Wolford's page

Maybe you should lighten up a bit.

I'm confused... I thought I was trying to lighten the mood by getting advice for alternate conflict resolution...

I don't see how one event is going to affect their alignment at all.

I kinda agree, once again this is why I was coming for advice and not just go along with what the DM says.

They're not clerics, they won't wield powerful divine spells - there's a limited amount of damage they can really do.

Do you have to be a cleric to call upon the power of the Gods? I know you have to be a cleric to cast divine spells, but gods do interfere/assist mortals who cannot cast from what I have read. Praying at a shrine to a god whose followers we are trying to snuff out can only lead to bad ju-ju.

While it makes sense that good characters would be horribly offended at these yahoos trying to invoke an evil goddess in the raising of their comrades, a bit of berating them is probably all that's really necessary

Fair enough, one of them is as new as I, and the other will not be a pc for much longer so this makes quite a bit of sense.

Trial? I don't recall any courts of law in Thistletop

I never said we were going back to Thistletop... There may be regional laws, or it may even be handled by the laws of Sandpoint as the town is directly tied to the well being of the mission success. If all else fails, frontier justice.

Punishment by drinking booze? Really? If the U.S. government wrote that into law, there wouldn't be enough cops and national guard and army to keep law and order in the land.

Oh geeze, I didn't realize I was playing in the setting of modern United States, I thought the setting was a made up world, glad you corrected me on that :p

Redemption? For trying to save an ally? Consider them already redeemed (their intentions were good)

"The road to hell is paved with good intentions" comes to mind. Save an ally? That's like saying I want to save my dead grandmother by donating to cancer research TODAY, you cannot save a dead person, only bring them back. Why try to bring him back via methods through a evil god instead of being patient and bringing the body back to town and have good ol' father Zantus take a look? Was his hasty idea worth direct confrontation from both a gameplay perspective and a roleplaying perspective? On my end, yes. I will agree your way leaves things a lot less complicated on the forgiveness side of things.

You can't fix their alignment since they didn't do anything wrong enough to fix, and you can't fix their thinking because, as Ron White so frequently says, "you can't fix stupid".

This is apparently a differing opinion between you and my DM, he has in the past made some rather radical moves to add shock value to the pc actions and the consequences so this is not out of character for him. The DM may not be able to "fix stupid", but he can give negative consequences and ways to work past said consequences (learn from your mistakes), and hence why I was asking for opinions on trials.

For one, blasphemy simply means "the act or offense of speaking sacrilegiously about God or sacred things; profane talk." Which in a fantasy setting, blasphemy is talking s@&& about people's gods, not doing bad stuff.

I disagree, to quote your quote:"For one, blasphemy simply means 'THE ACT or offense of speaking...'" The Cavalier ACTED against his religious principles, as he follows Cayden's edicts (not that he couldn't be lying as you cover later with the questioning topic).

Those characters were not religious, so the evil god may have been hoping for a convert, for instance, and given them a blessing if nothing else.

Again, the Cavalier was religious and has openly said it throughout the campaign... and the DM said specifically no additional magic was detected (I had detect magic active)

Why punish the Half-Orc at all? Why divinely punish any of the non-religious characters at all? Have the party sort it out internally.

When did I say the orc got punished? I will pass that tid-bit along regarding the sorcerer.

For instance, put up a Zone of Truth or something better and rigorously question the two characters. Since you incapacitated the characters, have them bound and without any gear. Do they serve the enemy? Have they been in league the whole time? Why were they so eager to make a sacrifice to evil god? Why did they want to kill the rogue twice if he came back evil? Was it part of some plot? Who else was involved? Make it a real grilling and write up questions before hand so you can remember. Take notes of their answers and ask the same questions again in different ways.

And I thought the DM was making things difficult... Again I will pass it along to the party.

The other party members can then have a conference as to whether or not they trust the characters after that and decide whether or not they'll continue to adventure with them or perhaps even turn them over to the authorities. This may waste half a session or more, but it will be the characters responding to the inappropriate character actions, not the players and the GM responding to the inappropriate characters. Keeping it in game helps mollify feelings and gives the players a sense that it's not just the GM being a jerk, or someone picking on a particular character. Further, you get the rest of the group's input, which should definitely matter in a situation like this.

You get an A+. This has given me an A-HA! moment. I did not want a drawn out event as this part of the campaign seems to be coming to an end, "slap a band-aid on the situation and rush to the finish line" if you will, but this point does make a lot of sense.

Because it broke out into inter-party violence, I can't condone just slapping them around and moving along. Player/Character tensions that bad will definitely erupt worse later on and get characters killed and players' feelings very hurt. Possibly a table flip moment.

Preeeeeeeeetty sure we're going to take you advice here. I am partially to blame about said violence, but when his character defiantly ignores what mine has to say and then resists a slumber hex leaves little options, and my LG cleric would not allow something like this to happen to a fallen ally... I think I role played it perfectly, but now have to deal with the consequences.

Thanks all for the input, it gives me a peek into the mind of different gaming groups. If anyone else has something new to add or a different perspective please do :)

Hey all, I recently started playing pathfinder and currently have a cleric of Iomedae in the Rise of the Runelords campaign (first book). Campaign spoiler alert!

My first question is did the dm handle this appropriately? I think this is a satisfactory ruling for the moment while we bring them back to town for resurrection and judgement.

Secondly, what sort of trial should they be put to? For the halfing I would suggest drinking a pint of liquor, as Cayden's displeasure may make him sick when he drinks the alcohol (reference: Gods and Magic). The Sorceror I have no ideas for, as she has not really aligned herself with any god in a roleplaying aspect, so only lawful judgement would seem fitting, or maybe have her fate tied to the halfling.

Lastly, I am faithful to Iomedae's teachings, meaning I believe anyone can be redeemed, but was hoping there might be some good ideas within the mind of the community. What trials might they face to redeem themselves, possibly done as a side quest while the rest of the party finishes off the dungeon?

Any input and experience would be helpful; also, maybe important to note the player for the Cavalier IS a $#!t disturber and will be DM'ing the next part of the campaign.