an in depth look at detect evil


Pathfinder First Edition General Discussion


The loathsome power, the plot ruiner, the ultimate ability to jump to conclusions.

OR so it was known in 1e.
The annoyingness of this ability, or rather it's gross over use in the 80s at gaming tables is the source of causing strife today.

Dm: You meet a man....
Paladin interjects: I detect evil!
Dm: .... let me finish, he's just a man you only have seen this second...
Paladin: I detect evil!
Dm: Sigh.... yes he's evil
Paladin: SLAY.

The birth of the problem

later editions of the rule sets sought to fix this by eliminating the spell know alignment and changing detect evil so it worked on artifacts, places, demons, devils, etc. but not people.
Almost defeating the purpose of the power to exist at all.

Detect evil has been changed back for sometime now, and it's still th problem child. For the same reasons above.

But let's look at this, what is it, why can the paladin do it.

If I walked up to a person in the bar, and grabbed a boob, and then turned around to my pals and said "Yep, it's and female and yes, they ARE real"
1) that would take someone completely plastered to do it (well maybe not)
2) a monsterous invasion of privacy

I propose to look at it this way, is it LAWFUL to probe people's auras without suspicion?
Wouldn't the detect evil power be A) precautionary or B) a back up confirmation for suspicion?

Precautionary: You are protecting the king during a session of court he is holding, and the evil cult of king slayers is expected to make an attempt on his life, the PCs might make a shake down line to all that are admitted in the kings presence and have the pally 'scan' them. Possibly not admitting anyone that detected as evil.

Confirmation: Old man jones is suspected by the party as the person behind the mysterious disappearances of people in town. He's been acting strangely as of late, according to townsfolk that know him. Is he under a charm? Being controlled? Down right evil? Or is he just a weird old man? Detect evil might help confirm some suspicions. IF yes he does detect evil, that would lead the party to investigate in another manner, or question him more rudely. Or even possibly warrant the paladin allowing the rouge to rifle through the mans stuff to possibly find more evidence.

However, if in a dungeon, fighting off packs of wild evil monsters, you have to ask your self, why is the paladin and his compatriots HERE? The investigation above would have already been carried out and the justification to enter said dungeon would already have been done (ie old man jones is a new convert to the cult of urgathoa, he detected evil due to his level of evil cleric, the party followed him here, where they found him feeding his pet zombies... blah blah blah) OR they stumble on a warren full of goblins, the dwarf in the party who speaks goblin confirms from eavesdropping the goblins are planning an assault on the nearby town of peaceful hollow. Tada stop the goblins.....

In this case it's rather redundant for the paladin to keep spamming detect evil, IF they come across something un predicted, like live human prisoners? Perhaps detect evil is warranted to make sure they aren't some kind of plant or twisted trap. After all, why ARE they prisoners? 4 out of the 5 could be captured towns people meant for food and the 5th could be the cult leaders former lieutenant that has fallen into disfavor, and is slated to be food as well. Letting HIM out would be a bad idea.

So rather than judging the power (by saying something like the presence of evil does not = smite) let me instead propose that yes, it does mean that. The person is evil, and a great danger, the potential to wreak havoc and harm or kill others is present and neigh.
BUT the USE of the power, and/or the justification thereof.....
Wandering town, detecting evil like a radar is NOT a lawful practice, it's paranoid, distrustful, imposing and hardly reserved behavior.
Like wise IF for a reasonable purpose the Paladin detected evil on someone , IN town, under the jurisdiction and protection of the laws of that town, the paladin cannot lawful do something about it without further, better evidence.
The detection would only mean, keep an eye on old man jones, your suspicion is right.

However catching old man jones in the wild, with a carriage full of halflings, screaming for help (all of whom do not detect as evil) is plenty license for beat down.

