I was pleased that the walking dead allows an ellipsis, "..." for pretty much everything. So you can sit on the fence if you want.
On the ends justifying the means, if you are trying to protect good people, and a fellow lawful or neutral good is in with a bad crowd and manipulated into attacking, well doing good and the ends justifying the means can easily lead to his death to protect those in your charge.
If...
There was no way to remove the child from the BBEG.
There was no way to dispel the effect that would harm the child.
There was no way to get an anti-magic field around the BBEG or the child.
Breath of Life (via Channeled Revival) couldn't bring the child back from about -20hp because I chose to make a non-lethal attack before smiting the hell out of the BBEG...
Then any Paladin I play that ends up in this sort of no-win situation would fall, and I would never play a Paladin with that GM again. And I would tell him exactly what I think of such contrived impossible situations in a game.
You may well be able to remove the term "a Paladin" in there, too.
Though I am curious as to where you get "Despair is a sin" from, would you mind quoting a passage for me, because I've never seen that.
And I repeat again: a paladin would ALWAYS believe that another way exists, and search for it. It's called "faith".
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And I repeat again: a paladin would ALWAYS believe that another way exists, and search for it. It's called "faith".
Or he would accept that it is his deity's will for him to perpetrate an evil act and fall. Even though he cannot understand the reason for it, he will blindly trust in his deity's infinite wisdom.
And this also is called "faith".
I'd rather call it a handy way of justifying an evil act to himself... Like so many witch hunters or conquistadores did in the real world. "Yes, it may SEEM evil, but God asks this..."
Seriously, you need to give up this whole line of thinking. If you're not applying ends and means to a moral situation then you're playing a lame semantic game and should not be taken seriously. Getting a drink of water, no matter how much you want it to be, is not a morally ambiguous situation. Like I said above, at this point you're just trolling for a 'gotcha.'
Sounds like you are presenting a straw-man argument in an attempt to discredit my statement. Sweeping statements using "Always" and "Never" are frequently wrong.
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Despair was once counted among the deadly sins (there were eight, not seven), and still today many theologists see it as the main sin committed by Judas
Though I am curious as to where you get "Despair is a sin" from, would you mind quoting a passage for me, because I've never seen that.
Neato.
And I repeat again: a paladin would ALWAYS believe that another way exists, and search for it. It's called "faith".
There's a difference between faith and deluding yourself (though there's a very thin line sometimes).
Heh. If the Paladin is lying to himself, is that cause for a fall?
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Heh. If the Paladin is lying to himself, is that cause for a fall?
O.O
/Dives for bomb shelter!!!!!!
How can I be certain that I'm deluding himself? How can I be certain of the consequences of a choice above another? "You're lying to yourself" is a typical villain line, to bring the hero to doubt and make the wrong choice. If this is a trial from my deity, and I fail, what could the consequences be? Could my deity (supposedly good and merciful) really want me to commit an evil deed? No, I refuse to believe that. There HAS to be another way.
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I'd rather call it a handy way of justifying an evil act to himself... Like so many witch hunters or conquistadores did in the real world. "Yes, it may SEEM evil, but God asks this..."
But what then if they actually and sincerely believe it to be God's will ?
"The Lord works in mysterious ways" is a staple of the faith.
Or do you believe that PCs should be immune to common human failings ?
Could my deity (supposedly good and merciful) really want me to commit an evil deed? No, I refuse to believe that. There HAS to be another way.
That is the choice that YOUR Paladin makes.
Another Paladin, with his own view and opinion about the universe and his place in it, could make a very different choice and he would still be a Paladin (if a fallen one), true to his faith.
After all, being sure that you know your god's mind and how it works smacks of hubris coming from a mere mortal being. Imposing the imperfect mortal, and extremely personal, view of what good and merciful mean to a Greater God's worldview lacks in humility to say the least.
Of course, we as players know how things are. But a PC does not.
So, what is faith for one is hubris for another. And what is an unacceptable choice for one is a hard but inevitable choice for another. And how can we know what the god -or the GM- believes? If we reason this way, I could do the right thing just doing what he reputes best. How can I tell? What if I don't agree with that?
I just can do what I think right- and hope.
As for myself, better to fall for a lack in humility than for taking an innocent life.
