This is on the Golarion gnomes, their hatred of lizardfolk/troglodytes and the alignment neutral good. You might see where this is going.
So a new character entered a group I am dming. At first he was playing the comedic relief as a druid with a medium mushroom companion (in one dragon magazine, it's all above board). He plays a whimsical character, curious and all that. The party need supplies to survive winter, they find a tower, troglodytes are in residence. Fighting starts and soon the Gnome is acting quite peculiar. Now I have said to him, what he has done is not neutral good, but he insists, no, he is protected by his racial hatred and what he has done is good, by his (relativist sigh) definition.
So I'll go through some of the surprising actions.
1) Strong angry racist remarks towards trogs and immediate hostility.
2) This hostility was not open to pacification from the bard, or even considering it. The neutral good bard really tried to persuade everyone we don't have to kill them all.
3) Leads the charge, even getting in the way of melee chars so he can do damage.
4) When the morale of some troglodytes breaks and two surrender, he proceeds to attack and cause his companion to attack the cowering surrendering hostages.
5) As the bard tries to protect and block the attacks against the hostages, the gnome gives the order to attack through the bard. The bard is incapacitated and one trog still killed, the other flees into another combat and is killed by accident.
6) He defends his actions on racist grounds, that all trogs are evil by their very nature.
7) He uses intimidation to solve a party dispute over healing, while the party are under siege from the now very very angry troglodytes. He sides with one pc over another npc, both of whom are extremely injured. Threats are used.
War crimes as neutral good. I ask him what alignment he is again? He says neutral good. I point out he is clearly not neutral good and the argument later continued.
So! What do ye all think?
I don't have Gnomes of Golarion, but what's wrong with Lizardfolks?
If some backstory on the gnomish hatred of scalykind—that involves linnorms and jabberwocks— does not already exist, it should.
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His actions were not good. At all. I mean, they weren't even CLOSE. And no, you can't hide behind racism to defend your claims.
However, it's also okay for a character to be flawed. Maybe his gnome IS a racist against lizardfolk, but is also generally a good person. It's a flaw in his personality, and a terrible thing, but it doesn't necessarily make him evil.
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What is the point of arguing with the player about this?
Why don`t you just rule that this shifts his allignment (or moves closer to doing so) however you view it? You`re the GM, not the player,
and YOU, NOT the player decide how everything fits into the game world`s moral cosmology.
As far as I can tell, you really only see an issue on the Good/Evil axis, so this doesn`t affect his Class Abilities at all.
I don`t even know why it is necessary to TELL him about this change, which could only engender meta-gaming.
The only thing it affects for him, is aligment-dependent effects of spells/abilities, and Detect Alignment.
If following his characters personality, which can include racial hatred and take-no-prisoners attitude, leads to a different alignment,
then what`s the problem? He was playing his character`s personality as he described it to you.
I think the way you dealt with it with the player has and will make it more of a problem than if you just tracked all player`s alignment drifts on an on-going basis. Many characters can easily shift alignment, especially from how they see themselves. That`s a pretty realistic situation, characters who see themselves differently from actual reality. Why don`t you just go with it then?
NOTE: if other-wise he is exemplarily Neutral Good, this one thing probably wouldn`t shift him to Neutral Evil. You have to judge this of course, but simply a shift to True Neutral could be what is called for. Or maybe he is SO good the rest of the time, that it isn`t even enough for a shift to True Neutral, but he is just shifted `closer` to there without crossing the line.
For classes with alignment restrictions, I would generally communicate with the player when their aligment is shifting towards a barred alignment, because presumably they would be aware that their source of power (deity, nature, etc) isn`t liking their latest moral orientation and it would feel progressively more difficult when communing with that source or using their alignment-linked abilities (same for monks), with no mechanical effect until the actual alignment is illegal, but they would feel they are getting farther away from where they should be. Some acts could be enough to shift aligment all in one go, but most wouldn`t.
Again, it doesn`t sound like this event has anything in conflict with Neutral Alignment, it`s not really Chaotic or Lawful, and it sounds like his character would act like this whenever he encountered Lizardfolk. I mean, this sounds like pretty shallow role-playing if the entire basis of this is `gnome racial hatred trait`, but whatever, if that`s his crutch let him use it.
Personally, I don`t think it`s important or valuable for players to write down alignments on their character sheets, as that is just a distraction from playing a personality. Play the personality wherever it takes you is what is the most important in my book. Obviously, Paladsins will KNOW their alignment is Lawful Good or not by their powers working, and others may know they are within `legal alignment range`, but other than that? Doesn`t matter. I guess the party can play `detect alignment` games around the campfire, but who really cares enough about that in the first place? Not most characters, just meta-gaming players, perhaps who just have the idea that they shouldn`t be Evil Alignment, independent of their characters` actions.
To be clear for Seldriss, gnomes in golarion have a hatred of lizardfolk and goblins. They get a small bonus against them. The problem is, if you run with it, and they encounter lizardfolk/trogs/goblins and treat them really badly, it makes a neutral good alignment a bit difficult to justify. True good does not mean, true good, except against my racial enemies, then I am xenophobic slayer whom kills the cowering defeated enemies and intimidates the arguing into line.
Thanks for the replies. Yes I too don't think it was even close to good. Hiding behind racism is a questionable justification for being good. On flaws, I like flaws, I want all my characters to be flawed in some way. I even have a flaw system I use.