However, what if old man jones is only the pawn and not the ring leader? How will you get to the bottom of this if you just slice old man jones's head off? Some parties may have the paladin who does this, and yea that sucks, but I also propose that this too may be an unlawful act.
A honorable, reserved, constrained knight of order does not just ride down foes, he gives quarter, he shows mercy, and he does capture enemies, He MIGHT execute old man jones after the fact (and yes this is OK to do, summary execution is in the paladins right and power). But the paladin wants to cleanse all evil, not just this one guy. Cutting the heads off everything he sees that detects evil will leave a very frustrated, disorganized and rather CHAOTIC paladin.

So I propose it's not the evidence the power gives that is the problem, it;s the USE of the power that is the problem. What is the paladins justified reasons for using the power? and thereafter how does he go about making his decisions once he has gotten his divine knowledge?

Old man jones might turn from the ways of urgathoa once threatened with death at the end of the paladins blade, perhaps he was coerced into the worship of this god and participation in the cults activities? Maybe if he didn't do this the cult leader was going to feed his daughter to the ghouls? You never know, all these reasons would still make him DETECT evil. But the paladin should get to the bottom of it.
BUT if there is no remorse, no reason to believe there are mitigating circumstances, then yes the man can be executed. No the paladin doesn't need a level 3 expert judge to sentence death on the prisoner. The paladin has followed his code and satisfied his god. The god has given the paladin his powers for a reason, and it's not so that justice can be carrie out by the level 3 expert.

Nuff said


It would depend on the kingdom. I think most kingdoms would be okay with a paladin spamming detect evil because they don't want evil people in their kingdom. Some may feel otherwise though.


It's not the kingdoms laws. It's the Paladins own code of ethics. a Lawful person is reserved, respectful, considerate, etc. Not a boob grabber.

What reason would the paladin have to detect evil on anything walking he would see? and what f he did get a result? then what? mount up and ride the person down? Not lawful behavior.

Plus if the paladin became known for that behavior, then evil guys could do all sorts of things to cause people they wanted dead to detect falsely, guaranteeing the death at the hands of the paladin, spreading more chaos.

This whole scenario doesn't fly, long before we get to the good vs. evil argument.


It's funny--I've never used my Paladin's detect evil in a social situation. It seems unusual and unnatural to me. I've also not bothered to Detect Evil when definitely in a fight (unless I was unsure about smiting something, in which case I'll use the move action version).

What I do use it for all the time, though, that drives the GM completely nuts because he never considered it before, is scouting. Detect Evil can penetrate up to "1 foot of stone, 1 inch of common metal, a thin sheet of lead, or 3 feet of wood or dirt." I never open a door in a dangerous situation without detecting evil through it.

It doesn't stop us from wandering into otherwise neutral creature's laps, but they're just as surprised as we are when that happens. It does stop neutral enemies from ambushing us, though, because that's evil intent.


Curious, I don't use it much either, except in situations like old man jones... hmmm i wonder.

Never tried to use it to scout through walls before though.
Dont you have to focus on one specific creature though? How do you do that through a wall?
Other wise you only know, "yes there is evil over there" but it doesn't give you much to go on. Could be an evil altar with no one inside, could be an army of orcs.

Shadow Lodge

Pendagast wrote:

Dm: You meet a man....

Paladin interjects: I detect evil!
Dm: .... let me finish, he's just a man you only have seen this second...
Paladin: I detect evil!
Dm: Sigh.... yes he's evil
Paladin: SLAY.

Paladin falls. Being a serial killer isn't being LG.

Yeah, Bob the Baker was kind of an ass, and he put his thumb on the scale when he charged people, but I'm not sure it was a capital offense.

Besides, by killing random people who are evil, you are adding to the hordes of devils/demons/daemons. Long, long ago a paladin killed an evil, bloated spellcaster instead of trying to redeem him. Fast forward a few aeons, and that spellcaster's soul is now the demon lord Orcus.


Pendagast wrote:

It's not the kingdoms laws. It's the Paladins own code of ethics. a Lawful person is reserved, respectful, considerate, etc. Not a boob grabber.

