would this be evil?

[Bonedagger]

I think I'm starting to mix the posts now So just to simplify.

The theft was not neccesarily evil. (Though I suspect it could be)

The rest of the group I would just call dusfunktional, stupid and dangerous to their surroundings. (They could very well be evil by D&D standard as well. Had I sat by the table I would have knowen)

Remember. Stupidity and bad judgement is not evil. They didn't kidnap for personal gain. They did it to help a friend. Did they ask for money?

 

[SHARK]

Greetings!

Patrick, that was just beautiful! LOL! I loved it!

You know, with all the squirming that the pathetic party is probably going through, with some of the justifications tossed about, I had a vision of a similar scenario in my head. I couldn't agree more! I can even imagine the players saying and acting just like that, too. Jeez, I hope they swing! This kind of stupid scenario should be an object lesson to them in stupidity, and how the price of being evil can be steep indeed. And swift.

Is it any wonder why such typical, evil brigands like these characters end up like this? I mean, this is the usual result and short lifespan of brigands like this. In the fantasy world, and in real life, such characters don't usually last very long. They rape and kill for a couple of weeks, maybe get to live high off the loot they have stolen from others, before the King's men or what not catches up to them, usually sooner rather than later--and they then find themselves tortured briefly in some dark, terrifying prison somewhere before they are taken out before the screaming mobs of people, and hanged.

Yeah. I like that. Seems like the perfect ending to their little spree of mayhem.

You know, it's not too strange why paladins, righteous clerics, wise Rangers, and sharp wizards don't get into these kinds of problems. Whenever you have these kinds of selfish, greedy, evil rogues and mercenaries, this seems to be the result. And it's kinda sad that if there are any other characters in the group that happen to be duped by the evil ones to go along with it, that their kinda dumb wizard, or slower-on-the-punch Ranger gets caught up in it all, and they swing too. Hopefully, this party will make up some new characters, and not only think about their character's morals and motivations, but then proceed to learn from this experience, and think about the consequences to their actions before doing something like this. This is a good way to blow the campaign out the window, you know?

Indeed, it is good that the campaign have a strong, consistent law enforcement, so that the players don't think they can just run rough-shod over everyone in society--like this group did. That way, the law enforcement authority and the society at large has some ability to protect themselves from jackals like this. After all, in a world where there are vampires and dragons to worry about, wolfheads like these can't be given any slack. I can imagine the local fantasy society--like our own in the present day--take a dim view of extortion, robbery, kidnapping, and murder. Get a rope!

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

 

[Wormwood]

I used Robin Hood and company as an example that stealing have been justified through time. Like "Only stealing from the rich". We don't know this thiefs motive.

Wrong. We do know the thief's motives---they were mentioned in the original post.

You are in a group with a rogue that like stealing. She wanders off one night before an adv (to make a lil money)

Motives:
1. The rogue enjoys stealing.
2. The rogue wanted a little money.

Hardly Robin Hood (who is usually portrayed *reclaiming* property unjustly stolen from peasants by corrupt and greedy nobles. In D&D, Robin Hood's 'victims' tend to skew Evil.)

 

[AngelTears]

You are in a group with a rogue that like stealing. She wanders off one night before an adv (to make a lil money) and is caught stealing from a high ranking polit figure. You need to get her out of jail by tomorrow in order to go on your way (and will prolly never come back to this town).

So you kidnap the politician's daughter and hold her ransome. While holding her hostage, she wriggles free from the mouthpiece and starts to scream. You hit her with the back of your sword to subdue her, but crits. the DM rules that you hit her so hard that she is bludgeopned to death.

Puting aside that you now have to deal with the law, but was that act evil? was the kidnapping evil? hitting her to shut her up? and what happens now? The adventure hasn't even started yet and we are in a heap of trouble.

If it were up to me- I would get the hell out of Dodge- and roll up new characters. But one of the players put a lot of work into his- and doesn't want to throw it away....

little help...

I would quantify this as Chaotic stupid. As in making a morally highly questionable situation impossible. The killing of the mayor's daughter, even though it was an accident, was simply a further sealing of their fate.

As for being Evil ( a repugnnant word in my diction), no. Evil (for me) implies premeditated acts, that would be considered foul. Evil would have been torturing the girl, and having one of the characters go too far and accidentally kill her. Instead of accidently getting hit on the head by a pommel in a really confused situation.