I remit myself to my god's judgment and mercy. I did my best, and I have no regrets.
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You are right, except for one thing : a Paladin PC has spent many years learning the ethos of his deity (at the very least the code he is supposed to follow). Thus he should already have a pretty good idea/belief of what the Gods (ie, the GM) expect from him. Which practically mandates that the Paladin's player spends time checking the GM's opinion on the code and reasons for a fall.
That can even be done IC by finding a wiser (ie, higher-level) member of your order or your church and ask them questions about the code, what constitutes evil actions and so on.
And if you do not agree with your GM, you should try to convince him. Because in the end the GM will be the only judge of what Good, Evil, Law, Chaos and Neutral are in his world.
Better to identify and deal with a disagreement on such sensitive issues before the game even begins than during play.
And so we're back where we started. ^_^
However, in real life, you wouldn't have a GM to talk to, so all you could do (all you CAN do in odds like this) is judge, act and hope the best you can.
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And of course, most GMs will tell you if what you are about to do will cause a fall. In my experience, Paladins very rarely fall. The GM will just tells the player "If you do that, you lose all your powers" and the player changes the action.
If I was the Paladin's player and I had not realized that the action was cause for a fall, I would likely change it.
However, if I knew beforehand that the action was likely to make me fall and decided to do it nonetheless, I would not change anything, even after the GM's clarification.
IMO a Paladin must be a character of utter conviction.
The ends never justify the means.
You don't lie to people to save thier feelings? Even if they are lies of ommission?
You've never skipped work because you just werent feeling up to it, and needed a break so that you dont burn out?
I'm not saying you're a paladin or anything. I'm just saying that the statement is... rigid, and yes Paladins are rigid.
I had a paladin in one of my campaigns who was the guardian of his goddess' daughter. His part of being a paladin was that he had to protect her at all costs. Well... the goddess attacked the priestess that it was his primary duty to protect. There is no action or inaction that the paladin could take that would be the right choice.
Life just isn't black and white.
The ends never justify the means.
You don't lie to people to save thier feelings? Even if they are lies of ommission?
Lies of omission are not lies. People group them the same but they really aren't. Same way Rogue and Ninja arenm't the same. No one says Ninja are underpowered but Rogues are.
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I played a paladin for 2 years of weekly games, the longest-running campaign I've ever had the pleasure of being a part of. Mine was a paladin of Pelor (3.5) and the chosen champion of that god, blessed with a sacred shield, holy griffon mount and, by 20th-level, a sword that was an angel.
Paladin ethics fascinate me, and let me start by saying that nobody is wrong. As we all know, the important point is that the GM and player are on the same page regarding the morality of the game world. That said, let me add to the discussion by talking about how it worked in our game.
The ends never justify the means. Now I've seen a few folks in this thread talking about buying a bus ticket to go shopping and so on, but that's not what we're talking about here. What we're talking about here is a moral scenario, in which a paladin is given the option of accomplishing a goal (the ends) through a certain set of actions (the means), wherein the goal is noble (usually saving the world) and the means are tainted (killing an innocent, for instance).
Some folks in this thread suggest that the paladin should kill the child and save the world, even at the cost (most assuredly) of his own soul. To do otherwise would be to value his own soul over the well-being of the entire world, a sin of both pride and arrogance.
I respectfully disagree. Doing so not only taints the paladin, it taints the entire world. A world saved through innocent blood is itself tainted for all time. What good is it to save the world if, in the process, you destroy its soul?
The hard choice here, for the paladin, is to risk the destruction of all to find a way to save the world and its innocence. To not take the easy way out, no matter how painful it is. He has to have faith that he can find a way to save the world that doesn't involve killing an innocent. God is with him in this. By God's grace, he will find a way, or die trying.
(Incidentally, this gives me a great idea for a future campaign that has been "saved" through innocent blood. The sun goes dark, and the world turns into a cold, "post-apocalyptic" type setting until the adventurers can discover what happened ages ago, and redeem the world from the paladin's sin...)
Can a paladin lie? Yes, but he will never do so if he can possibly help it. Paladins are champions of truth. However, they are not (at least how I play them), stupid. To further is heroic purpose, he may be forced to lie. Should he do so, he will seek confession with a priest of his God at the earliest opportunity.