Quandary, you do have some good suggestions. The alignment may indeed move off what is acceptable for a druid. As a dm, I do tell the players when they start acting... chaotic evil, when they are meant to be neutral good. If I just took his druid abilities away without some notice, he would also chuck a giant s~#@. Perhaps though I just will keep track of it. He hasn't been otherwise exemplary neutral good, he has been odd and a little helpful.
Dum de dum *scribbles a note*.
I don`t even know why it is necessary to TELL him about this change, which could only engender meta-gaming.
The only thing it affects for him, is aligment-dependent effects of spells/abilities, and Detect Alignment.
I agree with most of what you say here Q, except this. Don't wait till it "comes up" to let the player know his actions have changed his alignment. That will only lead to conflict.
Instead, take the time to explain to the player at some remove from the events that alignment is meant to describe a PC's personality, not restrict it, and that you feel a different alignment better describes his behavior. Don't stigmatize his actions when explaining this, I wouldn't enjoy that as a player.
Alignment can be divisive, but as long as you make certain that your first priority is to all the players enjoying the game, you'll make the right call. Try to avoid any ulterior motives or reactionary rulings about alignment based on your feeling toward the individual player, and focus on using alignment to describe the PC's actions.
Thanks.
Actually I checked in the PFRPG CoreBook and it mentions just reptilian and goblinoid subtypes.
I was just surprised as lizardmen - huh, lizardfolks - are rarely portraited as enemies. But nevermind.
Lizardfolk and troglodytes are reptilian humanoids. Yeah I had forgotten about it till recently too.
Well Lincoln, that sounds wise.
The aim of fun is also relevant. Because the player enjoys playing a racist violent druid, to vent steam no doubt. He doesn't enjoy a dm pointing out their alignment is not in accordance with their actions.
Right... I think the crux here is the player`s concept that the Racial Hatred trait makes all his actions vs. Lizard-folk morally neutral. That`s absurd, since Devils could flay and torture as many Humans they want to without being Evil if Humans were a Racial Hatred target. (and what about Ranger Favored Enemy`s? that is mechanically identical, and you can choose species that your race or people historically `hate`)
SO... if your species has a `racial hatred` which really only means you are good at fighting these creatures (there is nothing forcing you to act hostile, or impeding diplomacy, for example), what does that mean for individual gnomes? Well, evil gnomes could use it as a basis for direct hostilities. Neutral gnomes... they are still neutral, but perhaps they could justify a `shorter fuse` vs. Lizardfolk... and if a Gnome is so Good in other areas, they can be fairly Evil in one specific area while being Neutral over-all. What about Good gnomes? They are aware there is historic conflict between these two races, and they can even believe that Lizardfolk are usually in the wrong, but they aren`t going to go out of their way to harm Lizardfolk that they don`t need to, i.e. aren`t presenting a danger, etc... that wouldn`t be a Good type of thing.
Of course, people can be conflicted, and act Good in some areas but not in others, which is a more realistic way of role-playing things. I don`t see how it`s problematic to have a Lizardfolk-hating Gnome PC, but I wouldn`t pretend it has no moral consequences, alignment-wise. That would trivialize the whole subject.
To me, I wouldn`t class this episode as Chaotic Evil, since it sounds like the character would normally act like this, and sees it as normal, i.e. a conflict between species. It seems plausible that the character could fit this conflict into their normal belief system, just like other characters could kill a certain pest species on sight (there`s a species of tropical fish that eats other fish` eggs, and thus is bad for the whole eco-system. maybe a `druid` may not seek the complete obliteration of this species, but killing it when possible could be a `good` thing in their eyes)
If you want to get the player to think some more, perhaps ask them under what circumstances they WOULDN`T kill Lizardfolk? Maybe this situation had enough latent conflict that they instantly went into combat mode, but what if there were Lizardfolk that could be seen to be doing Good acts? What if there were Good Lizardfolk getting along with other Gnomes, etc? Maybe the player won`t bite for that, and maybe they want to view it as a racially-programmed war vs. Lizardfolk... which is OK, but unless they are REALLY REALLY good in all other areas, I don`t think they will count as `Good` over-all.
EDIT: And I don`t think I disagree with EvilLincoln on this, player can have preconceptions about alignment such that `springing` changes on them (if only NPC`s spells showing them as Evil, etc, not Class Abilities disappearing or faltering) wouldn`t feel like `fair play`. This is why just telling EVERYBODY up-front `you can erase your alignment from your character sheet, I as GM track that, so you can feel free to play your characters` personality. if your alignment is shifting in a way that could cause problems with your class abilities, you will usually have warning of that before it happens, unless you do some huge alignment shifting act`.
On the main command being fun, it is difficult to make it all fun all the time.
Yeah I make interesting dungeons, npcs with flavour, describe regions, cultures, attitudes the weather, the sense of victory and accomplishment, how the enemies act to build more tension. Again and again though, I do come across players having moments of despair, or sadness or bitterness. If a player gets killed by a trap, they are bitter. If a player is penalised say from curses, sickness, failed fort saves they can certainly be quiet and resentful. This medium pulls on a lot of emotions, and sometimes, players are very moody.
I'm not sure we can and should run by the fun command. We create entertainment, and that can draw out more emotions that just, ah that was fun, I want to go on the ride again. Some of the best moments I've had in game haven't just been fun, but other moments, like surprise, bafflement, seeing something bigger or true through a game.