What reason would the paladin have to detect evil on anything walking he would see? and what f he did get a result? then what? mount up and ride the person down? Not lawful behavior.

There is nothing to indicate that using detect evil is any more invasive than looking at someone or listening to them talk. The issue here is whether you have the right to secretely be an evil person. I don't think a paladin would consider that a right that should be protected by their code.

There was a rather long discussion on the forums recently where many people argued that a paladin killing someone because they ping as evil is completely okay. It could very well be lawful behavior if the paladins code includes "destroy all evil". Then the Paladin would be obligated to kill the evil person.

Alternately, the paladin could use the "pinging as evil" as probable cause to investigate the person further. Because either the person is evil or their is an evil caster nearby using misdirection. Both would require a paladins attention.

Liberty's Edge

mplindustries wrote:


What I do use it for all the time, though, that drives the GM completely nuts because he never considered it before, is scouting. Detect Evil can penetrate up to "1 foot of stone, 1 inch of common metal, a thin sheet of lead, or 3 feet of wood or dirt." I never open a door in a dangerous situation without detecting evil through it.

In my experience that is exactly the function for which it was used from 1st ed onward.

I have never meet a paladin doing detect evil/smite as his tactic (BTW, that is a 3.x construct, smite didn't existed in 1st and 2nd edition).

Maybe it is because there isn't a lack of evil guys that haven't broken the law in my world.

Evil man Jones and his carriage of halflings? Slavery is allowed in Chelaxia, Quadira or Nidal.
"a Lawful person is reserved, respectful, considerate, etc."? The Nazi government was certainly lawful evil but it wasn't reserved, respectful or considerate. A LG person is generally reserved, respectful, considerate, will work better, and even that is a generalization.


in the case of old man jones again, it would be more prudent (and organized/thorough - a lawful trait) to investigate what was going on. if he jus slices his head off, he may never find the lair, may never find prisoners to release, and wouldn't stop the disappearing people, as the ghouls would still be hungry.

Liberty's Edge

Pendagast wrote:

Curious, I don't use it much either, except in situations like old man jones... hmmm i wonder.

Never tried to use it to scout through walls before though.
Dont you have to focus on one specific creature though? How do you do that through a wall?
Other wise you only know, "yes there is evil over there" but it doesn't give you much to go on. Could be an evil altar with no one inside, could be an army of orcs.

PRD wrote:
Detect Evil (Sp): At will, a paladin can use detect evil, as the spell. A paladin can, as a move action, concentrate on a single item or individual within 60 feet and determine if it is evil, learning the strength of its aura as if having studied it for 3 rounds. While focusing on one individual or object, the paladin does not detect evil in any other object or individual within range.

As written a Paladin can do both versions. The regular one, requiring 3 rounds to pinpoint the sources in a area and his special version that check a single target.

The radar version is the first one, not the second.
Note that bot version still read the aura strength and a evil non cleric of level 4 or less isn't detected.

Silver Crusade

Being Evil is probably not against the law. If your Paladin is running around chopping off the heads of everything and everyone he detects as evil see the serial killer comment above.

Not to mention that if a creature is 5hd or less it will not detect as evil, ever. Low HD persons/creatures have no aura. As the HD increase they gain an aura ranging from faint(6-10) to overwhelming (51+)

Now aligned undead, aligned outsiders, clerics, paladins, anti-paladins have auras... and will detect at 1 HD.

People miss use Detect Evil all the time.

Detect evil is not as powerful as people make it out to be. Just because the Kings advisor has a faint aura of darkness about his soul doesn't mean the Paladin gets to cut off his head on sight. It does mean the Paladin will likely keep a close eye on said advisor. Of course the Advisor may be entirely loyal to the king and have no plans to do harm to his leige or the kingdom... or he could be bent on world domination.


well an advisor could be LE of high enough level to detect.
He could be abusing his power to further his own gain (selling halfings into slavery and putting the coin in his own pocket or whatever) But yea there is no lawful way to bring him down for it at sword point. Halfling slavery might even be legal in that country...


