so, exactly how evil are we talking here? (kinda long)

[Negative Zero]

in our game last saturday, the rogue had an opportunity to CdG a bad guy after he'd been dropped by some powerfull sleep poison we'd taken off one of his flunkies about an hour prior.

here's what we know about said bad guy:
1) he's one of the lieutenants for the maain big bad in our campaign thus far.
2) he's pretty much forcing himself on one of the servants in the castle we've snuck into. (from forcing himself, you should read rape.) he's ordered her to his room.
3) he is ... was planning of passing her on to his flunkies when he was done with her (we heard them saying that he promised her to them when he was done)
4) he killed ... well tried to (we saved him at -9 HPs) said servant's boyfriend in cold blood. had him chained up and ran him through with a magical rapier. (this we saw ourselves ... yeah we could have saved him, but at the time, we had no idea who they were or what was going on.)
5) he's directly affiliated with the person who killed a former party member. (ok so that one isn't that big a deal, but added to the rest...)

now, bad guy gets hit with an arrow tipped with sleep poison at the last possible second. he's just about to get away and sound the alram that there are intruders in the castle. fails his save by 1 an is now unconcious. the rogue is standing over his body, while my mage character is saying "kill him!" (we've already promised the girl who we saved from him that we would.)

and the DM says: "killing a defenseless person is an evil act." he makes it clear that there are no exceptions. thorws in the line: "well, you can do it, but it is an evil act." which of course, in a heroic game is as good as saying "don't do it."

now, yes i know that every DM has the right to make up his own rules about alignment in his game and whatnot, but i dunno if i agree. sure in most situations, this is a given. but with someone who's been proven to be evil, and a danger anyone not more powerful than him, it seems to me more an issue of chaos than of goodness.

what d'you think?

~NegZ

 

[Drawmack]

How about inpacacitating him. I hear that without toungues, hands and eyes these guys are pretty feeble.

Okay, so we can't kill him because that's evil.

However his tounge allows him the verbal components to his spells so I cut that out. His hands allow him the somantic components to his spells so I cut them off too. He might have silent spell and still spell so I poke out his eyes so he can't read his books anymore. Being that I was justified and don't feel sorry for him I leave him there without bandaging his wounds. I'm confident that he will live though after all he is a powerful wizard.

You don't have to be a DM to be the rediculous rational game.

 

[Enkhidu]

Your DM, within the scope of the D&D Alignment system, is right. That's an evil act. But you know what? Sometimes good people do bad things, and they don't stop being good people because of it.

"So what," you may ask, "is you're point?"

A good alignement is not necessarily about what a character will do in a fit of passion, its about how he or she deals with it after the evil act is done.

 

[reveal]

As a DM, here are my views:

Out of Game: I think murder is wrong. Regardless of the reasons, it cannot be justified.

In Game: This is a heroic, cinematic game. Justice, "eye for an eye", righting the wrong, that's what it's all about. Maybe saying something like "This one's for Betsy" and then stabbing him. But, as a player, I would probably opt for something a little more humiliating, since he sounds like such an evil bastard.

It sounds like your DM is mixing personal views with his campaign world as most people do.

 

[hunter2112]

How about inpacacitating him. I hear that without toungues, hands and eyes these guys are pretty feeble.

Okay, so we can't kill him because that's evil.

However his tounge allows him the verbal components to his spells so I cut that out. His hands allow him the somantic components to his spells so I cut them off too. He might have silent spell and still spell so I poke out his eyes so he can't read his books anymore. Being that I was justified and don't feel sorry for him I leave him there without bandaging his wounds. I'm confident that he will live though after all he is a powerful wizard.

You don't have to be a DM to be the rediculous rational game.

I would view this as more evil than just killing him. Death ends it but this would be considered torture in my world. I would agree with your DM that killing the guy in cold blood would be considered evil but it would I doubt it would make you evil. It might start a person on the path but there is still plenty of time to turn back considering all the info you gave on the bad guy.

