What about a evil cleric who summons a good creature and forces it to "Kill those good guys over there?" I guess he becomes good?
Poor Paladin when he tries to smite evil on him!
Again, the sword and the creature is a tool.. just because I summon a Natural animal does not make me Natural .. its what I do with that animal.
What if I summon the undead and use them as manual labor to help get much needed supplies to feed starving kids?
what if by NOT summoning the undead I have doomed, lets say, 20% of those kids to death because we could not get the food their on time?
The evil cleric cannot summon good creatures, because doing so gives the summon spell the [good] descriptor. He can summon a neutral creature to harass the paladin, but doing so does not make him neutral.
Likewise the good cleric cannot animate dead, because it has the [evil] descriptor. It just ain't on his list of options.
A neutral cleric could animate the dead to haul supplies to the orphanage, and would be committing an evil act for a good cause. Just the sort of shenanigans that make him neutral in the first place.
An evil cleric could animate the dead to haul gnome-meat to the orphanage, and be committing two evil acts disguised as a good deed.
That's the problem, this isn't an alignment thread. It's a serious rules question: What constitutes being evil for a smite evil to work on you?
Having an evil component in the alignment line of the creature being smited's statblock.
As a rules question, you are smite-able if you have an E on your character sheet in the alignment section. What you are doing at any given moment is irrelevant.
EDIT: ... freakin' ninjas.
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This is an alignment thread right? So isnt the answer batman?
Anyway, in all seriousness, I really think you need to differentiate chaotic form evil behavior. Stealing, Lying, cheating, these are not implicately evil acts, they are chaotic. Now mind you all of these things COULD be evil depending on circumstances, but they are evil because of the consequences, not the act themselves. For instance, stealing 100gp from a rich noble, is chaotic. Stealing 5 copper from a poor farmer so his family starves, evil. Lying about whether or not that dress makes the bar maid look fat, chaotic (maybe), telling a lie in court that gets an innocent man executed, evil. Cheating at dice in a gambling hall, chaotic (maybe stupid depending on the hall's security). Cheating a struggling merchant on a deal that leave him and his family destitute and starving? Evil.
To me, good and evil are based on knowing consequences. If innocent people are harmed by my actions, the action is evil. If innocent people are helped by my actions, they are good. If innocents are mostly unnaffected its neutral.
That's the problem, this isn't an alignment thread. It's a serious rules question: What constitutes being evil for a smite evil to work on you?
That's a very simple question: as long as your alignment is Evil, smite evil works on you. As long as your alignment is something else than Evil, smite evil doesn't work on you.
What constitutes being evil for a smite evil to work on you?
Actually that makes things a lot easier:
The DM's acknowledgment of 'yes, this is evil'. The DM is (in my opinion) the referee, when a matter open to debate appears, it's his time to exercise some decision making. If you're the DM in this case, decide for yourself, what do you honestly see as evil and smite-able?
A character currently committing an evil act but who is not evil (yet) is not a valid target for smite evil.
What about a evil cleric who summons a good creature and forces it to "Kill those good guys over there?" I guess he becomes good?You can't summon creatures with an alignment opposed to your own (using Summon Monster).
Poor Paladin when he tries to smite evil on him!
Again, the sword and the creature is a tool.. just because I summon a Natural animal does not make me Natural .. its what I do with that animal.
What if I summon the undead and use them as manual labor to help get much needed supplies to feed starving kids?
what if by NOT summoning the undead I have doomed, lets say, 20% of those kids to death because we could not get the food their on time?
You changed raising undead into summoning undead.
Creating undead is certainly an evil act because you are bringing evil into the world. Summoning evil (as a neutral character) is a bit different; there was a whole prestige class in 3.5 based on the idea of using evil against itself (the malconvoker). I could also see evil characters binding good outsiders to use as thralls. These are both inherently different than creating undead.