Last session, we laughed till our throats were sore, the stairway fighting was insane, so many natural 1s from the enemies. But one player, a bit of a moody chap, and that is what I mean by you can't always run a fun game for everybody, became very disheartened and quiet towards the end, because he was fatigued from doing fighting and labour, and he was sickened because of the troglodytes. So he sort of kept back, almost killed himself with a variant fly potion, finally came into the last fight.
People can be fickle, and if you do point out something as simple as, your actions are not the same as your alignment, they can start to whinge, whinge, whinge. I don't actually game with 10 year olds, despite how it may appear (average age is 23).
Emo kids these days. :P
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I'm not seeing the Chaos aspect, but I'm definitely seeing the evil.
My advice would be to let him know that roleplaying the racial hatred is fine. Yes he hates lizardfolk. Yes he fights them vigorously when the situation comes up. He's likely to be rude, and be hesitant to believe that you can have nonviolent solutions, in situations where its questionable. I can see him barking racial slurs at them in combat, and I can see him even spitting in the faces of lizardfolk prisoners.
HOWEVER
His racism is not an area where alignment does not apply. If the lizardfolk could have been dealt with without killing them if he had not attacked them, or if he kills prisoners, or is killing them in other situations when it isn't self defense or defending his friends, that is in fact Murder, and Murder is an evil act.
Committing murder on one occasion may not slide the scale toward evil, but the more he murders anyone, the less good he is.
From what you are describing, he currently sounds like he is playing both a true neutral or neutral good character, AND a neutral evil character. Perhaps he is a schizophrenic, or has Disassociative Personality disorder (from your description I'd guess the former.)
If he were in my game, I'd peg him as neutral, on his way to neutral evil. I'd let him know that's how his character has been acting, and while I'm fine with it, he should be aware, if thats how he's going to play the character, that's the alignment his character will have. It may get awkward if the paladin uses detect evil and he starts to light up like an xmas tree.
He's not acting CE, so I cant see him losing his class abilities, but there may be in-game repercussions from his evil acts; even if those repercussions are just where he goes when he dies and whether or not magic against evil works on him.
Full disclosure: I hate `country music` but to this date I have managed to keep my violent urges under control. 8-P
Yes, there is nothing forcing the gnome to act evil and xenophobic. He has the training, he knows what has happened, but his wisdom does not override his racism in this instance. I liked the 3.5 druid description, where it talks about a certain requirement of dissociation and low passion to accord with the neutrality and lack of caring in nature. Nature does not get s@~#ty towards troglodytes, they are a part of the darklands eco-system. Relaxed, sedate, knowing, not quite so radical and lets hack their heads off. That is the player role-playing themselves not the character, oh noes META>
"If you want to get the player to think some more, perhaps ask them under what circumstances they WOULDN`T kill Lizardfolk? Maybe this situation had enough latent conflict that they instantly went into combat mode, but what if there were Lizardfolk that could be seen to be doing Good acts? What if there were Good Lizardfolk getting along with other Gnomes, etc? Maybe the player won`t bite for that, and maybe they want to view it as a racially-programmed war vs. Lizardfolk... which is OK, but unless they are REALLY REALLY good in all other areas, I don`t think they will count as `Good` over-all."
This I like quite a bit.
To add more info, they actually got repulsed from the tower once, and had to rest and recover. The bard tried to talk to the druid about why do we have to kill them all again? The druid just went into full nazi mode. Refused to listen, discuss it, they are bad they should all be killed. Even a slow flute song with the sort of why do we fight, it only leads to despair tune, did nothing. He refused to budge.
Taking the position that war is inevitable with a sentient species, and that we can never come to peace, that is extremely un-wise and without much thought or questioning.
I am not such a relativist that I want to remove the alignment system. I actually think it does stand for some very significant positions people hold. Yes, sometimes people think they are good when they are clearly doing evil.
All this discussion of racism reminds me:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JdAlYF67r9E&feature=related
Full disclosure: I used to hate country music. But then I gave it a go, found some songs I liked, and didn't kill every troglodyte in my path.
I would also bring up the idea that there are Good, Neutral, and Evil Gnomes. (those are just the crude categories)
So within Gnome society, there would certainly be a range of opinion on the proper way to deal with Lizardfolk.
I belive the default alignment for Gnomes is merely N, so if you are Good, you would be on the good side of `common gnome opinion`.
I find that Paizo`s Golarion is pretty upfront about Good being a somewhat minority, it is not just `the good races are mostly good`, there are very very few mortal `good races`, and good always must struggle up-hill. That to some extent removes the moral superiority `good genocides the evil green races`. Of course, the `green races` are still broadly Evil in Golarion, but staking out a way to be Good in that world is still a challenge, not taken for granted.
One thing I would ask, if you are having the players use the descriptions of the races in the books, are you also using those descriptions? What I mean is, if troglodytes are described as evil SoBs, are you playing them that way? Or are you playing them as neutral, but letting your players think they are evil SoBs? There are reasons in-game why gnomes would hate troglodytes, I have no idea what those reasons are, but I'm sure there are some and they are legitimate within the setting. If you take those reasons away but don't inform the players about it and then act baffled when they don't respond in the way you expect due them not being aware of what you are, then you shouldn't really be surprised when situations like this arise.
Now having said that, the real problem for the gnome's character being NG was once he turned on his own party members. He might have believed that his ally was deluded for trusting a troglodyte but that doesn't excuse attacking the ally.