I am having a discussion with the paladin player in my group on this subject right now. He invokes "detect evil" on everyone he meets, regardless of circumstances and regardless of suspicion or threat. And when he detects evil he immediately goes into full-bore paladin-must-attack mode.

This is a major, major reason I don't like paladins either as a player or a GM.

In our last session he finally encountered a major NPC who is part of a civil war. He is essentially the general of one side, the rebel side, if you will. As his army was pushed to the brink and eventually defeated, he agreed to a bargain with some evil tribes of orcs, goblins and ogres to come to his aid.

The NPC in question is not, as I have written it, an "evil" person. He is a person who feels that he has been forced to consort with evil types to defeat an enemy HE believes is evil. And yet he is now allied with evil forces, and as such is culpable in some part for the atrocities those evil forces have committed in the civil war.

So when the paladin finally met him, of course he immediately did "detect evil!" on him. So I said "you detect a taint of evil."

He responded with "He's evil or he's not, what's his alignment?"

I said "You did 'detect evil' on him, not 'detect alignment' and you detect a taint of evil."

His response was "there's no such thing as a 'taint of evil'!"

So I had to invoke Rule zero and say "in my world, there is. You detect a taint of evil, but you do not feel the man is irredeemable. What do you do?"

And we moved on. But this is just one instance of his use of the power in ways that I believe reduce the potential for the game to have subtle interplay between characters.


Are paladins allowed to tolerate slavery?

5e does this so much better. Detect Evil is the "this town is weird" sense, and doesn't work on individuals.

Grand Lodge

I'm not sure this answers any questions, but I ran into an interesting situation while playing my paladin character recently. The party came across a single woman, who appeared to be trapped an alone and my paladin tried to detect evil just to make sure it wasn't a trap. It turns out that she was evil, but she was also trapped and alone, and I decided that the decent thing would be to help her get home since she was not actually causing any trouble at the time. I wondered, in hindsight, if I should have acted more aggressively, though the DM did not give me any hassle about it.

What mod was it?:
The module in question was The Frozen Fingers of Midnight, and the woman was the one on the frozen ship at the end. She never tries to do anything evil in the mod (it's unclear how much she played a role in ending up on a frozen ship full of undead) so she didn't strike me as someone who needed to be smote without question. My paladin tends to be less strict that many I read about on these message boards, though.


While I think that it is entirely reasonable for a society to consider such magic to be unreasonable invasions of individual privacy, it should be noted that Detect Evil as written should NEVER be used as a justification for violence.

The reason being that the magic returns "false positives". A creature with evil intentions registers as evil - one who may even be good aligned. For example: A young metallic dragon wanders a city for the first time while shapeshifted into a human. The dragon hasn't fully come to terms yet with the concept of simian creatures being fully sapient and cruelly plans to take candy from a baby out of curiosity. Paladin walks by, dragon has enough HD to register, and (CRB, p.267) "Creatures with actively evil intents count as evil for purposes of this spell." Smite ensues.

Oops...stealing candy from a baby is undeniably evil but does not justify the MURDER of the perpetrator. Paladin falls.

Alternately: A neutral follower of an Evil-aligned deity will register as evil despite not personally having that alignment. A legitimately neutral cleric may feel that an Evil deity has a valid place in the world or even be trying to temper some of the excesses of his/her religion. Smite on sight not justified.


home brew wise "We" (as in people i have always gamed with over a 25 year period) have always run it like adamantite dragon, "light evil, medium evil, this place gives you a head ache, and you passed out and got blown back 30 feet when you tried to detect"

But of course that's a personal flare.

howeever AD's player is wrong, because it specifically states there are different intensities that can be detected.

It doesn't tell you an alignment, it tells you how strong.

