I am considering a storyline in which branches of good are brought to war over some irreconcilable difference in views.
the players are recruited by one side or the other to end the fighting as the material plane has the most "choice" and free will.
my original idea was a clan of angels that goes to war with Azatas for their chaotic nature.
Lawful good vs chaotic good.
but i am wondering if a better choice may be found in two other groups. for example angels vs inevitable's
lawful good vs lawful neutral: the argument having to do with the fact that inevitable willingly work with devils.
or possibly devils figure out a way to bring Azatas into conflict with inevitable's (chaotic good vs lawful neut)
ultimately i am trying to avoid common conflicts like good vs evil or even devils vs demons
so i am looking to see if any one here has any ideas in relation to this.
Find some finite resource each faction requires to sustain functioning in some way, then slash/ruin/diminish a large swath of it abruptly. When there's not enough vital stuff to go around even good forces will have to suss out who gets to live, probably violently after diplomacy breaks down.
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I like the idea of inevitables. How about this: In the dawn of history the sentient races were plagued by an unstoppable horror. They got together and made a deal with a powerful Neutral force, a primordial god thing. The deal was 70 millennium of peace in exchange for the god-thing devouring their world when the time was up. Of course, things being as they are, a group of adventurers destroyed the artifact that was the means of the god-thing re-entering the material plane. The world is saved.
BUT...
This is a MAJOR contract between the sentient races of the world and a primal being. Destruction of the artifact constitutes breach of contract. The inevitables come to destroy every descendant of the sentient races that made the deal (which might lead to some interesting exceptions - for example maybe they leave gnomes alone unless attacked but give fair warning "You should leave this world.") which is, of course most of the planet.
Enter the CG gods. Their stance is that the contract was illegal to begin with, as no one can offer as payment their descendants in a good contact. The cannot directly oppose the inevitables, they are covered by a contract of their own, but they can free their servants to aid the mortal races as they see fit.
Makes things a little more personal for the PCs. They loose and they loose their world.
People let alignment control too much.
Perhaps there's a war over the available land, or perhaps it is a civil war because two royal brothers both believe they have an equal claim to the throne. Anything really.
History is loaded with wars where there were no obvious good or bad sides. The people doing the actual fighting were always sure (maybe brainwashed?) they were fighting for a just cause, or at a minimum, to save their own.
You could say the invading force is the bad side, but lots of people think the Iraq war was necessary, making the US the good guys. One side is making the world a better place, and the other is protecting their homeland from invaders.Not trying to derail, but war is always political.
I am actually looking for a war of opinions and ideals.
essentially a political war over how to best implement Good or Law or some such.
or maybe a situation in which the normal activities of one group (like inevitable who only care about the law) puts them in conflict with another group (like Azatas who are mostly focused on Good)
so using that idea I could see a situation in which devils send inevitables to bring 'justice' to a town/city/country/organization which has broken the law/contract in the name of good, which brings them into direct conflict with Azatas who are protecting the town for some reason.
or maybe the Azatas themselves are tricked into breaking an agreement with the Devils and the inevitables end up fighting the Azatas in the devils stead.
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My question would be what is each side willing to do to secure/destroy/attain, etc... What means are justifiable? It's usually in peril that the characters are tested.
Just how much peril is either "good" side willing to put the PC in? Are they willing to let them die?
Historically there are thousands of examples of wars between nations that wouldn't be considered Evil.
The crusades and the surrounding wars were about which believers in Christ were the most right. Both sides believed that they were the good guys and that the other side was the bad guys. Religion is the real life cause for most wars. Why not the fantastical cause as well?
just encountered a situation in a game I was playing in where two sides of the same church were coming to blows over the disposition of a major magical item they had come into owning. Half of the church believed that it should be considered a holy relic and protected at all costs while the other side felt that by selling it, they would reduce the threat to the church AND make enough coin to support the church thru lean times.
A contract giving rights to some valuable land to group A, that is being lived on currently by an impoverished group B.
The Inevets are more concerned with the issue of Law while the Azatas could be more concerned with Good.
Now, to make it something worthy of their attention- the "something valuable" could be something huge with an equally large land mass to suit.
perhaps a continent (or large island chain?) that once belonged to group A but was taken forcibly in ages (or just a few years) past but that is now inhabited by an innocent group B long after the invaders came and departed.
Group A wants their land back seeing it rightfully theirs while group B has a claim of "good" to it as well. And maybe it has something worth fighting over aside from just good dirt. Gold, gems, maybe its the site of a 50 year coterminus(sp?) junction with some other plane.
You can then flush out the nationalities of the two groups (or of the one group, and the distinct tribes of the "squatters" or whatever).
Not sure that entirely fits the bill but its what came to mind.
-S
A contract giving rights to some valuable land to group A, that is being lived on currently by an impoverished group B.
The Inevets are more concerned with the issue of Law while the Azatas could be more concerned with Good.
Now, to make it something worthy of their attention- the "something valuable" could be something huge with an equally large land mass to suit.
perhaps a continent (or large island chain?) that once belonged to group A but was taken forcibly in ages (or just a few years) past but that is now inhabited by an innocent group B long after the invaders came and departed.
