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<blockquote data-quote="Elderbrain" data-source="post: 6409530">Right. I completely agree that the ends do not justify the means. I was only trying to indicate that even in a world where there are Commune spells, Detect Evil and the like, it is still possible for (initially) well-meaning people (or people who THINK they are well-meaning!) to err morally. For that matter, who's to say that a character couldn't dispute the results of a spell (i.e. &quot;This spell says what I plan to do is evil, but it's for the greater good, so the spell must be wrong!&quot;) After all, other things are disputed in D&amp;D canon by characters, for instance the divinity of the Powers. The Faction known as the Athar flatly denies that the gods are really gods. It admits their existence, sure, but insists they are merely very powerful beings and not true divinities. Likewise, I can see a Paladin refusing to accept that Elysium and Arborea are fully as Good as Mt. Celestia, regardless of what his spells and granted abilities indicate (of course, if his deity told him so, he might have to relent, but still...) Just because a rule in the game tells us that, say, Mt. Celestia is equal in goodness to Arborea, doesn't mean that characters in the game have to accept this as truth (of course, they may.)In any case, some of those Harmonium members definitely STARTED OUT with Lawful Good alignments, so even if their actions caused them to change to Evil, I'd dispute the notion that doing Evil somehow &quot;proves&quot; that the characters in question were never Good to begin with. Evil is a slippery slope, and a body doesn't have to fall all the way down in one go... he can get there gradually. Or to put it another way, one Evil act doesn't necessarily instantly change a character from LG to LE, or even from LG to LN. It depends on the severity of the act. So it is not literally true that a Good character can never commit a Evil act and still remain Good, despite the fact that the act itself is Evil.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Elderbrain, post: 6409530"] Right. I completely agree that the ends do not justify the means. I was only trying to indicate that even in a world where there are Commune spells, Detect Evil and the like, it is still possible for (initially) well-meaning people (or people who THINK they are well-meaning!) to err morally. For that matter, who's to say that a character couldn't dispute the results of a spell (i.e. "This spell says what I plan to do is evil, but it's for the greater good, so the spell must be wrong!") After all, other things are disputed in D&D canon by characters, for instance the divinity of the Powers. The Faction known as the Athar flatly denies that the gods are really gods. It admits their existence, sure, but insists they are merely very powerful beings and not true divinities. Likewise, I can see a Paladin refusing to accept that Elysium and Arborea are fully as Good as Mt. Celestia, regardless of what his spells and granted abilities indicate (of course, if his deity told him so, he might have to relent, but still...) Just because a rule in the game tells us that, say, Mt. Celestia is equal in goodness to Arborea, doesn't mean that characters in the game have to accept this as truth (of course, they may.) In any case, some of those Harmonium members definitely STARTED OUT with Lawful Good alignments, so even if their actions caused them to change to Evil, I'd dispute the notion that doing Evil somehow "proves" that the characters in question were never Good to begin with. Evil is a slippery slope, and a body doesn't have to fall all the way down in one go... he can get there gradually. Or to put it another way, one Evil act doesn't necessarily instantly change a character from LG to LE, or even from LG to LN. It depends on the severity of the act. So it is not literally true that a Good character can never commit a Evil act and still remain Good, despite the fact that the act itself is Evil. [/QUOTE]

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