I happen to agree with Victor on this - one of the PCs attacked him for no other reason than because he is a whinging, self-centered noble in a survival situation that is outside of everyone's comfort zone and control, while the rest stood back and let it happen.
As to handling the situation, even though he's fled for his life, he probably still sees the PCs as the best way to get out of the caverns under the city in one piece. So you have a couple of ways to deal with it:
* He trails the party as they make their way to the surface, walking in their wake and making his way home once he reaches the surface. His low Stealth plus their likely reasonable-to-high Perception scores will mean that they will probably spot him as they are making their way out of the dretch maze or another suitable spot in the caverns.
* When he fled from the PCs, he was captured by a roving band of mongrel men from the exile's lair. Have him be rescue-able by the PCs as he is kept in their kitchen awaiting sacrifice.
In both of these cases if the party confront/rescue him, treat him as immediately unfriendly and levy a maybe -2 circumstance penalty on any attempt to influence him with a Diplomacy check (they did attack him, after all). I would negate the penalty if the PC that attacked makes a sincere apology in amongst the check (and succeeds at an Aid Another check), but I wouldn't negate it either as there would be a high amount of distrust in the PCs and their motives. Unless you have a PC at your table who is stacking Diplomacy out of the nines, it is very unlikely that they will be able to improve his attitude from unfriendly to helpful in time to receive his aid in the Gray Garrison.
If they deliver him to his home, he would still begrudgingly pay their reward to them as promised (a contract is still a contract, and his faith in Abadar wouldn't allow him to do anything less than honor it), but he would then make it abundantly clear that he will not suffer their presence for a moment longer than he has to and forcefully request that they leave him to attend to the shambolic mess that is his house.
In all of this, I'd also probably require them to make a Diplomacy check to ensure that their relationship with Anevia doesn't degrade due to their attacking Horgus. Despite her distaste for the man, attacking someone for acting like a whiny git is not something that a Good-aligned character would stand for, and it would probably make her doubt their ability to treat people fairly. Aravashnial is a bit hit-and-miss, and I likely wouldn't have the PCs make a Diplomacy check to maintain his relationship with the PCs.
I would be pretty disappointed as a GM if my players playing good characters did this. I would expect at least one of the others to step in to defend Horgus regardless of how upsetting his behavior is.
If nobody stepped in I would be pretty harsh about it. I would have him leave, and have them find his corpse somewhere in the city or the tunnels, either slain by mongrels, Millorn or some sort of cave beast. Horgus is extremely ill-equipped to be traveling on his own so if he strikes off from the party his death is the most likely outcome.
From there it should be pretty obvious that the party is missing out on some valuable resources. If they get the other NPC's up to Helpful they will see the benefits they provide and wonder at what Horgus might have given them had they helped him instead of assaulting him. I also might have Anevia be much harder to influence after this incident. She seems too kind hearted and accepting of others to consider that sort of action acceptable, and I would play her as such for some time.
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Yeah, that's disappointing for a (hopefully) good aligned group.
I'd have them find Horgus's body, dead. A messy and horrific death. And then have them find a small group of civilians that Horgus had saved. Let them know that Horgus was one of the good guys, just a grump.
I'd then take delight in under equipping their forces. Mention that other merchants heard about what the players did, and don't trust them. "Obviously the group is just a bunch of meat headed adventurer's. Heroes of the crusade? Ha! Where were they when our business associate and friend Horgus needed them?"
The other NPC's should be a bit put out by them as well. Drop all of their attitudes a step, and make it harder, but not impossible, to get them back up.
Try to play up that this path is supposed to be about playing heroes, and capital "G" good guys, regardless of alignments. Petty cruelties should not be their stock and trade.
However, if it can be eased into a moment of realization, where that bit of petty cruelty is shown to have such far reaching consequences, so as to give the player a chance to direct their character along a more heroic path? That could be the sort of thing that MAKES a capital "G" good guy. But that really depends on how your player will take the events.
Good luck.
I'd seriously consider taking Sprain Ogre's suggestions to heart.
A bunch of "good" PCs that let that happen are not good, they are looking to ride on the easy coattails of being celebrated heroes. Not suffer through moral quandaries or make hard decisions.
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Hey guys,
We are continuing WoTR on the 29th of June, and the player in question is not available (Grrr!). This has caused quite a stir amongst the rest of the group, because of his actions towards Horgus.
As for punishment, I have decided to give the group a chance to find Horgus alive and try to re-rescue him; But they're going to have to really work for it! (Ha Evil Face!) The player in question has had his alignment shifted to Neutral Evil from Neutral Good; And he is going to have to deal with the fallout of his actions, as merchants and others will try to outcast him.
If anyone has any other suggestions about my plan I would be grateful to hear from you before our next gaming session.