Can a paladin travel/associate with evil individuals? Yes and no. Mortals are fallible. Many of them commit petty evils on occasion. This does not make them Evil with a capital E. Their alignments are probably Neutral or Lawful-Neutral. These he can deal with. Evil with a capital 'E' is reserved for the truly despicable. For demons and morals with truly black hearts. These he cannot abide. Tolerating such for convenience's sake is, again, the easy way. And the paladin is not about the easy path.
In my game there was a cleric of Farlangyn who would repeatedly make...morally questionable...suggestions. Luckily for him, I was the leader of our group, so they remained suggestions only. Still, I gave him the Evil Eye (Detect Evil) repeatedly throughout the campaign. He never pinged on the Evil-dar. Luckily for him. :p
Paladins are about doing what is right despite the difficulty. They are about choosing never to sacrifice the innocent. To tolerate Evil. To take the easy way out. They're about taking the high road, and having faith that God will show them the way.
Lies of omission are not lies. People group them the same but they really aren't.
They really are. They're used for the same purpose: To obfuscate the truth. In both cases you are hiding or withholding information required for the other person to reach the correct conclusion.
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A world saved through innocent blood is itself tainted for all time.
The world is not a sentient being, it has no soul, if it is saved by the means of killing an innocent than the world spins on, unaware that innocent blood saved it, unaware that it has been saved, in fact unaware at all as it's not sentient!
The sun will not turn red as a consequence, the sky will not darken, the seas will not boil.
The world will spin on, oblivious.
A world saved through innocent blood is itself tainted for all time.The world is not a sentient being, it has no soul, if it is saved by the means of killing an innocent than the world spins on, unaware that innocent blood saved it, unaware that it has been saved, in fact unaware at all as it's not sentient!
The sun will not turn red as a consequence, the sky will not darken, the seas will not boil.
The world will spin on, oblivious.
Our real world maybe would (I say MAYBE because... well, one never can tell... maybe it does have a soul and we just don't know... XD). But a FANTASY world? I'm inclined to agree with Lord.
On a side note: I once had a GM who loved throwing things like these at me. Her base group loved dark fantasy stories. I didn't, and we didn't know each other well enough at the time to recognize and settle our different tastes. It was her first time mastering, and my first time as a player... She implicitly sort of chose me to be the main heroine, and this doubled the stress! She threw in supposedly despicable but inevitable choices with little warning, and only AFTER sourly taking what I believed was the only path I was informed that there could have been another way.
In short, after the campaign end we fought at length, and I'm surprised that we were able to save our friendship.
Always, ALWAYS be careful with things like this.
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Lord Pendragon had an idea for a campaign based in a world of his own creation; a world 'tainted' by being previously saved by the shedding of innocent blood.
That is actually a really cool idea for a campaign! But it is not how each fantasy world works by default! He made that up! It is not something that applies as a general rule!
Further, unlike our general real life viewpoint dominated by monotheism, our fantasy worlds are generally polytheistic. This affects our mind-set.
In a monotheistic mind-set, there is only one God and if you're not with Him then you must be against Him. He created the world and is in ultimate control of everything that happens, with the possible exception of Free Will. In this mind-set, it is possible to believe that if the entire world is threatened with destruction, and this threat is averteted by means which do not meet God's approval, the His world may be tainted by that.
But in a polytheistic mind-set, no single god is responsible for the entire world. No single god expects to have the entire world worship him. Most gods understand that all the gods have their fair share of worshippers, and their own ethos. In such a world, if it is 'saved' by means which some gods don't approve, the rest of the world won't be tainted at all! The more prissy gods might not like the way the world was saved, but I bet they're glad it was! Do you really thing that the prissy gods will collectively take their proverbial bats and balls home just because something happened that they didn't like?
In most pantheons, there IS a ruling deity whose view is binding (Zeus, Odin) or a superior force that even the gods must bow to (Destiny).
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The world is not a sentient being, it has no soul, if it is saved by the means of killing an innocent than the world spins on, unaware that innocent blood saved it, unaware that it has been saved, in fact unaware at all as it's not sentient!What force judges the paladin?
Their god.
