With all the paladin questions lately, I've noticed several comments about player reaction to when GMs pull the "how to make the paladin fall" card. For some reason, players seem to hate it when the GM throws a moral conundrum in front of their character, basically the reaction of "What did you expect me to do when faced with *insert BEG* here?"
It got me thinking to my current situation, which involves a LN Paladin variant, an Undead Scourge of Pharasma. He is playing the character extremely neutral. Let something be evil all it wants, but if it is even remotely undead, Lucien will kill it on sight. My character, a Witch, is Neutral Good. I play her so "good" she might qualify for Exalted in the future. She is extremely trusting, and was willing to give even a Bugbear a chance to lead the party out of the woods on the promise he would be released upon completion of said task. Up until now, we have only met the Mindless Undead, those who cannot help but be evil. My Witch has had no problem helping the Paladin in his quest to rid the world of Undead so far.
Now we are faced with the Blade/Hellsing/Vampire Hunter D scenario (on a cliffhanger til next session): A good vampire who hunts bad vampires, and only wants to live long enough to get vengeance on those who destroyed his life. Once he kills the vampire who turned him, Balist (the vamp) will gladly be slain. He has no interest in immortality, only payback.
Here is the issue: Lucien has already stated that he will kill all undead on sight. My character is willing to give even an undead a chance if it will help her rid the world of evildoers. She will not travel with Lucien if he ends up going after the good vamp when the good vamp is willing to help them get rid of the bad vamps. If it was just her potentially leaving the party, it would be fine. I'd just roll a new character. But her husband is another PC. If she left, so would he. Plus the fourth party member would be severely torn as to which side to follow. If he stays with Lucien, me and my BF have to make new characters. If he comes with us, Lucien has to be retired. I have til Monday night to figure this out. Should I stick with my character's morals, and potentially break the party up? Or should I take one for the team and somehow be talked into staying even if it's not really what she would have done?
if you can let the vampire get away without angering your paladin friend, you could use him as an ally from afar, but if the vampire is stupid enough to just sit there and take a beating from the pali, probably not worth the time to save.
As for if the vampire is killed, I wouldnt make your character leave, she are neutral good, not stupid good, and should understand what it means to travel with someone who has devoted their lives to killing undead.
So first, attempt to talk the pali out of it, which could give the vamp enough time to make an escape, and if tht does not work, remember that you know your paladin friend and his code, and as a goodly person, you should forgive him because most of the time, his code is helping good, and destroying evil.
I was already planning on grappling the Paladin (prehensile hair with an INT of 19) and using some sort of spell to knock him out or make him sleep or something.
As for forgiving him, she might do that, but he does already have one strike against him. A previous encounter led them to a a village in the mountains that had a magic bubble around it which essentially stopped the progression of time for the people who lived there. They had been there for 10,000 years. They probably could have been talked into removing the magic field from around their village, but the paladin had to instead sneak down the magic item that projected the field (the spine of a dead time god), and then immediately destroy it. It reverted the magic, and thus the village began to age. My character had to talk the reaper who told the paladin about the village into letting the people live out their days, rather than taking them immediately. Her words: "They will age and die now. You've waited 10,000 years, what is a few more when you know now you will have their souls?"
After that incident, the paladin got all preachy and "you know everyone faces pharasma, everyone goes to the boneyard, that is the way of things, blah blah blah" and the rest of us were either mocking him or ignoring him.
So I guess this might be his second strike in her book.
One thing to note, is the fact that you are playing neutral good, at least for me, means that you would forgive rather then condemn, even if someone keeps messing up, so long as they do not actively seek to be evil.
That being said, I personally love love some quality in party conflicts, and if another character has fundamental disagreements with my character, I have both been killed, and killed, because of it. Never have I held a grudge from something in game, because it is just that, so I say if your pali attempts to kill this goodly creature with an honorable goal, then you have every right to put down the rabid dog.
(but going with forgiveness tends to cause less problems
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What you have here is not an 'inflexible paladin' problem, but a problem of different players, and the GM having different ideas about the reality of the shared game world.
The Pathfinder rules developers are on record as stating that all undead are evil, no exceptions.
Even when that makes no sense from the rules perspective; ie mindless, animated objects, moving via an unaligned power source (for that is what skeletons and zombies are)? NO EXCEPTIONS! EVIL!
Even when given examples of undead NPCs who are specifically placed to aid PCs in scenarios, the reply has been, "Yes, I wrote that scenario. I intended that NPC to help overthrow the BBEG. Doesn't make him any less evil.".
Evil NPC volunteers for vampirism? Evil.
Good NPC gets involuntarily bitten by a vampire? Turns Evil.
No exceptions.
So before you start in-party drama and grief, by blaming the 'paladin' for his reaction to undead, consider that he is the player taking into account what the rules actually say on the subject.
