Detect Evil and Paladin's actions


Rules Questions


Hi all!

I am fairly new to Pathfinder, I have been playing 4e for a while and switched over to Pathfinder earlier this year and I won't go back to 4e ever again. I do have an important question on regards to some rulings that I am a little confused about.

I am a GM for a group of players and there is a scenario revolving a paladin (current group level is 3) that I want to understand how it works.

Now how does Detect Evil works. Can they detect evil on any creature or only a creature with 5HD+ (or a group of creatures that would total 5HD+). So if he meets a single human that has 2HD can he detect evil on him?

Second question, in my campaign, the group of adventurers have been sent on a quest to kill a leader of a guild. They did sense motive on the quest giver and failed their check and didn't try detect evil. They went on and found the guild members and their leaders (who attacked first on sight as they considered the players invaders of their secret hide out). Combat, victory, guild leader is dead. A character appears in the a secret entrance sees the dead guild leader and cries in sorrow swearing vengeance and runs away successfully.

As the campaign continues, they find out a lot of information and clues of trouble that continuously seemingly to blame that guy they found in the hide-out as the mastermind. They manage to find out where he was hiding and went to him in which fighting happened instantly without discussion (on detect evil as I am not sure about the HD rule then, he found out that the guy was evil thanks to scroll of infernal healing that was used on him earlier which they don't know about) and proceeded to attack the guy.. they kill him and found out through his journal that they have... been mistaken.. they research his journal and evidence and its true they were truly mistaken they not only killed one good align guy but also a whole guild of good people.

What would happen to the paladin in this case? Initially he truly thought he was doing the right thing and honestly believe they were evil or bad people. After he killed the guy and discovered the mistake his first reaction was "he should've came and talked to us first" even tho technically they killed his love (guild leader) in front of him. What would happened to the paladin with his class / alignment as LG.. would he be punished? if so how so? losing his pally powers?

Shadow Lodge

As far as I'm aware (without looking at the rule, can't get to it right now), detect evil has no HD limit. So, any creature.

As for the paladin's actions, he didn't knowingly do wrong - so he's technically fine (although probably upset about it). His alignment isn't affected; intent is what matters more here.

(your campaign sounds pretty cool, by the way. Keen to know what made you think never again to 4E, too)


Hey, and welcome to Pathfinder. So for what I understand and for just detect evil, you can detect if there target is evil if they meet one of the requirements like: being a cleric of an evil god, being undead, I believe if you are 5 HD or lower with no aura's of evilness going on they just come up of not being detected. At least thats the way I understand it. For the Paladin he was acting for good with what he understood. That being said I dont think he should be punished for killing the good guys, unless he knew they were good before killing them. Sorry not making much sense right now about to go to sleep but I think as the DM you should decide on what happens to the paladin. Maybe he needs to support the family of those that died by his hand or something.... I dont know just an idea


Detect evil only works on creatures that explicitly have an evil aura, like clerics of evil gods, demons, ghouls, etc., OR on creatures with more than 5 HD. If it's less than 5 HD and doesn't have a listed aura, it doesn't detect. Reference: James Jacobs, Creative Director

For the second question, that's for the DM and the paladin's player to discuss. The rulebook says:

Quote:
A paladin who ceases to be lawful good, who willfully commits an evil act, or who violates the code of conduct loses all paladin spells and class features

I'd say the important word is "willfully." Unless the player wants to play a fallen paladin, I'd probably just give him a sidequest or something to atone for his tragic mistake. I had a paladin in one of my games who acted hastily and accidentally killed a 14-year-old boy. (Granted, the boy was trying to kill him at the time, but the paladin still felt guilty because he had assumed it was an adult attacking him and didn't wait to find out who he was smiting.) The player himself decided that to atone, his PC would never strike in battle until he had first been struck himself to remind him not to act in haste and anger.

Shadow Lodge

Oh, Detect Evil.

