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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Aurondarklord" data-source="post: 6042017" data-attributes="member: 6667464">As I've said before, I don't believe circumstances can MAKE a person evil, I don't believe a valid moral system can exist where a person is evil no matter what they do.  faced with two horrible choices, a good person who makes the less horrible choice for the right reasons (mainly "because it's less horrible") is still good.  So I do not accept "fall or fall", but this is a question of personal views on morality and I don't think either of us could prove the other objectively right or wrong.  I mean, the human species has been debating the nature of morality since we were doing it in grunts.I will acknowledge that "commit no evil acts AT ALL" is a higher standard, you're right, but it's a specific higher standard, it does not impose or imply a general higher standard.  what I mean is:Average LG person: mostly commits lawful and good acts, occasionally may commit a neutral, evil, or chaotic act.Paladin as I believe the class to be written: mostly commits lawful and good acts, occasionally may commit a neutral or chaotic act, may never commit an evil act.Paladin as some people seem to believe the class to be written: must commit only lawful and good acts, may never commit neutral, chaotic, or evil acts.Plus, of course, the specific mandates and prohibitions also listed in the code, but I consider them additional standards, not a general higher standard.The resign from service question isn't always as simple as a tyrannical government.  Sometimes a just, legitimate, even elected government does things, and asks its operatives to do things, that may offend the code of a paladin.I grant you, within the setting of D&D, good, evil, law, and chaos have some form of actual objective substance, that much is true.  but by default, divine magic characters are assumed to follow gods, hence the art in sourcebooks almost always shows them with holy symbols, hence rules tend to be written assuming a god first and then addressing the exception of a divine magic character who follows an ideal, etc.  Yes, D&D explicitly provides rules for running such characters without Gods, but it treats Gods as the default.vow of poverty =/= saint template, if I remember correctly, you have to have a couple sacred vow feats to be a saint, but I don't happen to have my books on hand to consult either, aftermath of hurricane Sandy, I can only get internet at a library, but you can pick which ones, so no particular sacred vow feat is part and parcel of the saint template.  So...excluding specific rules covered by individual sacred vows, where is the line between paladin and saint?  is it just as simple as the saint gets no "down time" and must be on the clock 24/7?  Some people who've posted in this thread seem to expect that of Cedric anyway...As for the question of "gross violation" meaning willing violation, while unintentional or unwilling violations are considered minor, I would say this is suggested not to be the case by the way the atonement spell is written.  Specifically, that if a cleric atones a paladin (or other class that has violated a code of conduct) who committed the violation unwillingly or unknowingly, they can do so for free, but if it was an intentional violation, the cleric must pay 500XP.  This suggests that an unwilling "gross violation" can occur, which suggests the intent of the designers was not to conflate "gross" with "intentional", so "gross" must have a different meaning...I would posit the meaning I've given to it.  Now personally, believing the way I believe about moral catch 22s, I find the idea that a paladin can lose class abilities for something they did as a result of magical compulsion laughable, but I accept it as part of the RAW.As for Cedric getting upset with Magnus...Magnus is not his superior, as far as I can tell, Magnus is a novice or at least "still kinda green" member of the church, inferior to Cedric within the hierarchy.  So Cedric did not disrespect legitimate authority, Magnus does not have authority over him.  Cedric became gruff with an inferior for disrespecting...in this case unfairly judging...him.  Does this maybe cast Cedric as a bit arrogant or short tempered?  Yes.  But, "Good is not NICE, POLITE, WELL MANNERED, self-righteous, or naive".  And further fiction seems to suggest that Cedric was less losing his temper with Magnus than teaching him a needed lesson.  Perhaps Cedric could have handled that situation better, he's not a perfect person, clearly.  But I do not see that instance by itself as grounds for falling, it was simply not severe enough.  At worst it was an isolated minor chaotic act, in that he momentarily broke self control and acted temperamentally.</blockquote>

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