I go a little further with it (which i didnt make up, it was first introduced by a DM I dont even particularly like) and it is like a mental "search" , a mind/personality probe if you will.

But that's not exactly cannon, or is it?

What does detect evil look like? If someone was using detect magic at the time, would the paladin radiate evil?

I assume detect evil LOOK like someone who is talking on the phone, but has an ear bud. You walk up to them and say "hey man whats up" only to realize they aren't paying attention to you.

I think a perception/sense motive would be able to realize what it was the paladin was doing (he's either concentrating on a spell or detecting evil, or having a telepathic communication etc)

the paladin could, for example mask the fact he is detecting evil on someone by carrying on a conversation with them, or possibly even someone else, but I would require some kind of a roll (possibly bluff)

Or he could just stand there with his hand out stretched like a jedi.

It depends, is he trying to conceal what he is doing?

But the detect evil radar thing like AD's player is doing is the REASON why we have people who hunt the paladin in game trying to make him fall (obsessively)

I fully disagree with Shadowdweller, a neutral person devoted to an evil god, as in a cleric of that god is worshipping and furthering the plans of the evil diety and is a mortal representative of that evil god.
It doesn't matter what the person thinks is justified, it matters what the paladins god thinks. The power is a direct communication from the god (otherwise wouldnt be lost when he was found unworthy) The paladin is the enemy of evil and this person detects as such.

WHAT a paladin will do with that information is something else. Killing evil isn't murder, because a murder victim must be innocent, this person isnt innocent.

False positive is a ridiculous DM fabrication because said DM is searching for reasons to nerd to power.

What I'm trying to say is STOP. the power is fine and is simple and works like it says, there is no 'interpretations'

It's the Paladins motivations and behaviors in USING the power.

The walking detect evil radar is not acceptable behavior and is the issue that needs to be addressed, not the invention or interpretation of false positives.

Silver Crusade

Reading what Pendagast has written, it seems that his actual problem is not the ability to detect evil at will, but how the paladin behaves upon getting a positive result!


Kimera757 wrote:

Are paladins allowed to tolerate slavery?

5e does this so much better. Detect Evil is the "this town is weird" sense, and doesn't work on individuals.

yes. a paladin can 'tolerate' slavery. If this wasn't true, either NO paladins would exist (because they were all killed trying to abolish slavery in the world) or NO slavery would exist (because the paladins descended on the offenders like locusts and abolished the slavery) so by virtue of it existing, means they must be able to tolerate it.

Paladins can work with those they know to be evil to further the greater good. Seelah is teamed up with Seltyiel for the entire AP of Council of thieves. By the end of that AP, Seltyiel would be 16-18th level. An extremely powerful evil person, yet tolerated by seelah?
Only because the acts of seltyiel fall in with her desire to stop the main antagonists.
However, Seelah also wouldn't fall if she decided Seltyiel needed to go. He is after all, evil, extremely powerful and very dangerous.

It's just one thing at a time, if he doesn't represent the highest priority seelah can actually handle herself, (1st level paladins arent expected to take on the nation of cheliax themselves)
then she may have cause to party with him, and 'tolerate' him.

The large issue of slavery, although certainly a target for abolishment, isn't the number one issue on the paladin or his gods agenda either. Paladins are after all, Lawful as well and do things in methodical manner, not running after every good cause that occurs to them that day.


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Adamantine Dragon wrote:

I am having a discussion with the paladin player in my group on this subject right now. He invokes "detect evil" on everyone he meets, regardless of circumstances and regardless of suspicion or threat. And when he detects evil he immediately goes into full-bore paladin-must-attack mode.

This is a major, major reason I don't like paladins either as a player or a GM.

As cliched as it may sound, it sounds like a player problem not a class problem.

Maybe a very common player problem (seriously, what's so fun about playing the stick-up-your-ass Smite machine that so many people do it?), but a player problem nonetheless.