Troglodytes are pretty evil and vicious. Standard descriptions apply. They are however, not all fanatics, and some can break, beg for mercy. Even though they are pretty nasty and not overly open to peace, they can still be talked to, bargained with, complimented etc. They are sentient.
He did believe the ally was deluded and a peacenik simply. Mowed through him via animal (plant) companion and sling bullets. Bard hit the deck hard on 0 hp. With his last words before passing out, said to the last trog "run, save yourself". I gave the bard a nice hefty xp bonus.
Are troglodytes really evil? Well it is hard to know, no one stops to talk, there are communication difficulties. The bard has linguistics, but the druid acts over the bard's attempts at non-hostility.
The player of the gnome is now calm. I'm leaving it as is for now. He said: "I don't let the alignment dictate the character so it's a moot point. Bagg is a good character - and the neutrality aspect is more in line with the druidic credo."
So he is good and neutral while being evil? There we have it. I wonder if he will continue to act evil and thoughtlessly? Projections?
He is a fair way off from getting an alignment change, but on the road again.
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Are troglodytes really evil? Well it is hard to know, no one stops to talk, there are communication difficulties. The bard has linguistics, but the druid acts over the bard's attempts at non-hostility.
If the Troglodytes aren't being aggressive or evil when the druid comes upon them, I'd run it as murder if he killed any of them. If he makes a habit of it? I wont play into his delusions that he's a good character.
I'll note I will allow them to keep playing their character even if they are evil, though the story will accomodate it. Rumors might spread of how savage and murderous he is if he's ever seen. If he isn't, and they come upon the remains, they blame the entire party. If things get really bad, he might get hunted for it.
He may understand the problem when silver and gold dragon paladins and druids are out for his blood.
But it would depend on how far it went and how far the character went in the story.
In the hunt, in the middle of the night. I had them come across a bunch of orcs with mud houses and straw rooves, next to a field and a road. They waited until the orcs went to bed in the mud and straw houses, lit all the houses on fire, and cut the orcs down as they started to step out of the 8-10 houses. The orcs put up as much of a fight as they can, using rocks, sticks the occasional axe, but the PCs manage to kill them as dawn nears, tired out from the fact that they just slaughtered some 40-60 orcs (including women and children), and the PCs were all like "that wasn't so hard".
They hear hooves on the road. Lots of them. off in the distance the see about 20 armed men on horses approaching to check out the smoke. They charge toward the PCs, who are rather worn out, and once they close melee, jump off their mounts. The leader takes a swing at the fighter and hits, and the fighter realizes this orc does as much damage as he does, and they're all in heavy armor with well oiled blackened weapons. He tells the fighter he's going to pay for slaughtering these orcs who clearly never gave the PCs cause for vengeance.
I then congratulate the PCs on the slaughtering of the orcish hunter gatherers who are just starting to try farming, and end the session for the night.
Next session, the PCs scrape by, but just barely (2 players die, one of the two gets a reincarnate).
I proceed to tell them after the big fight that after the orcs had gone to bed they could have just walked by on the road, or the could have diplomacied on their way by or maybe even asked for information on the marauders, and I let them see that had they only fought the orcs who were the intended enemies instead of slaughtering a village, it would have been a reasonable amount of drain on them and they likely would not have lost any party members. (some of the 20 were much lower level than them).
They learn their lesson to make sure the things they're killing should be killed before they murder women and children.
I dont know if this applies to your situation, maybe your situation is less extreme, but it certainly drove a point home with my players.
You could see if he still jumps to killing if you put him in a situation he can more clearly see a nonviolent solution, and go from there; test the waters as it were, before repercussions for his actions start happening.
Great story.
I don't intend to play into the delusions. I will for sure throw in some non-evil trog diplomats, see what happens. Also will see how he deals with other npcs and pcs.
Also, their mission isn't exactly kill all monsters. It is secure supplies to last the winter. It is amusing how dark people can go to get resources.
And the poor trogs just moved into the slightly haunted tower too. A party exploring out of the darklands into the light.
Ah but if it is pure violence with no compromise, hate unquestioned, execution of hostages eagerly with no qualms or interest in profit or monetary gain, then isn't it closer to chaotic evil than neutral evil? A neutral evil wouldn't always execute hostages, or do it quickly, hostages can be useful.
Where this gets real significant is that then the druid loses their powers. His power does come from the divine natural/neutral.
If he continues, I will keep making the point, that is not good, that is not neutral, exterminate! exterminate! DM is alignment bot.
We'll see if he keeps pushing around players, ignoring compromise, attacking anything that is cold-blooded (and killing them in cold blood).
This is all conditional. I don't know anything about this specific racial hatred, but this character is clearly on enemy ground. You say he acted differently for some time before entering this dangerous ground. That would seem to be his true, normal self.
This other self is the one that shows up when surrounded by his racial foes. Now, that's a weird concept in the first place, and hard to adjudicate in any situation. Dwarves hate orcs, we all know that. The next time a dwarf fighter blindly attacks an orc on sight, are you automatically going to rule a change in his alignment, too?
To my mind, that's exactly what you are doing here. You mention his behavior when not in this situation, but you fail to take it into account and are merely judging based on the reaction to his hated foe. Playing a character with a hated racial foe is very difficult. Maybe he has gone overboard in his portrayal, but try to remember, it is a game, a dramatic situation, and a concept (racial enemies) that is screwy and wrong in the first place. I'm sure he thought he was doing the best he could.