But that god understands its own place in the heirarchy of that pantheon, and does not consider itself to be the arbiter of that entire reality!
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In most pantheons, there IS a ruling deity whose view is binding (Zeus, Odin) or a superior force that even the gods must bow to (Destiny).
So who settles the disputes between Zeus and Odin then?
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Lord Pendragon had an idea for a campaign based in a world of his own creation; a world 'tainted' by being previously saved by the shedding of innocent blood.
That is actually a really cool idea for a campaign! But it is not how each fantasy world works by default! He made that up! It is not something that applies as a general rule!
First, I totally agree with you on this. It IS a cool idea and it is NOT generally applicable.
Further, unlike our general real life viewpoint dominated by monotheism, our fantasy worlds are generally polytheistic. This affects our mind-set.
In a monotheistic mind-set, there is only one God and if you're not with Him then you must be against Him. He created the world and is in ultimate control of everything that happens, with the possible exception of Free Will. In this mind-set, it is possible to believe that if the entire world is threatened with destruction, and this threat is averteted by means which do not meet God's approval, the His world may be tainted by that.
But in a polytheistic mind-set, no single god is responsible for the entire world. No single god expects to have the entire world worship him. Most gods understand that all the gods have their fair share of worshippers, and their own ethos. In such a world, if it is 'saved' by means which some gods don't approve, the rest of the world won't be tainted at all! The more prissy gods might not like the way the world was saved, but I bet they're glad it was! Do you really thing that the prissy gods will collectively take their proverbial bats and balls home just because something happened that they didn't like?
Here, though, we're starting to run up again against the difference between morals and ethics discussed earlier. Divine Command Theory, which is a real thing and which holds that morals are immutable and knowable (rulebased, hence deontological) because they are laid out in the holy writ of the religion adhered to by the believer is very definitely not universally accepted, even by monotheists. It is even less commonly accepted by polytheists. The question usually posed as a challenge to Divine Command Theory is "Does the fact that XYZ commands it make it good, or is it good because XYZ perfectly understands the standard of what is good and evil? The first option is often seen as unsatisfactory, and the second means (or at least appears to mean) that Good and Evil/right and wrong are independent of the divine. This may seem like semantic trickery, but it has serious repercussions. For instance, if you have some people trying to divine the will of Heaven and make public policy regarding a relatively novel moral challenge (e.g., cloning) from ancient holy texts that don't (at least on the surface) seem to have much to say regarding it while at the same time others are attempting to work out what the right and wrong choices are using other standards, such as greater good (consequentialist), Kantian ethics (another deontological system), and/or virtue ethics (aretological), you will see lots of heated disagreement. Rather like this and every other paladin ethics thread.
The important thing to keep in mind, though, is that as written, paladins are not consequentialists. They have a code. Consequentialists don't go that way; they care about results (well, barring "rule" utilitarians, but they don't believe in their rules the way paladins do). Paladins also don't go the middle way of virtue ethics, in which actions are judged by intent (Disclaimer: I have deontological leanings, but this is my personal preferred option). Paladins are always followers of some variety of deontological code, whether it be imposed by one or more gods or devised by mortals.
And in any deontological system, immoral means are immoral completely regardless of the possible or certain results of using those means. You cannot even argue otherwise within such a system, but must go outside it to another type of ethics altogether.
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A world saved through innocent blood is itself tainted for all time.The world is not a sentient being, it has no soul, if it is saved by the means of killing an innocent than the world spins on, unaware that innocent blood saved it, unaware that it has been saved, in fact unaware at all as it's not sentient!
The sun will not turn red as a consequence, the sky will not darken, the seas will not boil.
The world will spin on, oblivious.
Ignorance is no excuse. Consider Arthurian Legend. Arthur was doomed because he slept with his sister. It did not matter in the slightest that he didn't know she was his sister at the time. He committed an act that tainted him, period.
I did not mean to suggest that the world is sentient. But rather that everyone in it would be thereafter tainted and doomed, just like Arthur. They may not know why, but their lives were bought with Evil. It would be up to a later champion, a true paladin and not a pretender, to try and redeem them.
