Why are Lycanthropes less virulent now?

[Banshee16]

Then you misunderstand alignment, or at the very least the rules regarding alignment and lycanthropes. "Absolute" alignment is a tool for the use of the DM in running monsters (more on that in a second). It has no effect whatever on the alignment of player characters, barring magical influences that change alignment (a one-time deal) and/or KEEP it changed (an ongoing curse, such as might attend an artifact).
The lycanthrope template indicates an alignment of "Any", and has notes indicating that certain animals that the creature is based on will TEND to produce certain alignments, and that the DM [as should go without saying] can make changes. The MM glossary indicates an alignment modifier of "Always" is, again, NOT going to be applicable to player characters as INDIVIDUALS can change alignments. The fact that the number of monsters the PC's encounter which defy an "always" alignment will be rare doesn't alter the fact that unless the DM demands otherwise the PLAYER CHARACTER lycanthrope will be whatever alignment the player has him behave as. Nothing about lycanthropy in the RAW indicates that PC lycanthropes bitten by evil creatures are themselves then evil, or especially that they may never then change alignment - unless the DM declares that in his campaign it will be otherwise.

I thought that if a LG PC is bitten by a CE werewolf, when he's influenced by the moon, and turns into a werewolf, if he fails his Control Shape check, he acts in a CE manner. Then, when he returns to human form, he has to roll a save, or switch to LN....next time, roll or switch to LE, and finally, roll or change to CE.

Has this changed?

Banshee

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

I thought that if a LG PC is bitten by a CE werewolf, when he's influenced by the moon, and turns into a werewolf, if he fails his Control Shape check, he acts in a CE manner. Then, when he returns to human form, he has to roll a save, or switch to LN....next time, roll or switch to LE, and finally, roll or change to CE.

Has this changed?

Not as such. Not to hit this too hard, since this strays into issues of alignment specifically rather than lycanthropy in general, but the point is that individuals, even those whose monster manual stat block says they are "always" a certain alignment, can still change alignment. Regardless of failing one of the will checks and becoming "permanently" the alignment of the lycanthrope form, IF this is a PLAYER character, not an NPC, then the control of what alignment the character ultimately assumes is under the PLAYER's control.

During intial lycanthropic changes the character may temporarily be another alignment - but then it is also temporarily an NPC, not a PC. Unless the DM continues to dictate the characters actions - making the character by definition an NPC, not a PC - the actions of the character are controlled by the player, and thus the alignment is controlled by the player. Furthermore, alignment is NOT a straightjacket. It technically can't and certainly shouldn't be used to try to dictate a players choice of actions for his character. Not ever. And again, you will note that the chart in the MM p178 indicates "Preferred Alignment". While the MM may state that a PC lycanthrope can have his alignment "permanently" changed, the PH rules regarding alignment for PC's (which trumps the MM) leave the choice of actions - and thus the alignment that reflects those actions - to the player.

For all practical purposes you can suffer a change to your alignment with any magic or curse you like, but unless it is an ongoing effect, a continuous behavioral control that afflicts the character and prevents the player from certain choices of actions, the player may simply choose to CHANGE THE ALIGNMENT BACK to what it was by having the character behave appropriately. Now maybe that's not in the spirit of things to simply IGNORE such an effect rather than put forth a good-faith effort to roleplay it, but the game is specifically structured to NOT allow others to tell the player how to run his character - the player runs his own character. The DM enforces consequences for those choices, but doesn't make the choices himself. If the DM insists that a PC werewolf continue to be and act CE, and the PLAYER doesn't wish to continue to play along with it, then the character has effectively become an NPC and the player might just as well roll up a new character as if the lycanthrope character had died. That, too, is not in the spirit of things to deny a player the basic right to actually control thier character. That's just how it is.

 

[wayne62682]

It was either Ghostbusters or a latter-day Scooby Doo, and I can't remember which now, that had a small village that was 1/2 vampires and 1/2 werewolves -- unknown to the heroes who had been called in by one faction to get rid of the other. Sorta like a cross between the World of Darkness, and Yojimbo.

By the end of the episode, open war had broken out and both factions were biting each other liberally -- so you had a town of vampiric werewolves battling werewolf vampires.

Coolest episode ever. I just wish I could remember which show it was from now.

-The Gneech

It was indeed The Real Ghostbusters. It was called "No one Goes to Lupusville" or something like that. And it answered the age-old question at the end: What happens when a werewolf bites a vampire.. and a vampire bites a werewolf? (The results weren't pretty.)

 

[Banshee16]

Not as such. Not to hit this too hard, since this strays into issues of alignment specifically rather than lycanthropy in general, but the point is that individuals, even those whose monster manual stat block says they are "always" a certain alignment, can still change alignment. Regardless of failing one of the will checks and becoming "permanently" the alignment of the lycanthrope form, IF this is a PLAYER character, not an NPC, then the control of what alignment the character ultimately assumes is under the PLAYER's control.