You should get them out of that situation, see if he reverts to happy and curious again, and judge his alignment by how he is the majority of the time in other situations.
Ah but if it is pure violence with no compromise, hate unquestioned, execution of hostages eagerly with no qualms or interest in profit or monetary gain, then isn't it closer to chaotic evil than neutral evil? A neutral evil wouldn't always execute hostages, or do it quickly, hostages can be useful.
Where this gets real significant is that then the druid loses their powers. His power does come from the divine natural/neutral.
If he continues, I will keep making the point, that is not good, that is not neutral, exterminate! exterminate! DM is alignment bot.
We'll see if he keeps pushing around players, ignoring compromise, attacking anything that is cold-blooded (and killing them in cold blood).
If you want to try to go that route, it would look more like LE than CE.
Lawful Evil: A lawful evil villain methodically takes what he wants within the limits of his code of conduct without regard for whom it hurts. He cares about tradition, loyalty, and order, but not about freedom, dignity, or life. He plays by the rules but without mercy or compassion. He is comfortable in a hierarchy and would like to rule, but is willing to serve. He condemns others not according to their actions but according to race, religion, homeland, or social rank. He is loath to break laws or promises.
This reluctance comes partly from his nature and partly because he depends on order to protect himself from those who oppose him on moral grounds. Some lawful evil villains have particular taboos, such as not killing in cold blood (but having underlings do it) or not letting children come to harm (if it can be helped). They imagine that these compunctions put them above unprincipled villains.
Some lawful evil people and creatures commit themselves to evil with a zeal like that of a crusader committed to good. Beyond being willing to hurt others for their own ends, they take pleasure in spreading evil as an end unto itself. They may also see doing evil as part of a duty to an evil deity or master.
Lawful evil represents methodical, intentional, and organized evil.
If he was just trying to kill every single thing without regard to what they were, I say, yeah CE. But he's focusing ruthlessly on certain targets without regard to their behavior, just their race.
My earlier point was just to caution against playing characters not in the way they are described. If a group of devils appear to be farming, is it wrong for the party to go in and wipe them out? "These devils weren't actually evil, they had been reformed." Things like that just smell of DM trap. Like saying all goblins are evil, every single one, and then putting a bunch of baby goblins in front of a group and punishing them for destroying the evil spawn.
Atarlost. Killing surrendering opponents is a war crime (if done in a military context, or murder) in the real world. It's evil, it's dark, it's cold. They are no longer combatants. Run a scene like that with the players, really describe what is going on as they cower and beg for mercy and the killing starts, and you will realise it is pretty evil. Villains and marauders killing helpless folk is one of the obvious markers that they are villains.
Atarlost. Smashing teeth in, cutting off arms as a necessity? Have you ever heard of rope? The argument of necessity is often shouted, but I don't buy it. Those trogs were really broken, they weren't up for escape and throat slitting of their captors anytime soon. They also did have a way to keep them, they have towers, they have rope. One character let one go before and that trog ran away real fast with not one look back. Murder isn't the only option.
Pres man, on the dm trap. That is exactly what happened to a character of mine. Runelords, killing the raiding goblins, later my character tearfully killed the goblin spawn so that they wouldn't be left to starve and cannibalise each-other, and I got given the CE alignment. Dm trap indeed.
1) Strong angry racist remarks towards trogs and immediate hostility.
-There's no reason that Good has to be nice, and venting hatred verbally probably isn't enough to move anyone's alignment, even as shocking as overt racism is to us in modern times.
3) Leads the charge, even getting in the way of melee chars so he can do damage.
-Which is Roleplay during combat, which is a rare thing.
What worries me more for the Good aspect is... why are they being attacked at all? The party needs shelter , but you're invading their homes to get it. The party should be comming in on bended knee, not with swords drawn.
4) When the morale of some troglodytes breaks and two surrender, he proceeds to attack and cause his companion to attack the cowering surrendering hostages.
-There are circumstances i feel where you'd be justified in not taking a surrender: they've tried to falsely surrender before, You KNOW the person is guilty of a capital crime etc... but "Yeah, this nice warm place you're sitting in? We need it" isn't one of them.
6) He defends his actions on racist grounds, that all trogs are evil by their very nature.
- That's a very reasonable view in a D&D world. Its also a view that makes it very easy to head down a slippery slope.
7) He uses intimidation to solve a party dispute over healing, while the party are under siege from the now very very angry troglodytes. He sides with one pc over another npc, both of whom are extremely injured. Threats are used.
-When all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.
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First off, I'd just like to say how refreshing it is to hear someone is actually roleplaying a Racial Hatred trait and not simply viewing it as another +1 to add to their attack roll. Frankly, I'm getting a little tired of seeing every dwarf and gnome palling around with kobolds, goblins and orcs and then taking advantage of their hatred bonus expecting their goblin buddies to be okay with it. I constantly see dwarf and gnome characters of nearly every alignment treat their "hated" foes with the same kindness and respect they'd show a member of their own race.
Hatred is not the same as Favored Enemy. Favored Enemy only means a character has specialized in fighting a certain type of creature. Their reason for doing so might be due to hatred, but it could just as easily be due to survival or even a lack of any other creatures to fight. The dwarf dodge bonus against giants is closer to Favored Enemy than the Hatred trait. Hatred comes from a deep-seated feeling that the character, its family, friends or people have been wronged by the hated creature. That +1 to hit comes from a strong desire to hurt said creature regardless of the character's alignment. That said, there are ways to RP that hatred based on alignment that might work better than others.