We've gotten lucky, our Paladin adheres to a nice strict code of personal morals that I think work pretty well for most Paladins. Lessee if I can dig it up.

Doctor Dakka aka Corvus Bellator wrote:

The Summary of Corvus

Or

"Paladins who won't Smite you."

Tl;Dr
-Would rather reform evil than kill it.
-Would rather use diplomacy than skull crushing.
-Will refuse to do things that don't fall in line with Beliefs (Ex: Break Laws, Attack Unprovoked)
-Tolerates Evil to the extent that it can be controlled and brought to Order.


Malachi Silverclaw wrote:
Reading what Pendagast has written, it seems that his actual problem is not the ability to detect evil at will, but how the paladin behaves upon getting a positive result!

Detecting evil at will doesn't mean that you should always do it.

The car can go 150 mph, SHOULD you go that fast?
is it prudent, acceptable, reasonable to do it?

The paladin can also swing is sword at will, how would he look/behave/be perceived if he constantly swung his sword around?

He can talk at will, would he constantly, unendiingly talk?

No. he would not. Neither would he make such statements as "I always have detect evil on"

I may as DM have him make will saves with increasing negative modifiers until he just gets exhausted and can no longer do it again. Then I would have him exhausted for the rest of the day until he rested as per normal. Or was treated magically. Just like if he swung his sword constantly, or hopped on one leg with out end.

There are physical and mental limits to anything that is "at will"

However, what would a lawful person do? constantly scan a crowd of strangers day in day out to detect evil? No. I would argue he would not.

Silver Crusade

Pendagast wrote:
However, what would a lawful person do? constantly scan a crowd of strangers day in day out to detect evil? No. I would argue he would not.

And I would argue otherwise.

Gods don't give paladins the power to detect evil just so long as they promise not to use it!

You've got it backwards. You would only have a paladin detect evil if they already found another reason to suspect evil. I would have a paladin detect evil in order to gain information that there might be a reason that this person is detecting as evil.

We would agree, I think, that a creature detecting of evil is usually not enough of a reason to attack; each situation must be judged on its merits.

When we meet someone for the first time, we look them up and down, assessing them to the best of our sensory ability. This is such an ingrained survival response that we don't even realise we do it. I would assert that it would be sooner rather than later that a paladin starts to 'assess' people they meet 'to the best of their sensory ability', and it would become such an automatic survival response that no more concious thought would go into the mechanics of it than we think about the mechanics of walking when we stroll across a room.

I also see no reason to imagine any obvious outward manifestation when the paladin uses this ability, though a Sense Motive check may give a clue (that may be easy to solve if he is known to be a paladin).

I also find it difficult to believe that the use of detect evil could be against the law, anymore than a con-man's cold reading of a potential mark could be illegal. Modern ideas of 'Miranda rights', 'reasonable cause', even 'innocent until proven guilty' are inappropriate to the kinds of societies which exist in worlds like Golarion.

There is no reason to believe that the use of detect evil is stressful or tiring, any more than keeping your eyes peeled for danger! I don't believe that many good-aligned inhabitants would see it as wrong, and I'm confident that neither paladins nor their gods think it's wrong! A modern day defence lawyer may think it's wrong, but what the heck is he doing in Golarion?


It is the GM's place to set the tone. If the players know that killing people who have not actually done anything wrong will get them in trouble they wont do it.


The real problem here isn't so much with detect evil, or with paladins, but with the players of those paladins' (and people who leap to their defense in forum threads) having this total disconnect on what it means to be evil, in game terms.

The short form is, there is capital-E Evil, where you have all your straight-up misery causing baby eating world-ending types, but there is also lowercase-E evil, which includes but is not limited to being a jaded selfish bastard. Even includes those jaded anti-hero types who always do the right thing, but do it with a higher body count and/or insist on getting paid for their trouble.

I'm fairly sure everyone generally agrees that the whole Confirm-Evil-Smite-Evil thing should only be done with capital-E Evil types. Lowercase-E evil either gets a pass, or a stern lecture.