If the GM and players want a campaign where the boundaries are blurred, where mindless undead are True Neutral (like golems), where good vampires can exist, wringing their hands, and being all 'Anne Rice' over their tragic fate ("Boo Hoo, I am cursed to remain forever young, strong and vigorous, poor poor me!")*, then they have to acknowledge they are house-ruling the game into a form not supported by the default rules or setting.
And then they should make sure every player is made fully aware of that fact when creating characters.
*which should be more than enough to justify a stake through the chest in its own right.
These two guys have been gaming together for a long time, and I am a first timer with them. I assume they understand each others style. I also do not see the paladin as being whiny if this causes Lucien to not be part of the party any more. Just as I am not going to be whiny if my Witch leaves the party. I'm just worried about he side effects towards the other two players (namely my BF/character's husband). The Paladin's player knows full well that his character is a creepy graveyard guy who was basically brainwashed by the Temple of Pharasma from childhood. It's not causing any out-of-character strife, I'm just preparing for the "what if's..." to see if I should seriously consider bringing a back up to next game or not. Most of the time, we feel pretty safe as far as staying alive, so back ups are not a concern. Only once has one of us (me) almost died. and we've been together from levels 1-6.
So I guess I assume that the Paladin understands that the GM will throw you for a loop sometimes. It's not game-ender. The GM has made it clear from the beginning that our characters know next to nothing about how the world really operates. We were four common villagers from a valley that had been shut off from the rest of the world for 5,000 years. There was occasional news from the outside, but never more than once or twice a year. We were basically self sufficient, and didn't even know what money was (having come from a barter and trade society). For various reasons, we decided to set out on a quest to see the rest of the world. Three Humans and a Half-Elf (me). The GM made it clear that our characters probably had a lot of assumptions about the world from lack of information on it (I.E. the RAW were probably wrong on a few points).
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The good vamp could be quite willing to be slain if such a noble person would swear to destroy his enemies...?
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Even when that makes no sense from the rules perspective; ie mindless, animated objects, moving via an unaligned power source (for that is what skeletons and zombies are)? NO EXCEPTIONS! EVIL!Even when given examples of undead NPCs who are specifically placed to aid PCs in scenarios, the reply has been, "Yes, I wrote that scenario. I intended that NPC to help overthrow the BBEG. Doesn't make him any less evil.".
Evil NPC volunteers for vampirism? Evil.
Good NPC gets involuntarily bitten by a vampire? Turns Evil.
No exceptions.If the GM and players want a campaign where the boundaries are blurred, where mindless undead are True Neutral (like golems), where good vampires can exist, wringing their hands, and being all 'Anne Rice' over their tragic fate ("Boo Hoo, I am cursed to remain forever young, strong and vigorous, poor poor me!")*, then they have to acknowledge they are house-ruling the game into a form not supported by the default rules or setting.
And then they should make sure every player is made fully aware of that fact when creating characters.
Actually, that's not entirely true.
What is true is that all undead have the evil subtype.
What does the evil subtype actually say?
This subtype is usually applied to Outsiders native to the evil-aligned Outer Planes. Evil Outsiders are also called fiends. Most creatures that have this subtype also have evil alignments; however, if their alignments change, they still retain the subtype. Any effect that depends on alignment affects a creature with this subtype as if the creature has an evil alignment, no matter what its alignment actually is. The creature also suffers effects according to its actual alignment. A creature with the evil subtype overcomes damage reduction as if its natural weapons and any weapons it wields are evil-aligned.
As for right now, the Golarion setting doesn't have many non-evil undead (there's apparently a CG ghost in an adventure path), but the rules do support them, so the DM throwing in a good aligned vampire isn't out of line or houseruling at all.
As for the OP,
A)the paladin doesn't have a choice. He is sworn to destroy all undead.
B)If he doesn't kill it, he will fall.
C)Your character knows this, and is asking him to go against his god and his training.
Only you can decide how your character would handle this based on these three things, but I'd say you knew what you were getting into with the Paladin, and its unfair for you to ask him to go against his god in this way.
This is the equivalent of asking a standard Paladin to consort with a devil.
As for the OP,
A)the paladin doesn't have a choice. He is sworn to destroy all undead.
B)If he doesn't kill it, he will fall.
C)Your character knows this, and is asking him to go against his god and his training.
Actually of all four of them, she gets along with him the least. But in all fairness, this thread is basically being used as her train of thought during this moral conundrum and is helping me figure out what she would decide. She doesn't want to leave the party, so the most logical thing would be to turn it into something similar to the Damnatio Memoria for a while. She ignores the Paladin's existence. "You are dead to me." The GM has also claimed to have an out to where everyone's content, but he's not telling us yet. It's just a matter of whether we follow "Plotte Wallace" (the nickname for any NPC designed to drive plot, his favored weapon is a railroad spike).
