Danceofmasks
First Post
Depends on the group.
Some PCs slaughter just for fun and profit, since it's not really a war if your enemies never win.
Psychopacifist clerics
- Thread starter On Puget Sound
- Start date
Depends on the group.
Some PCs slaughter just for fun and profit, since it's not really a war if your enemies never win.
Prestidigitalis
First Post
Assuming you mean Wikipedia, it's nice that they have a definition. That adds one more to the list I linked to earlier.
Epametheus
First Post
The aspect of the argument that I'm finding interesting is the presumption that the adventuring party is nothing more than a group of bandits with powers.
Though I guess if that's how the story works in your game, then that's how it works. I've had groups that were like that, and a pacifist healer would be nuts to travel with them (if for no other reason than because the pacifist healer is hosed if PC v PC combat occurs).
The mechanics of pacifist healer are a bit silly (though I must confess that I play one and I enjoy being able to solo heal a 6 person party). My guess as to why there's no penalty for zapping enemies that are healthy (which just happens to kill minions) is so that the cleric can actually use their at-will that's not Astral Seal.
I suppose you could expand the penalty to apply if the PC inflicts damage at all? Or change the penalty aspect to "If you destroy an enemy outright or damage a bloodied enemy, you waive the benefits of this feat until you reach a milestone after taking an extended rest."
Though I guess if that's how the story works in your game, then that's how it works. I've had groups that were like that, and a pacifist healer would be nuts to travel with them (if for no other reason than because the pacifist healer is hosed if PC v PC combat occurs).
The mechanics of pacifist healer are a bit silly (though I must confess that I play one and I enjoy being able to solo heal a 6 person party). My guess as to why there's no penalty for zapping enemies that are healthy (which just happens to kill minions) is so that the cleric can actually use their at-will that's not Astral Seal.
I suppose you could expand the penalty to apply if the PC inflicts damage at all? Or change the penalty aspect to "If you destroy an enemy outright or damage a bloodied enemy, you waive the benefits of this feat until you reach a milestone after taking an extended rest."
Danceofmasks
First Post
Well, the first time I saw the feat, someone said to me: "well, if you're thinking of taking that, you better make sure you blam hard enough to take them from unbloodied to dead"
Isn't that really what all versions of D&D are mostly about?
For example, look at 4E XP. The vast majority of it is about 10 encounters per level or 290 encounters overall to get to level 30.
290. Even with 2 encounters per gaming session and one session per week, that's 3 real years of two fights a week.
3E was 13 encounters per level or 247 encounters from levels 1 to 20. More if going to Epic.
Look at 4E powers. The vast majority of them revolve around combat. 4E stripped out many if not most of the miscellaneous spells of 3E and turned them into rituals that cannot even be used in combat for the most part.
Look at the Monster Manual. Many of the monsters are sentient (the vast majority ~340 have Int 8 or higher, just like the PCs).
Look at magic items. They are required to balance the encounter math at higher levels. Look at the parcel system. Designed for looting.
The word roleplaying shows up 31 times in 320 pages in the PHB and 32 times in 224 pages in the DMG.
It's a footnote.
D&D has historically and continues to be a hack and slash game. Sure, some people throw a bit more roleplaying in or skill challenges in for the reward system, but the game is not heavily designed for that.
It is designed to be an explore, trespass, kill, and loot game.
The game is totally about violence and deadly violence at that. Really little different than WoW in that regard.
How many times do two groups in D&D encounter each other and the DM announces "Roll initiative"? Happens nearly every session in many campaigns.
Can someone make the game something beyond that and take away most of the carnage? Sure. But, very few groups do.
And how has D&D historically gotten around the moral dilemma of PCs fighting sentient NPCs? They called most of them evil (monsters, bandits, outlaws, cultists). When the NPC has evil tattooed on his forehead, it's all good as far as many players of PCs are concerned.
In 4E, the designers even got rid of most of the good races and called them unaligned, just so that they could remove the moral dilemma even more. They also reinforced the concept of "points of light". Society = good, outside of society = bad (as a general rule of thumb). They combined lawful with good and chaotic with evil.