Now, the main thing that keeps Detect Evil in check is, it doesn't distinguish between the two at all. You ping if you eat babies, you ping if you're just really jaded. Now, if you're using the ability as intended, that should still get you the information you want, because you're getting an aura strength, and the three types of people who tend to account for the bulk of capital-E Evil (Evil Outsiders, Undead, committed followers of evil deities) tend to have stronger auras for their level than one would expect. If you know one of several people is a demon in disguise, you can potentially ferret them out by using detect evil on everyone, and fingering the person with the unusually large evil aura. Just make sure it isn't a really tough mercenary type giving you a false positive.

What a lot of people do though is play with a house rule (or more often, assume the group is running with a house rule) where only capital-E Evil detects. Lowercase-E evil is reclassified as neutral, lowercase-N neutral gets reclassified as good, etc. Now, if you do this, sure, you can go ahead and assume anyone detecting as Evil needs to be killed on the spot. We must not let the puppies be eaten or the world ended and all. That's why we have paladins.

If you aren't playing by that house rule though (and incidentally, if you're running a Paizo published module, the assumption is you aren't, make sure to adjust stat blocks accordingly), you better make darn sure you don't go detect-smite without at least tossing in some extra steps like carefully considering aura strength and the various sources of potential false-positives. Otherwise you've made a character who will straight-up murder people whose biggest crime is having an abrasive personality and... yeah that's not Good behavior by any stretch.

GMs meanwhile need to make sure their players have this straight when it first comes up, because it's entirely too common a misconception that that house rule is the default.

Liberty's Edge

Pendagast wrote:

I fully disagree with Shadowdweller, a neutral person devoted to an evil god, as in a cleric of that god is worshipping and furthering the plans of the evil diety and is a mortal representative of that evil god.

It doesn't matter what the person thinks is justified, it matters what the paladins god thinks. The power is a direct communication from the god (otherwise wouldnt be lost when he was found unworthy) The paladin is the enemy of evil and this person detects as such

A paladin don't need to follow any good so his ability to detect evil isn't a communication from the gods and can be mislead or give imprecise informations.

And:

Detect evil wrote:
Animals, traps, poisons, and other potential perils are not evil, and as such this spell does not detect them. Creatures with actively evil intents count as evil creatures for the purpose of this spell.

You can discuss what are actively evil intentions, but a father wanting to torture and murder a person that raped his daughter would register as evil for the spell even if he is neutral or good and that intention alone wouldn't change his alignment. Even taking it generally wouldn't shift his alignment to outright evil unless he was already near the border of that alignment.

Malachi Silverclaw wrote:
Reading what Pendagast has written, it seems that his actual problem is not the ability to detect evil at will, but how the paladin behaves upon getting a positive result!

Make it "some paladin player" and you are right on the spot.

Liberty's Edge

Malachi Silverclaw wrote:
There is no reason to believe that the use of detect evil is stressful or tiring, any more than keeping your eyes peeled for danger!

It require a move action to use the power, against the free perception check character gets in reply to a stimulus, so it require a bit more concentration than a keeping your eyes open. It is like actively searching an area for clues/secret doors/hidden people, something that you don't do every second of your life reflexively.

Silver Crusade

Diego Rossi wrote:
Malachi Silverclaw wrote:
There is no reason to believe that the use of detect evil is stressful or tiring, any more than keeping your eyes peeled for danger!
It require a move action to use the power, against the free perception check character gets in reply to a stimulus, so it require a bit more concentration than a keeping your eyes open. It is like actively searching an area for clues/secret doors/hidden people, something that you don't do every second of your life reflexively.

Using detect evil is akin to using Perception actively instead of passively.

Perception wrote:
Most Perception checks are reactive, made in response to observable stimulus. Intentionally searching for stimulus is a move action.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder Adventure, Rulebook Subscriber

One should not rely so heavily on sight that he does not hear the enemy unseen.