These are just simple suggestions you could use as guidelines:
Good-aligned hatred - a good-aligned hater doesn't want trouble and tries to avoid it, but he's ready for it. He doesn't trust any creature he hates and he'll happily mow down a raiding party that is causing trouble, but he isn't on a spree of genocide. He's loathe to do so, but would assist a hated creature hoping to humble it or teach it a lesson. He might even learn to get along with a single member or tribe of the hated race if they prove to be trustworthy.
Neutral-aligned hatred - a neutral hater is a bigot who doesn't want trouble but always expects it. He's passive/aggressive toward creatures he hates and impatiently waits for them to do anything wrong so he can strike. He'd never help a hated creature unless he stood to gain a great deal of profit and/or a feeling of one-upmanship. He'll never get along with the hated creatures, but could learn to tolerate them so long as they keep their distance or "know their place."
Evil-aligned hatred - This is all-out, genocidal racism. An evil hater will actively seek out his hated foes and/or provoke them to violence all while playing the victim card. He will never help a hated creature and may even attack those who do. He may press members of the hated race into servitude, but only for as long as he can tolerate their continued existence.
As far as the gnome goes, what's done is done. It sounds like he wants to play a good-aligned hater but ended up acting like an evil one. Using these guidelines, you and the player could discuss how he can play a reptilian-hating gnome without coming off like a complete psycho or you could come up with your own "levels" of hatred. It could be this one battle was just years of pent up rage getting out all at once and, after the gnome's had time to reflect on it, he realizes he became the monster he's feared for so long. He keeps his good alignment and, in the future, reins himself in when the party finds goblins or reptilians. Also, remember that gnomes are notorious pranksters. The druid could direct his hatred into a less fatal form of enmity by using his abilities to play tricks on his hated foes. Maybe he casts Faerie Fire on his animal companion and then uses Ghost Sound to frighten the same goblins every night with a mysterious ghost badger that won't let them sleep?
I do find it a bit strange for a druid to act this way, regardless of the race of the character. Druids can shape change and eventually get thousand faces ability. Form and race would be almost irrelevant to most druids. Shape is irrelevant to the druid since they can change shape as they wish eventually.
Scales on the curb!
I think the racial hatred traits are really, really dumb.
Apply them in any sort of way to real life (I won't because someone will be offended) and you will see just how dumb they are.
Quite funny ice titan. The most dumb part of the racial hatred traits, which gnomes get against the reptilian in this instance, is that it really stands at odds with the neutral good alignment. A chaotic good could justify it, velcro zipper has given examples of how it could be played, but neutral good is the most good of good, potentially saintly, at the very least accepting and decent. How does that mix with hatred?
Atarlost, I am not repeating that after you. You missed my point entirely. I do not run games of relativism where alignment doesn't exist, and good becomes whatever the party decides is good, pragmatic killing becomes good, the idea of taking hostages becomes ridiculous. You can do that in your game if you wish, but a good and morally upstanding character should not be executing hostages like a villain. As they pleaded and cowered the rest of the party could see they were now helpless, and one stood up to stop the killing, and was injured by the druid and his companion and taken to 0.
The evil can be redeemed, the evil can be taught a lesson and released. Murder isn't the only answer here.
"As far as the gnome goes, what's done is done. It sounds like he wants to play a good-aligned hater but ended up acting like an evil one. Using these guidelines, you and the player could discuss how he can play a reptilian-hating gnome without coming off like a complete psycho or you could come up with your own "levels" of hatred. It could be this one battle was just years of pent up rage getting out all at once and, after the gnome's had time to reflect on it, he realizes he became the monster he's feared for so long. He keeps his good alignment and, in the future, reins himself in when the party finds goblins or reptilians."
A damn good suggestion.
On a side note, walking the good-aligned path is most of them time really difficult since it steps away from pragmatism. A good-aligned character can be merciless to evil marauders when defending a village from their wrath but can't carry it too far. The book of exalted deeds elaborates alot on playing such characters and the redemption of evil foes.
Troublesome and potentially dangerous? It can be but a good-alignment almost never coincides with the safest and most pragmatic solution to a problem since morals are certainly not a code of convenience.
"For they are moderate also in virtue,--because they want comfort. With comfort, however, moderate virtue only is compatible".
-Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra 1999: 116.
Being good and taking a more difficult course when faced with real enemies is not quick or easy. Against evil it is also quite easy to be just as evil and selfish as your opponents. They cheat, we cheat, they torture, we torture, they kill hostages, we kill hostages. I think Bernard-Henri Lévy said it best when he asked "since when does someone else's criminality cancel out our own?"
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Cleaned up some posts. If you don't like a thread, either flag it if its violating forum rules, or just stay out of it if you just don't like it.
Dwarves and Gnomes have had their long standing hatred of certain humanoid races for a long time, and it is certainly justifed, even given the traditional alignments of LG (dwarves) and NG (gnomes)
Both of these races are VERY long lived.
We're talking centuries.
Dwarves have been fighting Orcs and Goblins the entire history of the race! Same with Gnomes vs. Goblins and Kobolds (The kobolds being the primary target of the reptilian humanoid hate, btw.)
Imagine how many kin the Dwarves and Gnomes have lost to brutal raids from these humanoids. Wives. Children. Brothers. Parents. All likely slowly tortured to death, enslaved, eaten.