During intial lycanthropic changes the character may temporarily be another alignment - but then it is also temporarily an NPC, not a PC. Unless the DM continues to dictate the characters actions - making the character by definition an NPC, not a PC - the actions of the character are controlled by the player, and thus the alignment is controlled by the player. Furthermore, alignment is NOT a straightjacket. It technically can't and certainly shouldn't be used to try to dictate a players choice of actions for his character. Not ever. And again, you will note that the chart in the MM p178 indicates "Preferred Alignment". While the MM may state that a PC lycanthrope can have his alignment "permanently" changed, the PH rules regarding alignment for PC's (which trumps the MM) leave the choice of actions - and thus the alignment that reflects those actions - to the player.

For all practical purposes you can suffer a change to your alignment with any magic or curse you like, but unless it is an ongoing effect, a continuous behavioral control that afflicts the character and prevents the player from certain choices of actions, the player may simply choose to CHANGE THE ALIGNMENT BACK to what it was by having the character behave appropriately. Now maybe that's not in the spirit of things to simply IGNORE such an effect rather than put forth a good-faith effort to roleplay it, but the game is specifically structured to NOT allow others to tell the player how to run his character - the player runs his own character. The DM enforces consequences for those choices, but doesn't make the choices himself. If the DM insists that a PC werewolf continue to be and act CE, and the PLAYER doesn't wish to continue to play along with it, then the character has effectively become an NPC and the player might just as well roll up a new character as if the lycanthrope character had died. That, too, is not in the spirit of things to deny a player the basic right to actually control thier character. That's just how it is.

I think that's a pretty literal interpretation of the rules that kind of ignores the spirit.

A GM, if faced with a player playing a character who is acting out of character for their alignment, should point this out to the player, and possibly guide the character into an alignment more in line with his/her actions. An example would be the player running a CG character, who has him going out and robbing and bullying people, beating up villagers for lunch money, etc. That's not CG....and either the player changes how he acts, or the GM changes the character's alignment. Similarly, the player who's running a paladin, but helps his party's rogue to steal, or, again, to beat up an enemy of the party like a guardsman, who is simply doing the job he's been legally appointed to do. The GM is correct to strip the paladin of his powers, and force an alignment change.

Banshee

 

[Scarbonac]

Rent a British film called Dog Soldiers.

W3RD.

 

[Banshee16]

Hordes of the Abyss is another supplement which discusses PC alignments being changed by an in-game effect. There's a disease that causes victim's alignments to irrevocably go to Chaotic Evil. The player can't just "decide" he's going to be lawful good again. It becomes a roleplaying thing.

Another place in the book has a fiend that conducts experiments that apply the half-fiend template to characters....turning them to Chaotic Evil.

I think there's enough precedent to say that PCs can't just pick and choose this kind of thing whenever they want. Hence, lycanthropy *can* affect a character's alignment. To do otherwise, and have a bunch of LG werewolf PCs running around is basically allowing PCs to cherry pick the powerful abilities of the template, without the negatives (ie. alignment). It's pretty basic to the idea of werebeasts that you could have a LG character who gets wounded, and a month later, the morning after the full moon, wakes up in a ditch somewhere, with torn and bloody clothes, and goes home to find out that during the night, some horrid wolf-creature burst in through his family home's door, and massacred his siblings and parents. That's basically one of the reasons no player would really want the template for their character. Maybe the character realizes what has happened, and turns himself in...and he's either cured, or killed. Or, if he doesn't turn himself in, and tries to hide it, and deals with it himself, he's basically refusing to admit that he's responsible for innocents being killed.....and becomes no longer LG.

Banshee

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

I think that's a pretty literal interpretation of the rules that kind of ignores the spirit.

A GM, if faced with a player playing a character who is acting out of character for their alignment, should point this out to the player, and possibly guide the character into an alignment more in line with his/her actions. An example would be the player running a CG character, who has him going out and robbing and bullying people, beating up villagers for lunch money, etc. That's not CG....and either the player changes how he acts, or the GM changes the character's alignment.

Exactly. The DM doesn't tell the player how his character must act. He simply applies the consequences for how he DOES act, preferably with sensible warnings about those consequences rather than handing alignment whacks out like sucker punches.

Similarly, the player who's running a paladin, but helps his party's rogue to steal, or, again, to beat up an enemy of the party like a guardsman, who is simply doing the job he's been legally appointed to do. The GM is correct to strip the paladin of his powers, and force an alignment change.

But the DM is saying, "Your characters alignment is going to change. You can change back by changing behavior to what it used to be, or continue as you are with the new alignment." He isn't saying, "Your characters alignment has changed. You MUST now have your character behave thus and so because your alignment REQUIRES that you do."

It may be a subtle distinction to some, but it's an extremely important one. One leaves control of the character to the player. The other usurps control of the character from the player and places it under direct command of the DM instead.