Group A wants their land back seeing it rightfully theirs while group B has a claim of "good" to it as well. And maybe it has something worth fighting over aside from just good dirt. Gold, gems, maybe its the site of a 50 year coterminus(sp?) junction with some other plane.
You can then flush out the nationalities of the two groups (or of the one group, and the distinct tribes of the "squatters" or whatever).
Not sure that entirely fits the bill but its what came to mind.
-S
edit: weird, I posted this then it didn't show up but was in my post history. so, posting it again!
The crusades and the surrounding wars were about which believers in Christ were the most right. Both sides believed that they were the good guys and that the other side was the bad guys. Religion is the real life cause for most wars.
Only if you don't scratch the surface. Even the Crusades were largely about acquiring land for a lot of knights that would have caused heaps of trouble at home if they didn't have a place to invade. Actual, honestly religious wars? Far less common than you might think.
Wars are usually about greed. Greed for land, for money/gold, greed for so me resource (oil now-a-days). The people at the top usually do a good job of painting it a something else, but it's still greed.
Take the 4th crusades (I think it was the 4th, working from memory here). Lots of knights go out to invade the holy land for God and Church and whatnot, right? Well, they didn't have the money for ships to get there, so the Venetians stepped up to offer ships...if they invaded Constantinople (the Venetian's competition). That wasn't even a sect-vs-sect religious war, it was a cutthroat business maneuver.
The crusades and the surrounding wars were about which believers in Christ were the most right. Both sides believed that they were the good guys and that the other side was the bad guys. Religion is the real life cause for most wars.
Only if you don't scratch the surface. Even the Crusades were largely about acquiring land for a lot of knights that would have caused heaps of trouble at home if they didn't have a place to invade. Actual, honestly religious wars? Far less common than you might think.
I second that. Religion and ideology are often used to sucker the rubes into going along with a war or crusade or police action, but the real reasons of the actual movers and shakers is almost always economic or about maintaining or gaining more real world power.
In terms of setting Good aligned beings against each other that is tricky because if they really are Good aligned (as opposed to just claiming to be as in this world) then I can think of only a few circumstances in which they could be set against each other. One of these would be a situation in which there is a life or death disagreement over which course to take is the highest good.
In the Avengers movie, the secret council that Nick Fury answers to decides that the highest Good is to nuke New York to stop the alien invasion that threatens the entire world. Nick Fury decides that the highest Good is to give the Avengers more time to save the city and then the world and actually fires an RPG (or something) at the bomber taking off. There is a clear case of two forces acting for the greater Good coming into violent conflict. Superhero comics generally have a lot of story lines like this were misunderstandings will set heroes at odds with one another and they end up fighting. A common one is where two god like beings decide to have a kind of chess game and pick two hero teams to fight it out for the continued existence of their respective worlds.
Group A (Chaotic Good) has captured a slew of Evil short-lived race X, with the goal of slowly changing their ways to good through generations of exposure, teaching, and reward for good behavior.
Group B (Lawful Good) has sworn an oath to never suffer an evil to live. Therefore they would have to go be at odds with Group A to get to X. It doesn't even have to be openly hostile, they could try to kidnap members of X and give them an opportunity to show their true colors, upon which they judge their entire tribe. For the sooner they get Group A to abandon this fool's quest, the sooner they will go off and do some actual efficient good.
...and the players could be the group kidnapped and set loose inside an elaborate moral test to decide the fate of their race.
The (Chaotic) Good vigilantes would like to race into the area and kill off all the evil guys.
The (Lawful) Good police insist that haste produces errors and things need to be addressed through the courts instead.
For extra credit, describe a situation where two Neutral Good factions are in armed conflict.
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In the early years of warhammer 40k, they had an idea of war bands where the leader had a spark of the god emperors soul. They were crusading against evils that the god emperor himself was sending them up agains. However, the inquisition felt these guys were dangerous heretics, and were sending loyalist forces to try and eradicate them, since they were mostly unsanctioned psychers and freely mixed with xenos species.
At the same time, the god emperor himself sent different forces to help or hinder these guys, since his mind had fractured so much over the milennia that different parts of his own psyche were working against itself.
That there is a great way to set up a good vs good style war. In pathfinder you could use remnant sparks of Arodens soul, and the remainder of his believers or the new religion that filled that void believe that they are possessed of some taint trying to bring down their current rebuilding efforts.
Hoping that gives some sort if inspiration at least.
Cheers
wow. great ideas.
I especially liked the ones put forth by Wrath and Scott Carter though black tom had a good point. how far WOULD the sides go against each other?
would neutral good angels fight and kill lawful good angels?
come to think of it... what sparked the first angel war in the PF universe which lead to shadow angels and erinyeses? it seems to be a throwback to traditional christian lore but was there an actuall event in pathfinder history?
thanks for the great ideas, I am usually pretty creative but some time need a seed to work with.
always open for more.
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In my home campaign, there is a lawful good nation who is willing to drain the furtility of surrounding lands in order to maximize their own crop yields and support an oversized population and army. their goal is to invade the wicked outside lands and purge evil from the world. there are several druidic factions who believe thier magical draining to be an evil abomination. most of the involved druids are nuetral good. i have debated an open war breaking out as a new storyline for some time.