How can anyone seriously consider most groups of PCs to be anything significantly more than bandits with powers? Sure, they might be supported by a king or a sheriff and they might help out others. That doesn't really make them good individuals. Not with the amount of death and theft on their hands. Not when they are rewarded for killing and stealing (via XP and wealth and level increases).
Compare this to a superhero game. There, the PCs do not typically explore (at least not in the sense of traveling around exploring the world wherever the road leads). They do not loot. They rarely kill. Instead, they show up and help others when the bad guys show up. They arrest foes or hand them over to the authorities. How often do Superman or Batman kill foes? How often do they steal? The violence is still there, but the murder and theft aren't.
Superheros are heroes. D&D PCs are typically thugs, even if they are helping out other NPCs. They kill. They steal. Sure, there are occasional exceptions. But, those are the exceptions.
If PCs were really heroes who only killed when absolutely necessary and never stole, then different types of Pacifism would fit in better into the game system and we wouldn't be having this discussion.
Danceofmasks
First Post
My PCs aren't thugs, they're tyrants.
If terms aren't offered to me, personally, that's advantageous to my nation .. then they will serve me in death.
Sure, I'll couch it in terms that don't seem tyrannical, but hey ... every empire behaves that way.
If terms aren't offered to me, personally, that's advantageous to my nation .. then they will serve me in death.
Sure, I'll couch it in terms that don't seem tyrannical, but hey ... every empire behaves that way.
lukelightning
First Post
I want to make an evil pacifist cleric. He refuses to fight because that's what his minions (i.e. the other PCs) are for. I'd make him some creepy imperial-Chinese-eunuch-type, sort of like Lo Pan from Big Trouble in Little China.
. . .and we come to the root of the problem. You cannot comprehend anyone disagreeing with you. You do not see how you could be wrong. This is fine for you, but for everyone beating their head against a wall trying to explain it, it stinks.
After taking a few days away from the thread to think, and not get in a shouting match, I think I have what a key hang up might be. Magic.
Real world definitions of Pacifism do not need to take magic into account. D&D pacifism, however, should do so. In the real world, a Pacifist might pray for his enemies. When he does so in D&D, does his patron use divine power to show them 'the way'?
We don't know in the default setting, and that is a *good* thing. It allows the player and DM to flavor it as they like. I don't have this feat, and probably wouldn't take it. I'm not defending it out of any need to have it personally. Just so we are clear....
Jay
ValhallaGH
Explorer
I used to think PCs were, automatically and almost universally, played like heroes. Then I started encountering the sort of behavior that inspired this Penny Arcade classic (NSFW). Just replace "Anonymity" with "Personal Freedom from Repercussions" and you see the same formula at work in many, many gaming tables.
Now, I don't play with the people that showed me this. But there are a lot of them, enough that they approach the "standard" of PC interaction.* As such, when designing rules related to morality and moral choices, it is important to keep in mind the background and patterns of your target audience.
All audiences have niches, of course, so something along this line would be appropriate for some of the audience.
I still think the feat should require you to render your foes unconscious (excepting undead, constructs, and other things that are already dead / never alive), so you can at least remain a technical pacifist. This solves the minion issue and allows the character to continue to attack bloodied foes; both of which are contributions that enhance the flavor and the game-play appeal of such a character.
*I'm fairly sure this was the cause of the confusion between "Chaotic Neutral" and "Chaotic Evil". Most folks would qualify as Neutral but like to think of themselves as "Good". When playing a not-Good character, they judge actions based upon how they themselves would see it. If they can see themselves doing it all the time then it is "Good", if they'd only do it when being a jerk then it is "Neutral", and only the most depraved and malicious acts are "Evil". In truth, the actions they do all the time are largely Neutral, and the ones when they are being selfish jerks are varying shades of Evil.
The problem is that it becomes mechanically unbalanced - the feat provides an overwhelming amount of healing with the downside of preventing you from damaging bloodied enemies. I agree with you in terms of your change retaining the flavor of the feat... but I suspect it would require a full redesign to get something appropriate, balanced and the exact right flavor.