To keep everybody happy though, why not truss the guy up so he's not a threat, then bring him back alive to the girl he raped. That way the DM, playing her, can decide his ultimate fate, not the PC.

 

[RedSwan78]

This sounds to me like the DM is mad about you "getting his bad guy". He of course wants the bad guy to live because HE has plans for HIM.

He sees you about to kill him off, ruining *his* plans and throws that out there to spite you, hoping that you won't kill him so that his evil guy can get away to complete whatever plans he had set up for him.

That of course is just what *I* see going on Otherwise, what would it matter? So what it's an evil act, it's only one. One that can *barely* be considered "evil" either, to me it's more like JUSTICE.

Doing this should in NO way effect your alignment.

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

In D&D, I would not define killing that specific NPC when he was unconscious as an evil act. He's clearly an extremely evil and unpleasant fellow, and killing him is clearly the right thing to do, depending on your character. As a rogue, unless you were playing him as a Lawful Good Rogue with aspirations of paladinhood, then there shouldn't be any particular consequences for killing him.

Apart from the fact that you get to keep his stuff, of course.

Your DM is perfectly entitled to his opinion, but I think he's wrong and is trying to save this guy for metagaming reasons.

 

[Darrin Drader]

I'd say that the degree of evil here is pretty small really. I mean this guy is clearly not redeemable.

As a DM, I would probably want to keep the guy because he sounds like a good villain. Nevertheless, a good DM can resurrect him after he dies, or better yet, bring him back as a death knight.

In Star Wars, Obi-One tells Darth Vader that if Vader strikes him down, he will become more powerful than he could possibly imagine (a hollow threat if you ask me, unless we're talking about how he will be seen as a martyr by Luke, who will then take the fight right back to the emperor). Anyway, in D&D, there is definite truth to that statement.

 

[Henry]

I would have to ask:

WWMD

or,

"What would Malachite Do?"

For those not familiar, Malachite is a Paladin, played by fellow poster Blackjack, in Piratecat's Defenders of Daybreak Story Hour. I don't know him personally, but I know he plays one HECK of a paladin.

Why I bring this up is that I have a strong gut feeling that Malachite, and by extension the Emerald Chapellars, would not view slaying someone this blatantly sadistic as being murder. If a well-played paladin would have no qualms with it, I doubt those who are NOT paladins really should either.


Now, the other side:

Your DM is certainly entitled to define good and evil in his game as he needs to, but he should MAKE these tenets clear before the game begins, same as if he had house rules that differed from the core book. In the absence of that, you should ask him, "what would the tenets of my beliefs have me do?" If your PC's are even remotely religious, which most PC's in a game with active gods would likely be, then by your alignment, your CHARACTER should know what is the course of action he has been taught is right. After all, people often know what they SHOULD do by the tenets of their beliefs, even if they're not doing it.

This is, of course, an underhanded way to get your DM to tell you what HE thinks is the proper course of action given your alignment. And you will have a better idea of whether or not you want to follow that path.

Like Enkhidu said, one evil action does not necessarily turn someone evil. It takes at least a few actions to head down that path.

 

[Shadowdancer]

Yeah, it's evil. But so what? It gives the rogue character some good role-playing opportunities -- how does he handle what he's done? how does he atone?

If I was DM, I wouldn't have said anything until after the act was done, unless the character was a paladin or lawful good cleric. Otherwise, let the players act, and then face the consequences.

In one of the first campaigns I ever ran, there was a player (my girlfriend at the time) who was playing a Ranger. She killed a prisoner after torturing him during interrogation. This was clearly an evil act, and against her alignment. But I didn't say anything, until the next time she was wounded and wanted the cleric to heal her. The cleric, a good alignment who was not present for the torture session, could not heal her -- his deity wouldn't allow the cleric to cast the spell -- until she atoned.

I think as a DM, you have to let the players play, and let the chips fall where they may. If they are a good alignment, and they keep committing evil acts, and the DM keeps hammering them for it, they eventually will get the message -- change your actions, or change your alignment.