Cleric alignment review / analysis (should I / how should punish this cleric -continuation)


Pathfinder First Edition General Discussion


Super long post! These are the minutes from the last gaming session as requested by a previous posters (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2tn01?Should-I-How-should-I-punish-this-cleric ). Please be aware there are minor spoilers but nothing that would ruin a module or anything. For context, you'll need to know that

:
both the Night Peddler NP and Tick tock man TTM are LE and thus I played them as reasonable but evil. Additionally, you'll need to know that the ant queen has sent them out to recover her grubs and stop them from being stolen by these to evil folks in the future by means to be determined by the PC's. Each main NPC has a token the PC's need.
(and that I put little side notes in parentheses) Out of character speech is prefaced by X-player said "" while in character speech is just denoted as X-said "". somewhat pointless text is italicized

Night one- The Night Peddler allowed the Cleric and Paladin to rest while cuffed. Prophetic dreams ensued; Cleric was visited in his dreams by a messenger of Sarenrae who expressed concern for his actions and asked him to return to the light and do good works. Moments later he was visited again in dream form by a demon that tempted him with power from Asmodeus. Rogue-Player blacked out and had her first werewolf transformation. Rogue-Player realized what happened in the morning and why - then decided to conceal those facts and snuck back into camp to uncuff slaves. 5 Slaves died in the night due to her rampage.

Day 1- The party, being the only variable introduce and clearly responsible for the missing merchandise, was charged for the cost. Cleric's alignment was shifted to True Neutral due to his previous actions. The Cleric and Paladin was uncuffed and let loose under the condition they pay their bill before leaving camp.
Rogue-Player successfully got one set of cuffs unlocked.
The next attempted unlocking was a natural 1 and this resulted in a slip that stabbed the slave with the lock pick for 6 points. This resulted in a yelp which alerted a guard – the rogue left until things died down.
Rogue-Player got another 8 successes and another 1, again stabbing someone but this time for 4 points, yelped again, guard took notice of similar injuries and reported this to the NP.

Cleric went into the sunlight and prayed for his spells, "star light star bright, god bless, magic circle against evil, prayer, firewall, fireball, remove fear, doom, protection from energy dispel evil." Cleric-Player " ... it comes out as a rap when I do it." – and danced in the sun.
Paladin unilaterally decided to buy the freedom of all the slaves, cleaning out the party loot (he had the bag and wasn’t being watched) - getting an especially good deal on cleric vestments and a holy symbol of Asmodeus because the NP was interested in founding a religious form of control due to the previous conversation with the Cleric.
There was a large commotion as the slaves were gathered, told they’d been purchased and we’re being let free. The Paladin spoke with the leader of the rebellion who thanked him and was surprised by his altruism and ability to gain their freedom bloodlessly. The NP lowered his price -in grubs- for his token, because he was rather pleased at the recent large deal. Cleric-Player said “Well now we got to kill these guys!” (presumably to recover the party loot sold – clarified slightly by a comment later)
Rogue went to heal the injured with salve and Cleric-Player said, “noooo – don’t waste the salve!”. The Cleric then channeled energy to heal the injured slaves instead.
Cleric-Player said, “The NP has to die, so the antqueen will give us her gem.” He then continued and explained how the Tick Tock Man should be compared to the NP and whichever is a bigger dick they should kill that one. When asked for clarification if his Character felt that way or if this was table talk, The Cleric then officially signed off on the message "we should compare the tick-tock man to the NP character and whichever was a greater dick should be killed." When warned this was essentially advocating murder he smiled and said" no, this will be a holy war" Cleric-Player, then recanted briefly and said, “well first let’s meet the tick tock man - we don’t necessarily need to kill him.”
When told the cost of buying the slaves (most the party loot) freedom Cleric-Player said “Well now we should kill the guy just to get the money back!" and berated the paladin for being inefficient with money.

They asked Jacob (an NPC) to guide them back to the briar (where they’d been) and point them in the right direction (to where they wanted to go but hadn’t been), 2 nights later werewolf transformation #2 occurred and 6 more slaves were lost (time flows weirdly here, style choice, don’t bust my chops). They reached the briar’s edge and set out for the smith’s caldera (the new location).
-Day 3-
Their insults failed to deter the caldera citizens who treat the visitors to a rockslide trap.

They took some damage, Cleric channeled energy to heal, Paladin spoke to the Citizens for a moment not gathering anything useful (information). Rogue tried to sneak invisibly up the mountain but ultimately failed to find alternate routes. Paladin charged into a rest area and met the ill-tempered cyclops bartender.

The party tried to find a way around the angry bar cyclops, to no avail, but eventually made a side route by stone shaping a whole into an adjacent chamber. They met a fire giant variant and dealt with his insults. (He was not happy about his lot in life) Paladin and Rogue suggested helping him, they consulted the cleric who pawed through his spells and didn’t find the situation solving spell (stone to flesh). The party then attempted to get the bartender's aid / search the area for something to cure him - to no avail. The bartender tried to bounce them due to them essentially lacking the requisite cover charge, a fight ensued, the Paladin did some considerable damage and the bartender acquiesced and gave a key to the next area, after that they went to visit the Tick Tock Man.

While talking to Paladin and Cleric, Rogue snuck about stealing things, got caught, aggravated the situation - The TTM drew his sword trying to find Rogue, he went invisible and used his quicken suggestions (“It’s getting dangerous here, you should leave and not come back.”) to try to get people to leave, Cleric and Paladin resisted but Rogue failed and then fled but not before getting a shot off.. Paladin used his abilities to do nonlethal damage, Cleric went for straight lethal damage. The TTM got a 1 and fell prone, prompting Cleric to say, "co-operate with us or uh, we'll kill you, by the edge of the scimitar." A few boring damaging combat rounds later the TTM turned invisible again and ran for it.
Then, Cleric-Player said, after he was out of the immediate vicinity, "I kind of have half a mind to wreck all of his shit buuuut nah, let’s get him! .........subdue him."
They pursued him to the bar where the TTM raised a clamor among the npcs and healed up a bit whilst invisible. Paladin tried to talk him down but the TTM claimed that the PC-party were aggressors that came in smashing and stealing stuff, attempting to go for the throat with the Paladin as the lone exception. Paladin argued that he can't control the individual actions of party members, only his own.
– Tabled the game there for the evening-


...hmmmmmmm. Well, it does sound like the cleric-player took the hint, and but it does look like he is starting to consider moving over to Asmodeus, base don his actions.

Good to hear that everyone had fun!


Hmmmm . . . . The "Mandalorian Wars" effect is taking hold. Impulse control (particularly those that run counter to professed ideals) is good roleplaying/characterization, and conflict is great for storytelling. I hope you and your party/group keep a good narrative going.


I remember this from the other thread. The cleric is definitely playing his character not as any good alignment but as a chaotic neutral inching towards true evil. You should inform the player of what his cleric's actions are going towards.

Shadow Lodge

Warning and alignment shift seem like enough for now, especially since Sarenrae is the type to give second chances to straying followers.

However I would definitely be prepared for the cleric to fall in the future, probably requiring shifting allegiance to a new deity.

I would also keep in mind the potential conflict with the paladin. While it is possible for a paladin to adventure with an evil party member it can be difficult to roleplay and the player was probably not anticipating the cleric's alignment shift. The paladin's player seems to be doing OK for now, but if the cleric actually hits evil (and especially if the cleric starts worshipping an evil deity) it's going to increase the strain.


I recommend talking to the cleric's player and seeing where he see his character going.

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