Just as dwarves and gnomes are usually good, these humanoids are almost universally evil.
Pick up a copy of Classic Monsters and see just how delightful kobolds and goblins are.
Trogs have one of the WORST reputations of barbaric cruelty in the game. (almost as bad as ogres!)
This isn't a blind hatred without cause. These races are locked in an constant state of genocidal war with each other. Its very much a war with racial survival on the table for all involved.
Now as for YOUR case.
The gnome acted out of alignment when he let his hatred influence his actions when it came to endangering his party members and the non-trog NPCs. I would have called him out on it immediately. Killing trog prisoners, meh, thats nothing. A Geneva Convention list of what constitutes as war crimes means nothing in Golarion. But risking harming another creature to kill a helpless hated foe is crossing the line. The driving reason for the racial hatred is personal LOSS. By risking the lives of your companions to take actions solely for the purpose of revenge upon a helpless foe, the character is pretty much putting himself directly into the shoes of the enemy he hates. While I can appreciate the reality of this (since it happens often enough) and think it constitutes good roleplaying, it DOES warrant a potential alignment shift.
Before you decide to add in trog diplomats and goody-goody types I would ask if this is really something you want to explore. Your job as a GM is not to find "gotcha" moments to show your players they are wrong.
If you found this experience with the player was something that made the game less fun for you (and that is the impression I get) then I would avoid having any lizard folk or trog make appearances in the game moving forward.
This does have the side effect of negating the players racial bonuses since they will never come up, but that is a small price to make sure that the table is still having fun (which IS your job as GM).
Sean Mahoney
I agree with your last point, but killing trog prisoners as nothing? Tearing up cowering beaten foes whom are begging to be spared is not good. Try and find that as a definition of good in the alignment descriptions in any edition of the game. You've got to prove yourself to be morally better if you claim to be morally better, or you are as bad as the worst trogs.
What neutral good is, is at least clear.
Update: the player refused to accept their actions as being even close to evil, didn't accept the warning of what was evil and could lead to alignment change in time. Was extremely sensitive and just backed right off the game, how dare I the dm explain alignment.
We can also discuss fragile players if anyone wants to go into that? Good ol' alignment, always a source of argument.
For Sean, the diplomats are connected to the larger trogs of the region. On the trog matter it was mostly fine, and the player whom got offended made the damaging actions to another player, it was not the trogs fault. The trog diplomats are also a source of what the players are after--wealth for supplies. They aren't the worst trogs ever, not saying they are the good guys and that I am using a gotcha moment. I've got good dungeons and combats to run. So don't worry about that. The barbaric trogs once had their own civilisation, trog courtiers can be talked to and negotiate, and still be damn evil, they are just civilised evil in a sense. ;)
3.5, I disagree with this, at least from a game standpoint:
but neutral good is the most good of good, potentially saintly, at the very least accepting and decent.
The bias toward social order, the idea that social order is intrinsically positive (though there are exceptions) is built into Pathfinder, and has been built into the game as long as the 9 alignments have been around. You can have philosophical discussions about the relative merits of order, balance, and individualism in the real world, but in the moral universe of the game the alignments have always been arrayed from best to worst as
LG
NG
CG
LN
N
CN
LE
NE
CE
Social structure as a virtue, or regard for social structure as a virtue, is implicit in this schema.
Yeah, it definitely sounds like fragile player syndrome: refusal/inability to separate their character from themselves.
Along with that, refusal to consider the possibility of having acted evil is itself highly suggestive that the underlying aligment being acted out IS evil... And it sounds like he`s basically arguing with you that killing non-threatening surrendering `opponents` ISN`T anything but a Good act...!?!?! (as if his racism changes the Moral Laws of the Universe)
Good characters can generally doubt their actions, etc, much more easily, and since good doesn`t equal perfect, most good characters probably do have failings they may feel bad about (even if they don`t know they would act differently in the same situation). Along with others` comments about Good-alignment not wanting to become just as Evil as the Evil they oppose, one could see conflicts like this being recognized as `unavoidable Evils`, but that at least involves a recognition of one`s own commitment of Evil (and if over-all you`re still mostly good, your alignment may not shift more than Neutral, perhaps the Goodest of Good may still be Good). ...But refusal to recognize cold-blooded execution as Evil is pointing itself out as Evil with giant neon arrows, more so than simply having done it once.
I don`t know what else to say, since the goal is what is most fun for everybody, or how the game can be best. Since he did attack other party members (when that wasn`t necessary to protect anybody), it seems reasonable that you could discuss privately with the other players what their characters` think, and if/how they are prepared for a similar (or worse) situation. More so than the mechanics of alignment, I think how the other PCs react to his character are what can bring this player back to ground in the most productive way... That isn`t the aim of the alignment system, after all, but if the player has to deal with the other PCs `intervening` (not necessarily with reference to the alignment system per se: if they use Detect Alignment and you say he Detects as Evil/Neutral, I don`t imagine him reacting well out-of-game), he will kind of need to face the issue in some way or another... Deciding whether his racial vendette is more important than sticking with his allies in their quest to achieve Good (presumably) is of course a pretty clear test of Good alignment itself. Ignoring what he thinks is Good or bad, is his characer willing to work with the whole party for the common good? If there is a Good aligned Cleric or Paladin in the party, if they would continue to accept his presence (if there is a choice about it), it seems like they would want to assist him with an Atonement, which of course involves voluntary recognition of Evil acts.