I think it is the playercharacters decison what are they going to do now.

-Angel Tears

 

[Bonedagger]

Per the first post, they didn't "trust" the girl at all, she "wriggled free".

My mistake Doesn't change anything though.

[Long story. snip]

So now anarcy is evil?

Hey. As long as the guy who killid the girl see the wrong in his actions and is prepared to make a 'sacrifice' because of it you couldn't call him evil.

 

[Rhialto]

You know I'd just like to state that the whole 'Good and Evil are Absolutes' tends to get overplayed in these arguements. All the rules mean is that there is a point where a person is a decent man, and a point where he's an evil one, and when you cross it this has effects. It does not mean that individual circumstances have no effect on an action's goodness or evilness.

Now no one is saying these people did good. But I'd like to know a little more about this situation before I give a "game" decision. What was the penalty the thief was facing? How old was the daughter? What was the politician like?

Mind you right now, I'd be shifting virtually every Lawful character in the party over to Neutral or Chaotic, no questions about it.

 

[Bonedagger]

Wrong. We do know the thief's motives---they were mentioned in the original post.



Motives:
1. The rogue enjoys stealing.
2. The rogue wanted a little money.

Hardly Robin Hood (who is usually portrayed *reclaiming* property unjustly stolen from peasants by corrupt and greedy nobles. In D&D, Robin Hood's 'victims' tend to skew Evil.) [/B]

Nothing wrong in likeing your 'job'. Robin Hood probably did. He was good at it. We don't KNOW if she has a codex of some kind. I do know that middleage politicians tended to be very rich though As for giving it to the poor. Do the succes of their adventure benefit some greater good?

 

[Tsyr]

My mistake Doesn't change anything though.

So now anarcy is evil?

Hey. As long as the guy who killid the girl see the wrong in his actions and is prepared to make a 'sacrifice' because of it you couldn't call him evil.

You're right. It doesn't change anything. But you're not right in the same way you think.

Anarchy is a concept, neither good nor evil. Anarchy can be used to "explain" evil acts, though, yes.

As well, the example that you sniped was not an example of anarchy. It was an example of anarchists, at best, trying to "justify" their evil act. Though, true anarchists shouldn't feel the need to justify themselves to anyone, so I don't even know that you would call it that.

And, to clarify, speaking for myself, I have never called the person evil. I call the act evil.

It seems that you think that since this is an unlawful act (Which I think we can both agree on), that that is the end of it. I believe that it is also an evil act, regardless of it's position on the law/chaos axis. And this is a -10'er* on both axis.

*a reference to how I track alignment shifts

 

[Bonedagger]

You're right. It doesn't change anything. But you're not right in the same way you think.

Anarchy is a concept, neither good nor evil. Anarchy can be used to "explain" evil acts, though, yes.

As well, the example that you sniped was not an example of anarchy. It was an example of anarchists, at best, trying to "justify" their evil act. Though, true anarchists shouldn't feel the need to justify themselves to anyone, so I don't even know that you would call it that.

And, to clarify, speaking for myself, I have never called the person evil. I call the act evil.

It seems that you think that since this is an unlawful act (Which I think we can both agree on), that that is the end of it. I believe that it is also an evil act, regardless of it's position on the law/chaos axis. And this is a -10'er* on both axis.

*a reference to how I track alignment shifts

Hey. Don't go personally on me now I'm only discussing this in regard to D&D logic.

I was just trying to fit Arcanes story into a D&D world.

Personally I never use concepts like good and evil but thats another story.

All I have tried to do is to fill the gaps in the story and see if there was a chance they didn't act with evil intentions[For the sake of peace I'll edit that to "...see if there was a chance they wasn't evil ]. At this time I would not make a conclusion because I feel I have to many questions. Others may feel differently. That's ok.

[Edit: LOL. Lets just agree that it was a bad thing they did]

 

[bensei]

I have to repeat the question from my previous post:

Why is it important to know if this behaviour was evil?

This is the key question, since the D&D alignment system is a guideline, not an ultimate truth. Technically it is only important for the impact of some divine spells or for some PrCs. All the rest is role-playing.

Behaviour is just a little too complex to be able to classify into a 3x3 matrix,
so why are you trying to do it? Why is it important to classify?

Try to answer this question!