You can use Detect Evil on anything. However, if you follow the chart given in the spell, a humanoid who is not an antipaladin or a cleric of an evil god will not detect as evil.

The Paladin shouldn't fall unless they willingly commit an evil act. This is more of a terrible misunderstanding. On the other hand, I'm not sure the party did their due diligence on this one. What did the quest-giver say that convinced them not only to investigate this guild, not only to take the leader prisoner, but to kill 'em all? Even if he wasn't intentionally lying or under some sort of magical compulsion (the type of thing Sense Motive detects), he could be misinformed about the guild. Did the paladin not at any point notice that his Smite Evil wasn't working properly? If your group is also new to PF/D&D I can understand them not being too suspicious of the quest giver, and in some groups that's just fine, but if you as a GM want to throw this sort of plot development at them they really should learn to do a bit more investigation and maybe take more prisoners for questioning.

Some sort of atonement or quest sounds appropriate. Make some sort of restitution to the victims' families, or take up their cause.


Thanks for the replies, that clears up a lot of confusion about detect evil and how to handle it. As well with the Paladin problem, I was a little confused but that clears it up. I'll be sure to discuss with him about his actions and the effects of it. No punishments unless he wishes to atone for his actions.

@Avatar-1: Thanks for the kind words! The reason I will not go back to 4e because I generally find the rule set in Pathfinder A LOT better and a lot more flexible. There is so much you can do and there is a lot you can customize in your characters. 4e I feel like its a little dumb down, more focused on new players and/or players who enjoy current RPG/MMO games. Tank/healer/DPS/controller system was a bit meh. Pathfinders give the players the room to play the way they wish to play a lot more than 4e would. That is at least how I feel. As for the campaign I am conducting to the group I have been keeping a detailed journal of their adventure so if people are very interested I can share it in an appropriate section of the message board. :)


@Weirdo Well, firstly they are relatively new to the pathfinder/D&D. I need to give you a bit of background info so you understand what was happening. (The whole campaign is set in a world of my creation that I have been working on for long time) The party members were seeking council of an elder elf who is an important figure in the elven society. Not only she is an important, and a very very old figure, she is also considered a High Mistress. High Mistress and High masters are a rank above nobles within the elven society and do important political business. To see such a high figure they were instructed by a secretary of the high masters guild that they will need to show their worth to meet up with them but even then it will take a lot for nobodies to meet up with her. A low class High Master overheard their struggle and felt sorry for them and decided to give them a chance. He can arrange the meeting as long as they prove their worth to him first.

They were sent on a small task at first, they failed HORRIBLY and did everything that they shouldn't do at that quest. The second quest they did it rather excellent job and actually surprised me on their methods. The third task was to kill the assassin's GL. Now the info they received SHOULD make them question the quest giver more or at least the task but due to the desperation of the main quest they are on they have to finish this side quest quick. so they did not bat an eye twice on the situation. They took what he said as truth and went a long with it without doubting his words or investigating the situation a lot further.

The Assassin's GL would've fought to the death for a good reason of her own, and the party didn't even think of just knocking her unconscious and questioning her or her members. The High Master was supplying them with half truths and not the full details. Their sense motive failed as only one attempted and he rolled very very poorly. The quest giver did in fact say that negotiations is far over, they attempted and it failed. No more chances for the guild, their leader has to be brought down. The Paladin didn't use smite evil in that combat at all and in the second combat against the guy he only noticed after delivering one last hit in which he sensed it but before he could react and put 1 and 1 together, his ally already delivered the killing blow.

I agree that they should question and research their actions very carefully. That they sometimes need to take things slow and check things instead of rushing. They had a few moments where they could've done so, I'm slowly teaching them the ways, however it is creating a very very interesting storyline.

Shadow Lodge

Does sound interesting. I can understand their haste and their willingness to trust the High Master, but hopefully this will encourage them to check things where possible and take prisoners.

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