I would say that you should not bring Chaotic Aligment shifts into the picture... Plenty of other people also don`t see that in his actions (I could see a Neutral Evil doing what he did just as easily), and threatening his Class abilities is just going to be 10x as controversial. I don`t really see a problem with the idea of Neutral Evil Gnome Druids who pursue genocide agains Lizardfolk/Trog`s. Probably his attacks on intervening allies is the most problematic part here, but if you can work that out thru inter-character role-play (as above paragraph), without needing to invoke Druid-Casting Loss, I think it will work out the best for your group. If that doesn`t work, i.e. attempted Atonement, well, perhaps this nutso just instigated his removal from the group. It doesn`t seem like such a character who attacks other players can continue indefinitely.
re: above hierarchy placing LG as more good than NG, I agree that there is implicit good value placed on social order, but that doesn`t really mean that LG will be more purely enacting good than NG. If social order is implicit in good, then NG will not act against good by acting against social order when those are aligned. LG on the other hand, will not always act quite so much in the straightest path of good, since they are distracted by the demands of Lawfullness. So in an ideal world, LG may see themselves and be seen as most close to all that is Good (and thus somewhat lawful), but in an UN-ideal world, sometimes it`s necessary to act non-lawfully to pursue Good. NG doesn`t imply that they need/will act AGAINST lawful orders that are in-line with Good, though. A NG character could well respect some IDEAL LG order, but they probably have yet to actually encounter one where good perfectly intersects with Law, and they`d rather keep on the side of good. LG is more focused upon that ideal world, that they insist on it`s forms vs. what is most good in the given situation... often having more conflict along he way, which NG doesn`t have AS MUCH since they can just choose what is the most good.
I wouldn`t even agree that LG is made out as the most good alignment, especially if you look at representative outsiders. Good involves empathy for others, but that doesn`t need any laws or societal forms per se, though un-necessarily interfering with those could cause distress, NG doesn`t imply doing that, nor does CG, otherwise they wouldn`t be acting Good all the time. (this is based on acting a certain alignment all the time, which all but perhaps some outsiders don`t really do, so it`s just for comparisons sake)
As for the alignment change portion of things, my personal philosophy is that the character should be the one making the call on his alignment, not the GM. Now, before I get crucified for this heresy, let me explain.
The players only get to control one small aspect of this "shared world"... their character. The GM gets everything else. I try really hard to make sure I am never taking that one thing away from them (if I really wanted to do so, I should be writing a novel instead of GMing).
I would question the actions, I would ask for examples like those given above for the differences between good, neutral and evil characters with a hatred, but in the end it would be the players choice.
While I personally would agree that the acts were not something a good character would do, I don't think it is my place as GM to make that call. It is a shared world... and all the players get to play with is their own characters.
While I personally would agree that the acts were not something a good character would do, I don't think it is my place as GM to make that call. It is a shared world... and all the players get to play with is their own characters.
Of course its the GM's call. How else on earth do you control the "chaotic good" character putting babies in a catapult and shooting skeet?
Nobody has ever suggested the player doesn`t/shouldn`t have complete control over his character.
The GM has made clear he has specific standards about what the Good/Evil/etc moral alignments mean in his game.
To say that Detect Aligment DON`T work equivalently on this character, as to other characters who act similarly, would break his game world.
Ruling that a characters` alignment has shifted in no way impedes the players` control over his character,
any more than saying `if his character steps off a cliff, he falls` impedes their control over their character (BUT I SAY I DON`T FALL WHEN I STEP OFF A CLIFF!!!),
or asking the players to actually roll the dice instead of just declaring Natural 20 after Natural 20 (that is actually less player control than in this case).
If the player decides his character wants to act Evil, then the Alignmment will reflect that. If the player decides to act like a LG Paladin, the aligment will reflect that. All in the player`s hands.
Again, to follow up on my previous post, the other PCs are highly likely to do something about this.
If the PC can truly dictate what cosmic alignment their actions, and thus their character, are classed as,
you will be left with the situation of the other players role-playing opposition to some action which radiates Goodness.
Now whose role-playing is being inhibited?
Act evil, and your aligment may shift. Them`s the breaks.
It`s like this player wants to role-play evil but doesn`t want to be labelled as such (evil druids are A-OK by the rules).
That has nothing to do with a player playing their character`s personality, and everything to do with a player with issues.
Alignment is a REFLECTIVE MEASUREMENT, i.e. based on what you do.
Arguing the player should decide this measurement, independently of their actions, undermines that entire concept.
When starting a game, having the player write down an Aligment makes as much sense, because they have the solidest idea of their character personalty and history.
(although I would say that a thorough `character interview` covering that info, and allowing the GM to derive an Alignment, would keep players away from the mind-set that they dictate Aligment, or that they `should` be acting in accordance with a certain alignment... or everybody could just be started as Neutral alignment, or as close to it as allowed by their 1st class, and tracked from there based on their actions)
But for the player to dictate their aligment during the game makes no more sense than for the player to dictate their characters` AGE, irrespective of how much time has passed in-game.
Further, what is the point of `evil` or `good` descriptor spells: is that a suggestion to players on how their aligment could change? No, it`s an objective measure of that in-game, ALL casters of that spell tend to shift towards that aligment when using that spell (alot). What other game mechanic is left totally up to player interpretation? And again, how does the GM applying Aligment across the board impede the player`s role-playing? It doesn`t.