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Message: <blockquote data-quote="N'raac" data-source="post: 6160620" data-attributes="member: 6681948">Could be the computer used - I alternate between a work computer (at two different regular locations plus travel), a home computer (sometimes other home computers), and an iPad.  I wonder if I posted from the iPad or the home machine yesterday...Many other products as well.The Awaken spell makes it pretty clear animals are not considered "sentient" in 3.5 D&D.  I believe the rules use "sentient" in terms of ability to reason, a pretty common misuse.  In any case, if we accept farm animals as labour and food is not evil (which, I believe, is the common D&D assumption), then their use as sacrifices seems equally acceptable.Within your campaign, however, the animals having souls casts this into an even greyer area.  If a carnivorous animal is not evil, how is a carnivorous human rendered evil?  Here, the addition of souls to animals would seem to reduce the differentiation between animal and human.So it's OK to kill animals for my own survival, but not to aid in the survival of others?  Is the farmer evil for feeding his children, who cannot fend for themselves?  What about his aged and disabled parents, who would starve without the meat he produces?  It's OK to kill it as long as I raise it?  Does that apply to children as well as farm animals?  It all seems very grey, and rendered more so by applying souls to the animals.  It's pretty grey in our 21st century world already.I think you vary from the perception of druids by the rules.  Their respect for nature extends, by default, to survival of the fittest, and consumption of other life to survive.  Where is the differentiation?  Is it OK to eat insects?  What about crustaceans or mussels?  What about plants?  "Are ze snails stupeed enough for M'sieu?"  My old psych prof pointed out that even plants have behaviours - turn a plant away from the light and watch which way it grows.  In D&D we have spells to allow speaking with plants - would that lead Druids to demand equal rights for carrots?  Of course, we also have Create Food spells - that can mitigate the need to consume other life forms (assuming clerics high enough level to create food are in sufficient abundance to feed everyone, perhaps supplementing renewable food sources like milk - where do unfertilized eggs fall in the spectrum?).Of course, it's much easier to be able to prescribe specific issues as "good" and "evil", but even killing orcs is accepted by most Good societies in D&D.  I also note that   Paladins kill a lot of creatures in a typical D&D campaign, don't they?So would slaughtering an animal - yet there is no shortage of meat at the grocery store.  Frankly, I think magic in any form would give most people pause.  It's also easy to describe the Fireball you cast to burn those Ogres - I suspect the actual smell of their burning flesh may not be overly palatable.  Meanwhile, pretty much all of us have an idea what goes into a hot dog, but they still sell a lot of them.The problem with a lot of these rules is that, if the issue rarely arises, their impact is pretty limited.But you are imposing your morality on the question.  Substitute "paladin" for "assassin", and the same opportunities would exist, wouldn't they?  The only question is whether that Paladin would find this morally ambiguous (you know, as compared to dining on his steak dinner before going out to slaughter orcs and goblins because they threaten the farmers that have expanded into their territory).</blockquote>

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