Pathfinder Maps Subscriber

See also this thread, since I'm too lazy to type.


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Tempestorm wrote:

Not to mention that if a creature is 5hd or less it will not detect as evil, ever. Low HD persons/creatures have no aura. As the HD increase they gain an aura ranging from faint(6-10) to overwhelming (51+)

Now aligned undead, aligned outsiders, clerics, paladins, anti-paladins have auras... and will detect at 1 HD.

This is the answer to most of the problems with Detect Evil. I think Pathfinder's rewrite of the ability is genius in this regard.

Demon, zombie, anti-paladin? Not getting past a paladin's scrutiny.
A shopkeeper is Lawful Evil? Beneath a paladin's notice.

Liberty's Edge

Malachi Silverclaw wrote:
Diego Rossi wrote:
Malachi Silverclaw wrote:
There is no reason to believe that the use of detect evil is stressful or tiring, any more than keeping your eyes peeled for danger!
It require a move action to use the power, against the free perception check character gets in reply to a stimulus, so it require a bit more concentration than a keeping your eyes open. It is like actively searching an area for clues/secret doors/hidden people, something that you don't do every second of your life reflexively.

Using detect evil is akin to using Perception actively instead of passively.

Perception wrote:
Most Perception checks are reactive, made in response to observable stimulus. Intentionally searching for stimulus is a move action.

Exactly my point. You don't go around using perception actively every second of your life as it is "stressful or tiring".

Silver Crusade

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Diego Rossi wrote:
Malachi Silverclaw wrote:
Diego Rossi wrote:
Malachi Silverclaw wrote:
There is no reason to believe that the use of detect evil is stressful or tiring, any more than keeping your eyes peeled for danger!
It require a move action to use the power, against the free perception check character gets in reply to a stimulus, so it require a bit more concentration than a keeping your eyes open. It is like actively searching an area for clues/secret doors/hidden people, something that you don't do every second of your life reflexively.

Using detect evil is akin to using Perception actively instead of passively.

Perception wrote:
Most Perception checks are reactive, made in response to observable stimulus. Intentionally searching for stimulus is a move action.
Exactly my point. You don't go around using perception actively every second of your life as it is "stressful or tiring".

Yes. But there's nothing to stop you from actively using Perception as you walk through a crowded marketplace if you are expecting trouble. Likewise, there's nothing to stop a paladin using detect evil in the same way. Ditto when walking through a dungeon.


Googleshng wrote:

The real problem here isn't so much with detect evil, or with paladins, but with the players of those paladins' (and people who leap to their defense in forum threads) having this total disconnect on what it means to be evil, in game terms.

The short form is, there is capital-E Evil, where you have all your straight-up misery causing baby eating world-ending types, but there is also lowercase-E evil, which includes but is not limited to being a jaded selfish bastard. Even includes those jaded anti-hero types who always do the right thing, but do it with a higher body count and/or insist on getting paid for their trouble.

I.

Someone who always does the right thing isn't evil. They would be neutral at worst.


Blueluck wrote:
Tempestorm wrote:

Not to mention that if a creature is 5hd or less it will not detect as evil, ever. Low HD persons/creatures have no aura. As the HD increase they gain an aura ranging from faint(6-10) to overwhelming (51+)

Now aligned undead, aligned outsiders, clerics, paladins, anti-paladins have auras... and will detect at 1 HD.

This is the answer to most of the problems with Detect Evil. I think Pathfinder's rewrite of the ability is genius in this regard.

Demon, zombie, anti-paladin? Not getting past a paladin's scrutiny.
A shopkeeper is Lawful Evil? Beneath a paladin's notice.

On the flip side, it allows a paladin to spam detect evil without worrying about wasting his time on every selfish jerk that walks by. If something in town pings as evil, you know its worth investigating. Its either a very strong selfish jerk or a divinely evil power.

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