Thanks
Yeah I would change him to True Neutral, not Neutral Evil. That's a bit too far, but certainly make Horgus harder to bring around now.
Getting fed up with a moaner and swatting him for non-lethal is NOT cause for an alignment change. It does no lasting damage and is a sign of a short temper, not evil doing.
In the army, they'd call it 'tough love'. It's how you whip pissers and moaners into shape. Having Horgus overreact to getting slugged in the jaw by someone tired of his BS is one thing. Punishing the PC for the NPC overreacting is quite another.
==Aelryinth
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It's probably a bit much to push him all the way to evil. I might not even shift him all the way to true neutral yet (although, considering the circumstances and the results of his action, its a viable consequence!). If he continues down the path, shifting him to evil is certainly apt. Solving with the fist what ought to be solved with the tongue is not the actions of the good and just.
Good luck with it!
C'mon! who doesn't want to beat up Horgus! especially in a high stress situation like the first few parts with him being the dick face he's being!
of course if this guy is always doing it some pent up frustration on your part (and your other players) is understandable,
if possible deal with these types of issues out of character ASAP so they don't fester!
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"It was only one kitten!"
"That orphanage attacked me! I have witnesses!"
Tell me. Would this person attacking and nearly killing a child be an evil act? Would trying to kill an infant be an act switching someone's alignment from Good to Evil?
Why does Horgus allow the benefit of the doubt? Horgus was not a combatant, he's a noble of the town and a law-abiding citizen, and his city was just attacked. Attacking Horgus and nearly killing him just because he was annoying is not the actions of a Good person. The Evil alignment switch, especially given the demonic influences in the city at the moment, is logical and should be done.
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"It was only one kitten!"
"That orphanage attacked me! I have witnesses!"
Tell me. Would this person attacking and nearly killing a child be an evil act? Would trying to kill an infant be an act switching someone's alignment from Good to Evil?
Yes. But child murder and punching someone annoying are hardly equivalent actions, y'know?
Why does Horgus allow the benefit of the doubt? Horgus was not a combatant, he's a noble of the town and a law-abiding citizen, and his city was just attacked. Attacking Horgus and nearly killing him just because he was annoying is not the actions of a Good person. The Evil alignment switch, especially given the demonic influences in the city at the moment, is logical and should be done.
Uh...non-lethal damage isn't 'almost killing him'. It's bad, and likely an Evil act, but personally, I probably wouldn't even do any Alignment change, and all the way from Good to Evil is hideously excessive. Alignment is descriptive, it describes the aggregate of all your actions in your life...if punching a guy is enough to make you Evil, well, you weren't Good to start with, and this guy was, in fact, Good to start with. So...if that one act counterbalanced all the Good he's done (possible, he needn't be very Good) he could wind up Neutral, but Evil? Hardly, not from the one act.
Non-lethal damage is still lethal if it brings someone below 0 hit points. If Horgus was a level 1 Aristocrat, that punch could have killed him. As it is, he's what, level 3? Level 4? It's both a chaotic act, and an evil act. If it happened in peacetime, the character would likely have been jailed for his actions. And the excuse of "he was annoying me" would have gotten him flogged or put to death because it's assaulting a noble.
"It was only one kitten!"
"That orphanage attacked me! I have witnesses!"
Tell me. Would this person attacking and nearly killing a child be an evil act? Would trying to kill an infant be an act switching someone's alignment from Good to Evil?
Why does Horgus allow the benefit of the doubt? Horgus was not a combatant, he's a noble of the town and a law-abiding citizen, and his city was just attacked. Attacking Horgus and nearly killing him just because he was annoying is not the actions of a Good person. The Evil alignment switch, especially given the demonic influences in the city at the moment, is logical and should be done.
One non-lethal act of anger and passion does not make someone evil. It certainly calls their character into question if they can't take a little complaining from a whiny noble (hence my suggestions for a shift from neutral to good, which is not hard to correct back with attonement and repentance), but it does not warrant instantly having the character fall into the realm of evil.
Horgus is not a child, he's a petulant noble. He's an innocent, but he effectively picked the fight. The PC should have been above it, but Horgus does not go without blame so I think an evil shift is too much.
"It was only one kitten!"
"That orphanage attacked me! I have witnesses!"
Tell me. Would this person attacking and nearly killing a child be an evil act? Would trying to kill an infant be an act switching someone's alignment from Good to Evil?
Why does Horgus allow the benefit of the doubt? Horgus was not a combatant, he's a noble of the town and a law-abiding citizen, and his city was just attacked. Attacking Horgus and nearly killing him just because he was annoying is not the actions of a Good person. The Evil alignment switch, especially given the demonic influences in the city at the moment, is logical and should be done.
One non-lethal act of anger and passion does not make someone evil. It certainly calls their character into question if they can't take a little complaining from a whiny noble (hence my suggestions for a shift to neutral from good, which is not hard to correct back with attonement and repentance), but it does not warrant instantly having the character fall into the realm of evil.