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As for right now, the Golarion setting doesn't have many non-evil undead (there's apparently a CG ghost in an adventure...
This subtype is usually applied to Outsiders native to the evil-aligned Outer Planes. Evil Outsiders are also called fiends. Most creatures that have this subtype also have evil alignments; however, if their alignments change, they still retain the subtype. Any effect that depends on alignment affects a creature with this subtype as if the creature has an evil alignment, no matter what its alignment actually is. The creature also suffers effects according to its actual alignment. A creature with the evil subtype overcomes damage reduction as if its natural weapons and any weapons it wields are evil-aligned.
There's also Juju oracles, the 3rd party White Necromancer, Todd Stewart's liches, and that relevant sidebar from Classic Horrors Revisited.
OP, good luck on the pinning. Preventing the killing will make any plans to forgive(but likely not forget) easier on your PC's end. Rigid absolutism can make things difficult for party cohesion, sometimes even when that absolute is something the party generally agrees upon. It's part of why I dislike the Oath Against X options.
I'd suggest making moral arguments in-character, but the other PC's LN alignment and Inevitable-like code of conduct probably means appeals to pragmatism would be more effective.
One question that could make this a bit easier to help with: Why is the party together? There's clearly a strong moral/philosophical divide and at least two characters have clashed before over the fate of that village. What brought the party together, and what has kept them together until this time?
One question that could make this a bit easier to help with: Why is the party together? There's clearly a strong moral/philosophical divide and at least two characters have clashed before over the fate of that village. What brought the party together, and what has kept them together until this time?
My character and her husband were escaping their village because he killed a man who accused my character of witchcraft (a no-no in this valley). They came to a neighboring village and met a Paladin at the local temple of Pharasma. He was getting ready to journey across the magical forest barrier into the unknown rest of the world to find his friend. His friend's brother is our fourth party member. The four are the only ones in this world from their side of the forest. It's sort of an "I don't know anyone else/Safety in numbers" scenario. And the Paladin is mostly a good guy, more often than not he goes after evil. If the evil is not blatantly hurting anything, he might leave it alone. To him, I guess it's the line between Evil and Vile.
EDIT: The men who accused my character of witchcraft also attacked her and tried to do bad things to her. Yance, her husband, was only defending her when he killed one of them. They were promptly chased by pitch-fork wielding peasants.
ANOTHER EDIT: The Paladin has also been charged with accompanying a 9 year old Oracle of Pharasma who is supposed to visit Misharu, a mythical city on the edge of the map. She is also traveling with us, and they have come to odds (mildly, but still conflicting opinions) over what Pharasma's true will is. She even chose to alter the fate of my character (although my character doesn't know it yet, though she told the Paladin what she did) by saving her life when she was "fated" to die.
--People want the paladin to fall because misery loves company. A handful of DMs believe that a good person is impossible, and take great delight in it, and feel a need to prove it at all times. Such DM's also tend to be rather nasty people in their personal life.
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There's also Juju oracles, the 3rd party White Necromancer, Todd Stewart's liches, and that relevant sidebar from Classic Horrors Revisited.
All of which are great resources, but good luck getting Paizo to support them.
3rd-party products are, by definition, unofficial. I'll have to check out Classic Horrors Revisited again, to see which sidebar you mean.The rest? Even though they've appeared in official product, they're treated as the red-headed stepchildren that should have been drowned at birth. James Jacobs has made it quite clear that this stuff got in under the radar, and had the deadlines not been so close, and an editor been more on the ball, they would have been cut.
This is despite the material being popular, and despite it tying in with real-world afterlife beliefs, despite it making use of pulp tropes. And despite the fact that adding these options expands the stories that can be told, makes the game richer, makes morality less clear-cut, and forces players to think before they act.
I'm not telling anyone they're playing wrong by wanting to include Neutral skeletal constructs, respected Zombie Masters (such as on The Isle of Dread), Japanese style kindly ancestor spirits, ancient soldiers bound by an eternal oath, or philanthropic wizards who protect their people long after the flesh has fallen from their bones.
These are all things I am in favour of, want to see in the game, and consider their exclusion to be a mistake.
I am simply saying that any group who wants to use such things has to realise that they are playing the game in a style not condoned by the developers, and not supported in the official rules.
I'd be saying exactly the same if the GM was including psionics or spelljammer ships.
And therefore, when setting up a new game, and especially if taking on new players, they should discuss these changes from the core assumptions, so everyone is aware of the implied genre and tone of the campaign.
I suppose a lot of it depends on how your character views vampires, and other sentient creatures. Are they people like you are people? If they are people, would killing the innocent vampire be the same as killing a innocent villager? If not, why?