Naturally the DM has the right to set up the morality of his worlds as he sees fit, which I mentioned in my earlier posts. However, given the pedigree of the paladin concept, I've always felt that looking at classic ideas of faith, honor, redemption, and Evil are worthwhile. :)
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The end MAY justify the means. That depends on the end, and the means. We have moral priorities.
If the end never justifies the means, then you must tell the Nazis that the Jews are in your basement because lying is always wrong.
But we have moral priorities, for instance, most people would agree that the sanctity of life is more important than not lying, and would therefore lie to the Nazis.
However, our moral priorities differ, so while some people believe that in some cases, justice is more important than the sanctity of life, therefore the death penalty, others disagree.
Lies of omission are not lies. People group them the same but they really aren't. Same way Rogue and Ninja arenm't the same. No one says Ninja are underpowered but Rogues are.The ends never justify the means.You don't lie to people to save thier feelings? Even if they are lies of ommission?
"Does this Dress make me look fat?"
There are three ways to handle this...
1 Yes.
2 No.
3 Ooh look over there! ~Run~
The latter option... changing the subject... that would be a lie of ommission and that would actually be a good lie. Something that spares the feelings of another. Lies like that... are good. Of course it's a judgment call because sometimes you need to tell people the harsh truth... but its a grey area that makes things hard for people AND paladins.
Im wrong...theres a fourth option...
4 No, your fat makes you look fat.
Distraction =/= Lie of omission.
A lie of omission is when you leave something out for the purpose of deceit. Say, if your girlfriend asked you "What did you do last night?" and you responded with:
"Well I went and ate chimichangas with a friend, checked out the State Fair, hung out at his house a little bit, and now here I am.", but you left out the part where you picked up some random sluts at Taco Bell and got a blowjob in the back alley before you headed to the Fair. That's a lie of omission, she now thinks the night was innocuous when in fact it was not, because you withheld crucial information. everything else you said was true, except the important part.
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I agree with Malachi.
All this stuff about having faith in God to provide another option or to make everything all right in the end makes plenty of sense to me in a setting where there is one God and that God has an edge over the forces of evil and can be expected to eventually prevail.
It makes less sense to me in a setting where there are many good and evil gods of roughly equivalent power, where the battle between good and evil is ultimately undecided and the actions of the gods' servants have a meaningful impact on the ultimate outcome. In the typical RPG pantheon, no individual god is omnipotent. A paladin who holds out for a third option might find their god saying "With all my divine power I reduced our losses in this battle to one innocent life, but because you were unwilling to accept that loss we have lost everything."
In most pantheons, there IS a ruling deity whose view is binding (Zeus, Odin) or a superior force that even the gods must bow to (Destiny)
1) The ruling deity is still not omnipotent - Zeus was unable to prevent Hera from punishing his lovers, and Odin had to sacrifice an eye to gain wisdom.
2) Destiny is not a moral force.
3) RPG pantheons tend not to have a ruling deity, or if they do then this deity is removed from mortal concerns. It is more interesting in an RPG setting to have a pantheon of roughly-matched deities than to have one omnipotent force and their lesser servants. It's also problematic for one set of clerics to be able to objectively say that their god is supreme.
The important thing to keep in mind, though, is that as written, paladins are not consequentialists. They have a code. Consequentialists don't go that way; they care about results (well, barring "rule" utilitarians, but they don't believe in their rules the way paladins do). Paladins also don't go the middle way of virtue ethics, in which actions are judged by intent (Disclaimer: I have deontological leanings, but this is my personal preferred option). Paladins are always followers of some variety of deontological code, whether it be imposed by one or more gods or devised by mortals.
And in any deontological system, immoral means are immoral completely regardless of the possible or certain results of using those means. You cannot even argue otherwise within such a system, but must go outside it to another type of ethics altogether.
In which case the debate turns into "are Paladins actually truly deontological?" I personally tend to treat them as virtue ethicists with deontological leanings. They are supposed to exemplify the virtues of faith, honour, justice, courage, compassion, etc and they have a set of rules that help them do this, but ultimately it is the virtues rather than the rules that are more important.
Naturally the DM has the right to set up the morality of his worlds as he sees fit, which I mentioned in my earlier posts. However, given the pedigree of the paladin concept, I've always felt that looking at classic ideas of faith, honor, redemption, and Evil are worthwhile. :)
Of course it's worthwhile to look at them, and even to borrow heavily from them. But there's a point at which the traditional (christian) knightly values stop making sense in a non-christian world.
