Viktyr Gehrig
First Post
Rangers?
Problem is, Rangers are half-casters and only really use WIS for their spellcasting. (And Survival checks, I know, but everyone uses WIS for Survival.)
Rangers?
Problem is, Rangers are half-casters and only really use WIS for their spellcasting. (And Survival checks, I know, but everyone uses WIS for Survival.)
But, in practice, the "restriction" only "works" because it is a licence for the GM to interfere with the player's decision-making for his/her PC.
Which, is, in turn, a recipe for balance-of-power issues and conflict at the table (witness the endless aligment threads, which culminate - or, if you prefer, reach their nadir - with debates about paladins).
If players want to play a PC who is bound by a code, they can do so without themselves needing to be bound by the GM.
Or are envisaging the "restrictions" as a buffer between the player and the other players, who otherwise won't put up with the paladin player's roleplaying? That strikes me as a sad and sorry table, but is it a real issue for some paladin players?
I don't want to violate any board rules in disagreeing with this claim, but I will say that I've read a lot of moral philosophy, including by more-or-less contemporary Catholic philosophers like Anscombe and Tony Coady, and by classical thinkers like Plato and Aristotle, and I can tell you that D&D alignment, both as written in the rulebooks and (at least in my experience) as it comes out in play, bears no relationship to their writings.The nine-alignment system was never meant to represent a real-world code of ethics - that would have been far too controversial and subjective. It's meant to represent a spectrum as well as the kind of cosmic conflicts common to many mythologies. Good vs. evil, per the Abrahamic faiths, and law vs. chaos, which was more common to many of the polytheistic faiths of antiquity such as Babylonian or Norse mythology.
Honor is a part of D&D "law," not its sole sum
Maybe not, but I was suggesting that this could be a useful thing - if alignments are defined less by abstract notions and more by reference to the PC archetypes they are associated with, alignment could perhaps be turned into a useful set of guidelines for characterisation (which is how I see it in 4e and Basic) than as a morality hammer for the GM to wield against players (which is how I see it in AD&D).Saying that all paladins must be lawful doesn't necessarily define what is the Lawful outlook.
Yes, I followed that.The Lawful restriction doesn't necessarily have to define what the code of conduct is. The default fluff for the code might be chivalry, honor, etc. and the default cause might be good, but you might change the code to something else like your Raven Queen code.
I could go with this, and I think that it is implicit in the 4e paladin class, but I suspect that this is controversial among a wide range of players, who want Chaotic champions, paladins of Tritherion and the like.Conversely, being laissez-faire or egalitarian will not reward you with paladin status.
In this case, alignment adjudication would have to be taken out of the GM's hands - it would be like (for example) default racial personalities, which are (at least at most tables, I would think) a matter of group consensus and negotiation, with each player having ultimate say over his/her PC. Personally, I don't expect 5e to go this way - I am getting a pretty backwards-looking vibe, especially when it comes to the way story elements are to be established and adjudicated - but maybe I'm wrong.So if there are any alignment restrictions, I don't see it as a limitation on the player, but as helping to define the essence of why and how the class operates.
But you don't need alignment restrictions for this, I don't think - artwork and example PCs can go a long way here, can't they? I mean, in AD&D a dwarf PC and an elf PC can both be of any alignment, but nevertheless we all know that dwarves are dour and methodical whereas elves are witty and flighty.D&D has always provided default flavor, whether it's a full-fledged campaign settings or the default character class description or whatnot, and for years and years, many DMs and players have used this fluff as simulationist reference points which helps to create cohesion at the table.
Interesting. I've never had this experience. When my players play paladins, they genrally expect me to throw situations there way that will give rise to interesting "paladin problems" and I expect them to do something interesting with those problems. But alignment restrictions or other personality mechanics aren't needed for that - if they didn't want to RP those sorts of situations, they wouldn't play a paladin.In my experience, if a player sets out to play a character with a code, but it isn't mechanically reinforced, then the instant the code becomes inconvenient, it gets cast aside.
Random, off-topic thought: If Fighters are the INT warriors, and Barbarians are the CHA warriors... who are the WIS warriors?
It has been awhile since I played in Eberron and my books are not readily available but I seem to remember that it supports playing paladins of the Silver Flame in just the way you described. Eberron allows you to have evil clerics of technically good gods.
But that doesn't fit most worlds where the gods are not distant.
I feel that paladins if designed the way they always have should be lawful good. If you look at their powers it screams lawful good.
I think Assassins should either be neutral or evil usually they are not doing the killing openly or as form of self defense so I just don't see the good alignment. But I can see assassins who work for the crown and country so they should have a way not to be just evil.
Say you have a cleric of a chaotic deity. This cleric must follow the deity's instructions and ethics or risk losing their powers. Do you label this cleric as Lawful for following the rules or Chaotic for the actions they take?
The question isn't whether or not the PC should be bound. The question is whether or not the player should be bound - and, in particular, bound to the GM as the arbiter of alignment at the table (which is the standard D&D approach).
I enjoy it when my players have their PC's express moral beliefs. Of the PCs in my current game, one is a paladin of the Raven Queen, one a ranger-cleric of the Raven Queen, one a warpriest of Moradin, one a divine philosopher and wizard serving Erathis, Ioun, Vecna and (formerly) the Raven Queen, and one is a sorcerer demonskin adept who is also part of a drow-elf crossover cult devoted to Corellon and to undoing the sundering of the elves.I LIKE Alignment and the 9-points both as a "force/make up of the [game] universe" and as an aid for players (new and old) to use in their character's personality, and I want my players' PCs to have an ethical/moral set of beliefs and incorporated in their role-play.
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If that sort of thing does not interest you or your DM or your group as a whole, then just leave it out.
Not "storyteller" - at least, I associate that word with GM power over the story. But you are right that I like player-led narrativism which isn't necessarily confined to the players sticking to a first person approach.Ah, I think this again comes down to play style.
I have the impression that your style is more storyteller type narrativist,
Not "storyteller" - at least, I associate that word with GM power over the story. But you are right that I like player-led narrativism which isn't necessarily confined to the players sticking to a first person approach.
I hate alignment restrictions on classes. Only LG gods have paladins?
4e did a great service by removing alignment restrictions from classes and all of the crap like detect/smite alignment.
Again, LN, NG and some other gods also have paladins. Should a CE god of destruction have them?
I don't really like detect evil, but I think smite should be there. Maybe as smite fiends and undead, so that it would depend on creature type instead of alignment? Detect could do the same I suppose.
Well, this would be a question of what moral standards you want your game to reflect. My understanding of pre-Christian Norse law codes is that murder meant killing someone by treachery, in their sleep, in the dark, etc. So those codes answer "yes" to your second question.Is it less evil to kill something quickly and painlessly, or to stab it repeatedly with a big bit of sharp metal until it dies?
If a paladin can be good and kill things, I see no reason why an assassin can't be good too. Do you really have to kill things while people are watching to be considered good?
On the smite front, 4e handles this by giving paladins access to melee radiant attacks, which is de facto smite undead because nearly all undead are vulnerable to radiant damage. (Not demons or devils, though.) So damage types is another way of achieving "smite" without alignment.I don't really like detect evil, but I think smite should be there. Maybe as smite fiends and undead, so that it would depend on creature type instead of alignment? Detect could do the same I suppose.
On the smite front, 4e handles this by giving paladins access to melee radiant attacks, which is de facto smite undead because nearly all undead are vulnerable to radiant damage. (Not demons or devils, though.) So damage types is another way of achieving "smite" without alignment.