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Message: <blockquote data-quote="TimSmith" data-source="post: 2165342" data-attributes="member: 10322">Just to remind us all what the PHB says about alignments:-"ALIGNMENTA creature’s general moral and personal attitudes are represented by its alignment: lawful good, neutral good, chaotic good, lawful neutral, neutral, chaotic neutral, lawful evil, neutral evil, or chaotic evil. Alignment is a tool for developing your character’s identity. It is not a straitjacket for restricting your character. Each alignment represents a broad range of personality types or personal philosophies, so two characters of the same alignment can still be quite different from each other. In addition, few people are completely consistent.GOOD VS. EVILGood characters and creatures protect innocent life. Evil characters and creatures debase or destroy innocent life, whether for fun or profit.“Good” implies altruism, respect for life, and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings. Good characters make personal sacrifices to help others.“Evil” implies hurting, oppressing, and killing others. Some evil creatures simply have no compassion for others and kill without qualms if doing so is convenient. Others actively pursue evil, killing for sport or out of duty to some evil deity or master. " Now, the first paragraph would imply that there is a broad latitude in what you can do (as with most things 3rd edition- could those who are very prescriptive as to what the LG types can do be still thinking 1st Edition, I wonder?) As it states, there is a broad range of views even amongst those of a similar alignment, so maybe there would have been a difference of opinion amongst the party as to what to do with the prisoners? Also, few people are completely consistent and they were certainly under pressure. Finally, alignment is not a straightjacket...The second paragraph, describing what D&D "good" is, makes no reference to sparing evil prisoners. It says "protect INNOCENT life" and "respect life and dignity of sentient beings."The prisoners are certainly not innocent and respecting life is not the same as refusing to take it when necessary (as long as the creature is not debased in the process). In the RAW, what they did does not seem to be outside the bounds of the "Good" alignment at all. The debate has inevitably drawn in our own real world morality, but as others have said, its a whole different ball game. (At least some of) these guys worship dark gods and perform unspeakable acts as a matter of routine AND they are part of a wider network with the will and capability to do it on a large scale. Real, pure, unadulterated EEEEvillll. Strong. Dangerous. They don't take prisoners (except maybe for sacrifice). The characters are NOT soldiers but commandos on a strike mission without any complicated support network. If they mess up, good innocent civilians will die, probably horribly. Is it right to expect a good character to spare prisoners in this case, when the probability is that these prisoners will tell tales and give them away? Would it even really be a "good" act to spare them, when the result is likely to be genuine innocents dying and the jeapordising of the mission against evil? If good guys always spare bad guys like that, the good guys and their way of life and those they are fighting to protect are on the way to the history books as a failed civilisation. Some good people would no doubt say "so be it" rather than stoop so low, but one has to assume that adventurers will, by nature, be more on the militant side of goodness. (Of course, playing pacifist characters might be entertaining, although I would expect the average adventure to be more of a challenge for them).The game has room for many different interpretations of what is acceptable for a "good" character, and indeed our real world morality has plenty of room for debate even without the fact that D&D is a different reality to ours! The only way to deal with this is to make it clear what, in your world view, it means to be "good" if this is likely to be an issue. Or simply let the players define their characters' views for themselves</blockquote>

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