Would you allow this paladin in your game? (new fiction added 11/11/08)

[Mallus]

Don't you think it might be fun to try?

It might, rabbit, it might...

I think the point I was trying to make when I posted that was (and that was long time ago) was that I don't treat historical simulation lightly. It's extraordinarily difficult to unlearn all your cultural learning and attempt to see things from a different point of view. In fact, its more or less impossible. Too much goes into the shaping of a person's worldview. The best we can hope for is a kind of faux objectivity; a neutral space in which we promise to play nice and put away our more blatant prejudices.

So while I think it would be fun to try and immerse oneself in a radically different worldview, I also think that its a fool's errand. More trouble than its worth.

I think that the occasional nod towards the trapping of a given historical period works just fine...

 

[ZuulMoG]

Outlawing it doesn't make it wrong, either.

It's already wrong, don't need a law to make it so. Coercing sex out of someone by any means, be it force, finance, or blackmail, is wrong. I don't need a law to tell me that, it's as obvious as night and day; or, dare I say it (Oh Dare! Dare!!), black and white?

Paladins are the champions not merely of law, but of goodness. Both at once. Unjust laws they throw down and defeat the tyrants that seek to uphold them. Chaotic rampagers claiming to act on behalf of goodness are brought in to face the law (and meanwhile the paladin goes back out and smites the you-know-what out of whoever it was that inspired all that vigilantiism in the first place).

It's not an easy life, and it's not supposed to be. Paladins are modelled after the Knights Templar and Hospitaller, groups that were exterminated to a man by tyrants, IIRC.

 

[Mallus]

Coercing sex out of someone by any means, be it force, finance, or blackmail, is wrong.

.
Since when is a financial transaction automatically coercive? And I ask this as a Socialist...

Unjust laws they throw down and defeat the tyrants that seek to uphold them.

I've said this before in this thread, but hey, I'll say it again... Feudal aristocracies are fundementally unjust (it has something to do with the practice of giving a small percentage of their populations more rights than the rest based on their bloodlines). So why aren't paladins under the onus to overthrow every kingdom they run across?

Whoring is bad, but tacit approval of the brutal injustices found in Medieval fuedalism is okay?

 

[ZuulMoG]

Put the kettle on ma, this could go awhile...

Since when is a financial transaction automatically coercive? And I ask this as a Socialist...

Girls do not tell their guidance counsellors that they want to be hos when they grow up. Prostitution is a last resort caused by desperation, not a career choice. Making it a profitable enterprise is a form of coercion, as it erodes resistance to the concept by dangling money (a neccessity in most economies) as an enticement.

Feudal aristocracies are fundementally unjust (it has something to do with the practice of giving a small percentage of their populations more rights than the rest based on their bloodlines). So why aren't paladins under the onus to overthrow every kingdom they run across?

Firstly, your point about feudalism being inherently unjust applies equally to every form of government. There is no just human government, someone always gets left holding the short straw.

That said, paladins are under the onus to overthrow tyrants (IE the Lawful Evil who use law as a weapon against the people), but a just and wise ruler who nonetheless labors under the same unfair system as other rulers can still manage to rule in peace and mercy. Why overthrow a good king or lord? Because the system made them king or lord without input from the ruled? How does that affect their goodness and wisdom?

A paladin must perform a delicate balancing act every day: he must serve the common good without destroying law and order, and uphold the law without allowing evil to hide behind its letters. A whoring, hard-drinking, ass-kicker is not cut out for the role of paladin.

 

[Jeremy Ackerman-Yost]

I can't believe how contentious this thread still manages to become.

Nice monster you created, Shilsen

It's not an easy life, and it's not supposed to be. Paladins are modelled after the Knights Templar and Hospitaller, groups that were exterminated to a man by tyrants, IIRC.

They were also exceedingly mystic groups, with rituals that broke far enough from the Christian faith to make them easily demonized.

They were also hoarding priceless treasures and artifacts that they lawlessly looted and then refused to turn over to the Church, which theoretically had authority over the knightly orders.

Some things may be, as you contend, black & white, but the Templars and Hospitalers are NOT among them.

Girls do not tell their guidance counsellors that they want to be hos when they grow up. Prostitution is a last resort caused by desperation, not a career choice. Making it a profitable enterprise is a form of coercion, as it erodes resistance to the concept by dangling money (a neccessity in most economies) as an enticement.

It has been said before in this thread, and will probably be said again.

Your point here is false. For some women, it IS a choice. These may be in the minority, but they certainly exist.

What is more demeaning to them, their chosen profession or your insistence that they must be desperate, broken people to choose it?

 

[Agback]

Girls do not tell their guidance counsellors that they want to be hos when they grow up.

No. But then, I never told any careers guidance counsellor that I want to be an economist. I was financially coerced into it.

Prostitution is a last resort caused by desperation, not a career choice.

So is picking fruit or washing dishes. They aren't morally wrong either.

 

[shilsen]

I can't believe how contentious this thread still manages to become.

Nice monster you created, Shilsen

I know. Owlbears are easy. Monster paladin threads that are undead and have regeneration - now that takes some doing

 

[Mulengro]

An interesting concept should never be barred due to rules. The "Rules" are in place to help tell a story, not bog it down in debate.
Besides, Paladin's are always good targets.
- Looks at the mob on his left
- Looks at the mob on his right
- Throws the rock, and prepares a hasty escape.

 

[iwatt]

And it rises from it's grave once again.

Your mojo is powerful, Shilsen

 

[Falkus]

Girls do not tell their guidance counsellors that they want to be hos when they grow up. Prostitution is a last resort caused by desperation, not a career choice. Making it a profitable enterprise is a form of coercion, as it erodes resistance to the concept by dangling money (a neccessity in most economies) as an enticement.

Ever watch Firefly?