You can make a utilitarian argument for committing evil in order to create more good. This is the basis for paladins being allowed to temporarily join forces with evil characters. This does not mean that the evil act suddenly becomes non-evil because of your reasons for performing it.
But in my example, would it be evil to allow 20% of the children to die because you refused to animate bodies and utilize them to transport the food?
Because...
Smite Evil (Su): Once per day, a paladin can call out to the powers of good to aid her in her struggle against evil. As a swift action, the paladin chooses one target within sight to smite. If this target is evil, the paladin adds her Charisma bonus (if any) to her attack rolls and adds her paladin level to all damage rolls made against the target of her smite. If the target of smite evil is an outsider with the evil subtype, an evil-aligned dragon, or an undead creature, the bonus to damage on the first successful attack increases to 2 points of damage per level the paladin possesses. Regardless of the target, smite evil attacks automatically bypass any DR the creature might possess.
In addition, while smite evil is in effect, the paladin gains a deflection bonus equal to her Charisma modifier (if any) to her AC against attacks made by the target of the smite. If the paladin targets a creature that is not evil, the smite is wasted with no effect.
The smite evil effect remains until the target of the smite is dead or the next time the paladin rests and regains her uses of this ability. At 4th level, and at every three levels thereafter, the paladin may smite evil one additional time per day, as indicated on Table: Paladin, to a maximum of seven times per day at 19th level.
...and...
Alignment is a tool, a convenient shorthand you can use to summarize the general attitude of an NPC, region, religion, organization, monster, or even magic item.
Certain character classes in Classes list repercussions for those who don't adhere to a specific alignment, and some spells and magic items have different effects on targets depending on alignment, but beyond that it's generally not necessary to worry too much about whether someone is behaving differently from his stated alignment. In the end, the Game Master is the one who gets to decide if something's in accordance with its indicated alignment, based on the descriptions given previously and his own opinion and interpretation—the only thing the GM needs to strive for is to be consistent as to what constitutes the difference between alignments like chaotic neutral and chaotic evil. There's no hard and fast mechanic by which you can measure alignment—unlike hit points or skill ranks or Armor Class, alignment is solely a label the GM controls.
It's best to let players play their characters as they want. If a player is roleplaying in a way that you, as the GM, think doesn't fit his alignment, let him know that he's acting out of alignment and tell him why—but do so in a friendly manner. If a character wants to change his alignment, let him—in most cases, this should amount to little more than a change of personality, or in some cases, no change at all if the alignment change was more of an adjustment to more accurately summarize how a player, in your opinion, is portraying his character. In some cases, changing alignments can impact a character's abilities—see the class write-ups in Classes for details. An atonement spell may be necessary to repair damage done by alignment changes arising from involuntary sources or momentary lapses in personality.
Players who frequently have their characters change alignment should in all likelihood be playing chaotic neutral characters.
One act doesn't instantly change your alignment. So, yes, you can be LG and be in the middle of a baby murder rampage, but you aren't evil until the DM changes your alignment.
Would smite evil work against my cleric of Asmodeus? He is Lawful Neutral, but has an evil aura because of his diety...
Nope, you tricky minx.
There is one thing the game says is an Evil or Good act, casting a spell with that descriptor ([Good]/[Evil]). There's a lot of people that hate that ruling, but the devs have said that is the intent (so yes, Infernal Healing is an evil act to cast, although it's somewhat mitigated usually by the fact you're healing someone for theoretically altruistic reasons).Can you cite this?
Standard Disclaimer: Also what devs != rules, as we all know (until there is errata/new rules in a book).
It does equal the rules when the Dev in question quotes the text in the rules and tells you what it means.
Sean K Reynolds making a ruling that use of an evil spell is evil
Of course, you are free to ignore it or say it doesn't count, since it's just a Dev and Dev != Rules, but given he points to the rules and says that's the intent of the Dev's with using that wording, you're basically saying you will not accept anything other than an errata that says in big bold letters 'Cast evil spell are evil', which dozens in that thread said, then said they'd houserule it even if it was explicitly errata'd to be that crystal clear.
