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Message: <blockquote data-quote="takyris" data-source="post: 3327451" data-attributes="member: 5171">In a House Rules discussion, that's fine. In this discussion, the DM took creatures listed as "Usually Evil" in the SRD and actually made them MORE evil by having them radiate evil even as babies.1) Yes, it is. That's what the paladin's god wants the paladin to do. I mean, yeah, if you pass an evil guy on the street, you don't automatically go all smite-y, but you might want to follow that person (although you better have some Shadowbane Stalker levels to be any good at it) and figure out what they're up to.2) We do, in fact, know them. We know that they eat people (the parents kidnapped some kids, and that there are a bunch of dead people in the area, half-eaten). We know that the parents were evil, and we know that the kids, even this young, already clearly radiate evil. We know about all we need to know to make an informed judgment in the matter.3) "Some magic" in this case is the divine word of the paladin's god. That source of "some magic" is also the source of "all the paladin's powers", so it's a pretty good measure of whether the paladin would be in the wrong to kill those people who radiate evil.4) Paladins only need to give creatures a "fair fight" in declared duels. Paladins are allowed to win initiative. They are allowed to attack by surprise if they catch evil monsters unawares. They are allowed to flank, disarm, power attack, and cleave. Lawful and Honorable means that the paladin does not deviate from the rules of honorable combat when an honorable combat has been declared. It does not mean that the paladin disavows tactics, and it does not mean that the paladin puts away his holy avenger just because he's fighting a lemure and not a balor.In which case they'd show up as Neutral.It could also be the case that an evil warlock placed a false aura on the baby trolls, making them APPEAR to radiate evil when in fact they don't, and hey, they could also be pretty human babies polymorphed or glamored into looking like trolls. This could be an enormous setup to get the paladin to kill babies.Or the paladin could go with what's actually the case 99% of the time... that radiating evil makes you, well, evil. And not "cheat on income taxes" evil. "Kill innocent people in service of my dark master or in service of my own depraved desires" evil. That's the only thing that actually merits "Evil" in D&D's rules as written.Sounds like you want a game without alignments. I like d20 Modern and Grim Tales specifically because it has Allegiances instead of Alignments. The evil warlock has an actual allegiance to Evil, but his guards just have an allegiance to the warlock -- so if I have Smite Evil, it works on the warlock, but not the guards.I really enjoy playing that type of game, but I also know that D&D, out of the book, ain't that game.</blockquote>

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