Horgus is not a child, he's a petulant noble. He's an innocent, but he effectively picked the fight. The PC should have been above it, but Horgus does not go without blame so I think an evil shift is too much.
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Non-lethal damage is still lethal if it brings someone below 0 hit points. If Horgus was a level 1 Aristocrat, that punch could have killed him. As it is, he's what, level 3? Level 4? It's both a chaotic act, and an evil act. If it happened in peacetime, the character would likely have been jailed for his actions. And the excuse of "he was annoying me" would have gotten him flogged or put to death because it's assaulting a noble.
Uh...non-lethal starts being normal damage when you go over someone's HP. So you'd need to more than double their HP to reduce them to negatives, and even have a possibility of killing them. Horgus has 18 HP, so we're talking something like 10 points of damage, which you're right would potentially kill a 1st level Aristocrat...if people let them bleed to death internally or something. It'd reduce them to negatives, not kill them outright.
And besides, I'm not arguing it wasn't an Evil act, I'm arguing that it wasn't bad enough to shift alignment two steps all on its own. Things have to be really bad to justify that kind of shift.
And the fact that the penalty would've been worse because he's a noble is so utterly irrelevant I'm not sure why you even brought it up.
Because you're all whining "that's too harsh a punishment!" when a death penalty is in fact worse.
Slugging a whining a@%$~$*+ in the jaw to shut him up is a Chaotic act, not an evil one. Cayden Calidean would be cheering up there in his heavenly tavern.
In case you don't remember Crocodile Dundee? Paul Hogan's character effectively did that to the lady's very rich fiancée, in virtually the same kind of situation - he was being a whiny, baiting arse.
Hogar got what he deserved. Having a sore jaw for two hours isn't going to kill him...being stupid and thinking he can survive alone is going to.
==Aelryinth
Disruptive players shouldn't be mollycoddled. And punching out a NPC in a wartime situation when he's not a threat and is just "annoying" is disruptive. If it were an annoying child he punched then you'd be saying "evil act" no doubt. It's Horgus so you're handwaving it away.
No. It doesn't work like that. You want to use alignments? You deal with the consequences and things you dislike about them.
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Disruptive players shouldn't be mollycoddled. And punching out a NPC in a wartime situation when he's not a threat and is just "annoying" is disruptive.
This is, to be blunt, complete b&@%+$@$. 'Disruptive players' violate the OOC social contract of the group, acts IC are incapable of inherently being disruptive without the group finding them inappropriate. This group stood by and watched, so I doubt they felt the act was inappropriate.
And just as importantly, it's inappropriate to penalize a character for the player's acts. You can certainly punish the character for punching Horgus, but punishing them because their player's behavior is inappropriate is seriously bad form. OOC problems should be dealt with OOC. Doing otherwise is poor policy and seriously passive-aggressive to boot.
If it were an annoying child he punched then you'd be saying "evil act" no doubt. It's Horgus so you're handwaving it away.
'Evil Act' and "Your Good character is now Evil." are vastly differewnt things. Is it an Evil act? Yeah, probably (though not very). It's an unwarranted escalation of force due to anger. But is it the kind of thing that instantly shifts you to Evil? No. Hell, hitting a child in that situation wouldn't shift you instantly to Evil either (though it'd come a hell of a lot closer). Instant shifts two alignments on the spectrum are a big deal, we're talking rape or unprovoked murder here, not just punching someone in the face.
No. It doesn't work like that. You want to use alignments? You deal with the consequences and things you dislike about them.
What does this even mean? The GM is the one who decides whether to use Alignment and it's ultimate arbiter. Nobody else necessarily wanted to use it, nor does the GM need to put up with parts of it they don't like.
The GM is the ultimate arbiter. This GM chose to penalize the character by shifting his alignment to evil. This GM also knows what else the player has done that he didn't talk about. I'm defending this GM's right to penalize a player whose character was not acting in a fashion he felt was good-aligned.
Without knowing everything about that game, how can you say the GM is being "unfair" with this alignment call?
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The GM is the ultimate arbiter.
Certainly. That doesn't mean GMs are infallible, though.
This GM chose to penalize the character by shifting his alignment to evil. This GM also knows what else the player has done that he didn't talk about.
So, you're assuming this player did a bunch of other stuff and that's why the GM is justified? That's...not how rational discourse works. You're assuming facts not in evidence. You can't assume that anything like you imply here is going on beyond what the person has actually said or the whole discussion becomes meaningless as we all assume entirely different things and act like they're the objective truth.
I'm defending this GM's right to penalize a player whose character was not acting in a fashion he felt was good-aligned.