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Their god.They don't need one in Golarion ... the default in 3e too was that gods provide spells at most and in some settings not even that.
It's the other way around. In Golarion paladins must have a patron deity, and this is true in the Forgotten Realms.
In fact, in over 30 years of playing in campaigns where paladins exist, I've yet to actually play in a campaign which allows paladins to exist without a patron god.
This idea is relatively new, optional and unused (for any given value of new, optional or unused).
Lying is one of those actions where it is most easy to see the difference between different types of ethics.
Consequentialist ethics: If it is a greatest good for the greatest number sort of ethics, then Truth is only usually good. Sometimes lying might be the better course. Decide on a case-by-case basis.
Deontological ethics: Lying is either a) forbidden by a higher power, hence wrong, OR b) is seen as a deliberate injury to the person lied to, hence wrong. Someone following this ethic might lie to avoid a greater wrong, but would still feel guilty about it and be conscious that they had done wrong. Important note: when b) is the reason for the wrongness of lying, there are very narrow and specific circumstances in which some ethicists consider it justified, namely, when those who would be lied to have deliberately forced the potential liar into a situation in which no option of doing the right thing exists. In such a case, lying in the pursuit of virtue is considered ethical because otherwise the truthteller is willingly complicit in the evil of those who force such a choice.
Aretological (virtue ethics): Lying is generally seen as wrong, but the good or bad of any individual lie comes down to the intent of the speaker. Is this lie told in pursuit of another virtue and is this lie something that person's idea of the ideal person would tell without shame or guilt? If so, it is right and no shame or guilt is necessary. Otherwise it is wrong.
Lying CAN be considered the right choice in any one of the above ethical systems, although in the overwhelming number of examples it would be the consequentialists defending such a choice. However, the murder of an innocent child can probably only be defended from a consequentialist point of view (and seldom then). It would never be right from an deontological POV and I cannot easily conceive of it being defended from an aretological POV.
Distraction =/= Lie of omission.
A lie of omission is when you leave something out for the purpose of deceit. Say, if your girlfriend asked you "What did you do last night?" and you responded with:
"Well I went and ate chimichangas with a friend, checked out the State Fair, hung out at his house a little bit, and now here I am.", but you left out the part where you picked up some random sluts at Taco Bell and got a blowjob in the back alley before you headed to the Fair. That's a lie of omission, she now thinks the night was innocuous when in fact it was not, because you withheld crucial information. everything else you said was true, except the important part.
Okay yeah, it's a bad example. It was designed to illustrate issues at hand, and frankly it didnt. That's what I get for posting from work though...
Your example is actually better. You may have gotten a BJ, but you don't tell the person because you dont want thier feelings to be hurt by the event. Yeah, sure... you dont want the argument and fight that would ensue too, but the part of you that doesnt want to tell the girlfriend is still good.
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What the paladin believes about the world is simply not relevant to how the world actually works!
The paladin may believe that the world would be 'tainted' if it were saved by killing an innocent, but the world will spin on, oblivious.
And all those who do not share the paladin's ethos will be glad that the world still exists despite the loss of that single life. They are most likely unaware of the sacrifice, and the world won't be 'tainted' for them in any way.
The sky will be the same colour as it was before.
I guess it could be. Like a Claymore (in the manga of the same name) could pitifully execute a sister warrior to prevent her to become a man-eater monster when she loses control of her powers.
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There are worse things than death (especially with the presence of the afterlife).So is it OK for a paladin to kill someone to save them from a fate worse than death?
I guess it could be. Like a Claymore (in the manga of the same name) could pitifully execute a sister warrior to prevent her to become a man-eater monster when she loses control of her powers.
I can see this painful scenario also applying to "paladin trapped in a house with innocent people and surrounded by overwhelming numbers of soul-eating daemons".
When confronted with people impregnated by facehuggers and begging "kill me" or those suffering terrible inflictions that will only lead to a cruel and unusual death that the paladin is incapable of preventing save through one method, I can't really fault them for giving what mercy they can.
I'd expect them to look for alternatives first of course.
Silent Hill: Homecoming comes to mind...