Who was right

[theredrobedwizard]

... those hungry orphans don’t need food, after a few weeks they’ll be eating and gods table...

Remember earlier when I said Lawful Evil? Yeah. That. As a player, you could argue this. As the paladin character, there's no way in Hades you'd even be remotely Lawful Good after this whole thing.

-TRRW

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

This is completely off topic but what’s with all the Frank Castle hate? In the real world he would be the only hero who is actually doing any good.

Speaking as someone who still buys Punisher issues as they come out...in the real world, Frank Castle would be even more of a psychopathic murder than he is in the comics, which is saying something. No matter what he says, he's a revenge-driven murder that doesn't care about anything beyond killing people.

There's a reason he was originally a villain and still very much treads that line.

But the thing is, that kind of thinking doesn't work with a Paladin in D&D. As we're supposedly talking about a Paladin, there is no WAY the kind of rational Castle uses would result in anything but the Paladin losing his abilities. It is in no way good, and especially not lawful. Its the essence of chaos in D&D, with Castle ignoring the laws of society and acting on his own.

 

[Korgoth]

It sounds like the shield belonged to your character. The party cannot vote to redistribute the shield to another character, can they? Your character decides when to use it and when not to (like when he uses a 2-handed weapon or a different shield). If your character left the party, he would keep the shield, right? Then it is his asset and it's up to him to protect it.

You say your party is a "communist utopia", but even communist utopias have constitutions. So does your character possess a written document, signed by all members of your party, stating that material losses incurred while adventuring are compensated out of party treasure? Because if your character doesn't have that in writing, he cannot really establish that the party must operate in that fashion.

I agree that it would be nice if they all chipped in to help you out. But it doesn't sound like they're required to do so.

On the "cop example": if your party were cops, you would not be allowed to keep the loot. It would not even be called "loot"; it would be called "evidence". You would have to give it to the higher authorities for storage and processing. Your party sounds more like vigilantes. Which is fine, but if Charles Bronson breaks his gun when taking out punks, he has to go out of pocket for a new one. He doesn't go shake down his fellow citizens for the money.

A life is not worth 25,000 gold. A life is worth diddly, unless you're rich or someone rich cares about you.

Is that what your Paladin thinks? Because if so, he ought to immediately lose his powers and become a Lawful Neutral Fighter in need of an Atonement and an attitude adjustment.

I do wonder why your Paladin undertook this quest in the first place. Wasn't it out of the goodness of his heart, because he is a loyal and religious person? If so, then he will surely see this loss as an opportunity to grow in holiness through self-sacrifice.

 

[Moff_Tarkin]

What should we have done after the bad guys wiped out our village. Just let them go. Going after them would be revenge and revenge is evil so the Paladin thing to do is just move to a new city.

I am going to head down to the police station and tell all those detectives working cases that they are just crazy revenge ridden psychos looking for vengeance. If someone commits a crime police will hunt him down, capture him, and punish him. Revenge has nothing to do with it.

And you might say it’s different because they are police and we are vigilantes. Just remember that justice does not care if you wear a badge or not. Just having a badge does not make your action just and not having a badge does not make my actions unjust.

Besides there was no “legal authority” in this case. The dudes wiped out the whole village. Guards, judges, and all.

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

I am going to head down to the police station and tell all those detectives working cases that they are just crazy revenge ridden psychos looking for vengeance. If someone commits a crime police will hunt him down, capture him, and punish him. Revenge has nothing to do with it.

Wha...what?

If you're referring to the Punisher again, you're definitely missing the point. He is in no way, shape, or form, a detective or a police officer. HE is a killer. He doesn't capture. He kills. Police capture. There is a fundamental difference between the two. For police, no, revenge is not the point.

For the Punisher? Its all ABOUT revenge and killing. He is everything a Paladin should not be, simple as that.

 

[Cabled]

Lol

 

[Moff_Tarkin]

I wasent specifically talking about the punisher but D&D adventurers. Although it still applies to Frank as well.

Punishment has 3 purposes.

1. Punish the guilty.
2. Keep them from doing it again.
3. Deter others from committing the same crime

Our actions did all 3.

When cops throw a murdering psychopath in a jail cell for life, that’s punishment. When are party kills such a bad guy, that’s punishment. You are inclined to believe that the punishment carried out by the cops is just and ours is not simply because the cop has a badge and we do not. But justice doesn’t care if you have a badge.

Another thing I don’t think anyone is getting is that I am not being greedy here. I defended the monk getting paid back for his lost enchantment. And if any player has a valuable magical item destroyed in a future fight I will gladly defend the party using some of the bad guys treasure to compensate him. You are all arguing the assumption that I am a hypocrite but I have and will continue to defend the same rules for all members of my party. Not just for me when my stuff gets broken.

Greed is thinking about yourself. I defend this policy for everyone. So no greed involved.

 

[pawsplay]

In traditional sword and shield based societies, your enemy's loot is yours by right of arms, whereas stealth is still stealth. And you cannot sue someone for damages caused in combat. Assuming your character is lawful and believes in something approximating Roman honor or medieval chivalry, he is owed nothing for his shield.

 

[Michael Dean]

Sorry, man, but if you were so worried about losing your shield, you should have left it at home. It's a tool of your character's trade, so there is a certain amount of risk involved in using it. You took the risk and lost this time, is all.

As far as your "legal" arguments go, well, they wouldn't hold up in any court I know of, not that it's relevant to the discussion anyway. But as a just for fun exercise, let's see how well you'd do against the various parties as if we were writing a law school exam.



You v. Your Party:

Issue: Is the party liable for your loss of a magic shield? Probably not.

Unless you have a specific contractual agreement that lost magic items are replaced before any loot is divided, you would probably lose outright in any civil case against your companions. You work in a dangerous profession in which loss of life, limb, and property is a common occurrence. Loss of magic items is a foreseeable outcome in the normal course of business, and therefore you should be expected to make arrangements to insure any losses. Your party should not have to be the underwriters of your economic losses, particularly since you could have purchased insurance for the loss yourself.

You v. Guy who sundered your shield

Issue: Is the guy who sundered your shield liable for damages? Possibly, but it would be hard to recover.

You might be able to pursue a claim for restitution against the guy who sundered your shield as long as you could prove that he was either negligent or that he intentionally wrecked your shield. But the answer is not so clear cut, even if the guy was presumably evil. For instance, was the party invading the guy's home (i.e. the dungeon)? If so, the party is trespassing and therefore the guy has the right to repel the trespasser or to use force against the party in self defense or defense of others (his comrades). The key is whether he was using reasonable force to protect himself. In this case, it would appear that he was seeking to sunder the shield rather than attack the player. We know this because the sunder mechanic is used to destroy a shield rather than inflict damage on the shield's bearer. Since there is no risk of damage to the bearer with a sunder attack, a court would probably find that the use of force is reasonable to destroy the shield in self defense.


To the OP: In a nutshell, it's generally wise to never make the claim that any court would rule in your favor under the circumstances you describe. Any lawyer will tell you there's no such thing as a sure thing. There's always two sides to any legal issue, and therefore an amount of uncertainty.

 

[Imp]

In traditional sword and shield based societies, your enemy's loot is yours by right of arms, whereas stealth is still stealth. And you cannot sue someone for damages caused in combat. Assuming your character is lawful and believes in something approximating Roman honor or medieval chivalry, he is owed nothing for his shield.

Yeah, stick with this sort of line of thinking and try not to bring modern jurisprudence into it. It's not gonna make sense. Things break all the time in D&D worlds, and people deal.