Sorry if this comes off as rude, but while I'm fine with people disagreeing with the Dev's on rules clarifications (I hate the Dhampir FAQ entry, and house rule it), I hate people who insist the Dev's don't know what the rules are, instead of just accepting that that is RAI and admitting they are just houseruling it in their own games.
But in my example, would it be evil to allow 20% of the children to die because you refused to animate bodies and utilize them to transport the food?What about a evil cleric who summons a good creature and forces it to "Kill those good guys over there?" I guess he becomes good?You can't summon creatures with an alignment opposed to your own (using Summon Monster).
Poor Paladin when he tries to smite evil on him!
Again, the sword and the creature is a tool.. just because I summon a Natural animal does not make me Natural .. its what I do with that animal.
What if I summon the undead and use them as manual labor to help get much needed supplies to feed starving kids?
what if by NOT summoning the undead I have doomed, lets say, 20% of those kids to death because we could not get the food their on time?
You changed raising undead into summoning undead.
Creating undead is certainly an evil act because you are bringing evil into the world. Summoning evil (as a neutral character) is a bit different; there was a whole prestige class in 3.5 based on the idea of using evil against itself (the malconvoker). I could also see evil characters binding good outsiders to use as thralls. These are both inherently different than creating undead.
You can make a utilitarian argument for committing evil in order to create more good. This is the basis for paladins being allowed to temporarily join forces with evil characters. This does not mean that the evil act suddenly becomes non-evil because of your reasons for performing it.
Well, if you were a good cleric you couldn't animate the dead. Thus, you didn't refuse to you were incapable of doing so.
If you were a neutral cleric... it would be up to the DM. I think inaction is an evil. So, you raise the dead (evil act) and then you save some orphans (good act). How those balance out is up to the DM.
There is one thing the game says is an Evil or Good act, casting a spell with that descriptor ([Good]/[Evil]). There's a lot of people that hate that ruling, but the devs have said that is the intent (so yes, Infernal Healing is an evil act to cast, although it's somewhat mitigated usually by the fact you're healing someone for theoretically altruistic reasons).Can you cite this?
Standard Disclaimer: Also what devs != rules, as we all know (until there is errata/new rules in a book).
It does equal the rules when the Dev in question quotes the text in the rules and tells you what it means.
Sean K Reynolds making a ruling that use of an evil spell is evil
Of course, you are free to ignore it or say it doesn't count, since it's just a Dev and Dev != Rules, but given he points to the rules and says that's the intent of the Dev's with using that wording, you're basically saying you will not accept anything other than an errata that says in big bold letters 'Cast evil spell are evil', which dozens in that thread said, then said they'd houserule it even if it was explicitly errata'd to be that crystal clear.
Sorry if this comes off as rude, but while I'm fine with people disagreeing with the Dev's on rules clarifications (I hate the Dhampir FAQ entry, and house rule it), I hate people who insist the Dev's don't know what the rules are, instead of just accepting that that is RAI and admitting they are just houseruling it in their own games.
Yeah, it did come off as rude.
A Dev pointing to existent rules is different than a Dev saying 'this should work like this even though it doesn't so so anywhere in the rules' like here.
My 'disclaimer' is a reference to the fact that Devs often overrule eachother or end up issuing contradictory faqs or errata. The unofficial faq has many examples of this.
This is not a knock on the Devs, just a fact.
I also don't find SKR's reading of that descriptor line as entirely intuitive, but I'll accept it as that is the way it is intended.
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In almost all cases, what is and is not evil is obvious to most players. If it isn't obvious, then if the GM says it's evil, it is evil, even if you disagree. If the GM says it's not evil, then it is not evil, even if you disagree. The GM can say something you did was evil/not evil, but if you do it again under different circumstances he may say different, and he is correct, even if you disagree.
