity to repent and redeem themselves. But this is a fantasy game, where such things as absolute good and absolute evil really exist and are usually discernable as such by the player characters--the moral elements of D&D are as much a fantastic element as any dragon or magic spell. And different people of good alignment draw the moral line at different places. You can still use highly lethal attacks and fall into the moral category of "good".True, it isn't strictly realistic. But hey, this is D&D! Anyway, there's already a couple of feats, Poison Resistance (Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting and Masters of the Wild) and Poison Immunity (Book of Vile Darkness) that work on the same principle and Poison Resistance grants a broad bonus against all poisons in the same way as the assassin's class ability works. So I don't see any problems with allowing the assassin to keep his poison save bonus if he becomes non-evil or otherwise no longer meets the class requirements.</blockquote>

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