If the vampire wants to be/is-fine-with being killed, you could probably make a fairly strong case for working with him to eliminate other undead. Paladins can work with devils to prevent even greater evil, like Sarenrae and Asmodeus working together to bind Rovagug. This case is even better, since it's like binding Rovagug and getting to smite Asmodeus.
So, how do you view vampires and how does the Undead Scourge view his oaths?
Well first off, this guy was behaving very friendly towards us before finding out he was a vampire. He even saved the Oracle's life. My character believes that everything should be given a chance. If it is not hostile, it will gain no hostility from her. She values peace. One of her first act was sparing the life of a goblin when the rest of the party would have just killed it. That goblin later became a valuable guide when trying to navigate the wilderness he was raised in. Everything has free will. The entire valley thought she was evil because of her witchcraft, only one person (the man who is now her husband) gave her a chance. If he hadn't, she'd be dead. She doesn't want to have the same type of blood on her hands by allowing the innocent to die at the hands of misinformation and bigotry.
The Undead Scourge was raised from childhood by the Temple of Pharasma. He never knew his mother and father, for he was found on the Temple steps as a baby. He only knows the way of Pharasma. He behaves as if Pharasma's will is the same as his own, and will do nothing to wrong her. Undead is wrong. Vampires are Undead. Ergo, Vampires are wrong.
the purpose of the good is to forgive, therefor, you should forgive this paladin regardless of his perceived sins, especially because he is doing as he was taught from babyhood.
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She's a witch... burn her at the steak you used to kill the vampire. (Joking). Goodie Goodie versus the Law. I concur with the person who said an attempt by the Pali to take on the Vamps quest would allow both Goodie and Lawman to survive the encounter.
The law is that all things undead must die. He is nuetral about "even if its little babies or vampires." So he's going to do it.
You are attempting to exhalt your goodness above the evil that exists. Claiming all things have a choice denies the reality that Vampires have to feed on (and kill) other people. So how Good is it that you let them survive? Knowing they will kill other people. Even if they claim that they only intend to kill other Evil people for goodness sake? You should know better. But that is just my opinion. And I am CN. LOL.
(ps. your GM should stop watching Vampire Diaries NOW!!!)
Allowing the good vamp to live only as long as it takes for him to help us get rid of the bad vamps, and then slay the good vamp (just like the good vamp wants us to do), is the path that the GM is steering us towards. Hopefully it works out that way. What we have learned about vampires so far is that they don't have to feed to survive, nor to they have to kill those they feed on. It's more of a "this feels good" thing to them. The vast majority of vampires in this world give in to that feeling. We have learned that the vast majority of vampires are evil, but there are some who don't follow this path. This vampire does not ping as evil, and he does not have a magical way of masking his alignment. This vampire was a human who lived in a kingdom that was overthrown by vampires. Since then, he's been trying to get rid of those vampires. I also suspect, though haven't been told this yet, that this vampire was a Pharasmite before he was bitten.
And I don't think the GM watches vampire diaries, he just figured "let's see what the paladin will do when confronted with this." Just like when my character was proved to be incredibly trusting, the GM threw a bugbear at her, and she trusted him til they were led into a trap. Then when another party member went to kill the bugbear, she got mad when they stabbed him in the gut rather than a quick death.
I also find it kinda funny that the guy playing the super faithful character is a die-hard atheist IRL. But that might just be me.
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That's a cruel thing to do to a party like that...
also, undead neither necessarily have the evil subtype (ghosts, ghouls, whatnot do not, I just checked) NOR are they exclusively evil. Ghosts, for example, are whatever the alignment they had in life (such as the aformentioned ghost from the Carrion Crown AP, who is indeed CG), although this is rare, since most animated undead (at least according to a small blurb from Rule of Fear) do not keep their original souls when they are "re-born" but rather are maintained by a caricature of their original personality crafted from negative energy. There's a vampire, for instance, that due to a lengthy religious ritual (Conte Tiriac) who kept his own soul when turned into a vampire. He's evil for...other reasons. But in theory, such a character COULD be made good. Unfortunately, whether or not that's true is irrelevant. Pharasma quite clearly views the state of undeath itself (regardless of the creature this concerns) is an abomination that must be eliminated, for it defies her very philosophy, so...the paladin is essentially bound by faith to kill him, good or not (especially if he's just LN), whereas your character won't lose all their class abilities...so...
At this point, if he doesn't take the "out" of being able to let this guy live for a few more days in order to take out dozens more undead in his wake, thus doing more for Pharasma's will than merely killing him on the spot and not being able to take out the other vampires, then my character will forgive him, eventually. She will go through an emotional period of ignoring him and blaming Pharasma for brainwashing him and such, and then become tired of keeping up the fight when she cannot change his mind.