You act like I'm attacking him. I'm not. I'm saying, in the spirit of offering advice, which is what the thread asked for, that the particular course of action he suggests is vastly disproportionate to the offense committed and he might want to scale it back a bit. I'm of the opinion that, barring intervening factors we don't know about, doing as he suggests would be a mistake. Advising people so they don't make those is pretty reasonable, I think.
Without knowing everything about that game, how can you say the GM is being "unfair" with this alignment call?
I can say that, based on the evidence we have, his call is excessive (I never used the word unfair). Obviously, the character in question could have murdered small children the OP just didn't tell us about and that would change things...but that's not the situation presented to us. We, not being omniscient, when asked for advice and judgment must rely on the information provided to us. Assuming anything beyond that leads to, well, weirdness and arguments that don't make a lot of sense.
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Hi guys, wow what a response!
Let me just clarify a few things:
The neutral good fighter decided to draw his sword to attack Horgus, he did not declare non-lethal damage until after the attack, when another player suggested it in the hope of the -4 penalty incurred of doing non-lethal damage with a sword would cause the attack to miss.
This suggested to me that lethal intent was there. Also this player has a habit of impulsive stupid acts when things do not go his way!
Also I am using the alignment bar from the background generator from one of the books, and his alignment started at Neutral 4/Good 3, my planned change would take him to Neutral 4/Evil 7. Maybe I should change to Neutral 4/Neutral 6 instead, just on the border of Evil?
I am an experienced DM, but this is my first AP, and I am taking all of your comments into consideration, so please feel free to continue giving me aid.
Thanks all
All the way to evil is completely justified. This is the beginning of the adventure path, so the player has only been playing this character for a couple of scenes by this point. This isn't a single evil act after a long campaign of good - this is one of the first choices that player has been able to make that demonstrate how he really thinks his character behaves.
An even better thing might be to talk to the player before his next session. Tell him you're on the fence between Neutral 4/Neutral 6 and Neutral 4/Evil 7. Tell him you're leaning toward Evil. (This is important, as it puts the pressure on the player, and emphasizes your distaste for his actions.) Then say that you're unsure, because when one of the other players suggested non-lethal, he retconned his attack to non-lethal.
Tell him he has the opportunity to convince you, and ask what he thinks. If he (the player) shows remorse for his choice, and says things indicating his character is going to try harder for Good, then you can ease it back to Neutral 4/Neutral 6. If he gets defensive or shows no indication of modifying this behavior, say you're taking this act as "typical" of his PC, and set him to Neutral 4/Evil 7. And let NPCs react to him accordingly.
(I have a player in my group who is prone to impulsive acts. She truly thinks she plays good characters, but the group concensus is usually that she is evil. I make heavy use of the "Are you sure you want to do that?" and it only occasionally makes her stop and think things through. Sigh.)
EDIT: Thinking this through some more, one cautionary thought. Would labeling his character as Evil at this point just encourage him to play "EEEEEVIL"? Because if so, an alignment shift might just make things worse. You know your player, you're the only one who can decide this. If it might cause more acting-out, you may do better to reduce the alignment shift, and just stick with having NPCs react differently to different party members (and being much less willing to work with them without hefty convincing) to communicate the seriousness of what happened.
That's a fallacious argument. You're assuming players can roleplay an alignment they may have arbitrarily chosen but aren't effective at RPing. I mean, one of the reasons for so many Awful Good Paladins over the years is the inability of those players to run an effective lawful good character.
The person may have the mindset of Chaotic Neutral, but said "I'm going to do Neutral Good because hey, demons!" That player may continue through the entire campaign run this character as a Chaotic Neutral, despite being Neutral Good on the sheet and his character background. And while you could say "the demonic invasion drove him off the deep end" that still sounds like an immediate and lasting alignment change, no matter what the character background.
Given his use of a numeric alignment scale, the four-point shift is not unreasonable. It's from borderline-good to borderline-evil. And the GM also stated he's going to determine if it's a three- or four-point shift depending on how the player reacts to being told about the alignment shift and why.
Amusingly enough, while I barely use alignments in my campaigns, one of my players and I have been quite amused at the gradual reformation of one of the characters. He was a diehard Chaotic Neutral when the game started. But he's also the one who initiated "Averta's Cut" (Averta being a minor goddess that the cleric of the group worships), the Orphanage, the benefits of the Bank... and basically actually being increasingly decent.
I've even included little bits of humorous rants from Tongs on the forums in the past (including when he found half of Turtleback Ferry had the Sihedron tattoo, going on a rant saying "There's more to life than just drinking, gambling and wenching... oh god, what did I just say? I need to lie down now..." ^^).
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Hey everyone,
I want to thank you all for your feedback, it has given me a lot to think about. As I said we are planning to continue WoTR of the 29th of this month, and my problem player is not attending, so hopefully there should be no major problems.
I will post again after our session to keep you updated, so until then massive thanks again.