In general, use of anything with an evil descriptor tied to it (spells, weapons, etc.) is an evil act.
The same can be said for good.
A paladin immediately losing his powers if he commits an evil act is not a result of the nature of alignment; it's a result of the nature of a paladin.
Indeed, nothing about a paladin falling suggests an immediate change in alignment. In most actual cases of paladins falling, I would imagine they would still be LG.
How does that make sense? If a paladin commits an evil act, he loses his powers right then. But, as a GM, you could justify saying to a character:"well, your smite evil doesn't work because, although the villian is commiting a evil act, his alignment is neutral."?
Paladins are held to a higher standard. They get their class abilities by promising to act in a certain way, and when they break that promise, the deal is called off. If he willingly commits an evil act he loses his class abilities, but is still lawful good.
Don't expect alignments in D&D to make sense. It'll just give you a headache.
I can totally justify to a player that a guy committing an evil act isn't smite-able. Maybe he's animating these villagers to feed some starving gnoll babies somewhere.
Specific actions do not define your alignment. You got to add it all up and take the average. The best villains are the ones that are complicated and have internal struggles, or misguided notions, or "for the greater good" mentalities.
I'm guessing that you are playing a paladin, and you are having a hard time finding things to smite. This may be your DM building interesting and complex villains with tragic backstories, or he might just be jerking you around. So either congratulations, or condolences.
EDIT: How is that I keep getting ninja'd by a gigantic psionic catfish? They shouldn't be that stealthy.
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Although I would also say that traveling with, doing business with, allying with or otherwise interacting with evil creatures is not an evil act (though the actions you take in cooperation with them may be).
For this reason, animating the dead is an evil act (because casting the spell is evil), but commanding undead is not an evil act (though commanding them to perform an evil act would be).
Cannabialism (which in a fanatasy world means eating of the flesh/drink blood of a intelligent creature) [/b]: what about using the body parts of an intelligent creature ? Say a Dragon's hide for example. What about respectful and ritual cannibalism of the dead like we see in some RL societies ? Or when you have just nothing else available to eat for weeks ?
That discussion about cannibalism somehow reminded me about this brazillian tribe that cremates their deads and then mix their ashes in a kind of tea so they can always have their fathers and mothers spirit with them. I don't know if that kind of funeral cannibalism i can see as something innately evil
I have been reading some other threads, and I am stunned by people's ideas of what is and is not an "Evil Act". Let me make sure I am being clear: what I am talking about is an act that will cause your character to detect as, and therefore be smited as, evil.
I always thought this was cut and dry, black and white, but I am realizing different people see things differently. However, as a rule, what do you see as "evil acts"?
I use the the following as my guide:
Cannabialism (which in a fanatasy world means eating of the flesh/drink blood of a intelligent creature).
No, Book of Vile Darkness says cannabalism is not an evil act. There are exceptions:
1) if you do it not for food but for fun (eating them because you want to not that you need to)2) For powering vile spells
Murdering them for the cannabalism is evil no argument, but not the act of eating them.,
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Everything in Pathfinder is an evil act. EVERYTHING.
Except casting spells with the [Good] descriptor. You can use spells with the [Good] descriptor all you want and remain a paragon of Good, no matter what you use them for.
Capture and rape an angel? Good.
Kill a baby? Good.
Smite innocent bystanders? Just fine.
But gods forbid you raise a few undead to save your friends or drink someone's blood to save your own life you MONSTER.
While it has no official bearing on Pathfinder, I think this section of the BoVD is pretty reasonable:
Unliving corpses—corrupt mockeries of life and purity—are inherently evil. Creating them is one of the most heinous crimes against the world that a character can commit. Even if they are commanded to do something good, undead invariably bring negative energy into the world, which makes it a darker and more evil place.
Many communities keep their graveyards behind high walls or even post guards to keep grave robbers out. Grave-robbing is often a lucrative practice, since necromancers pay good coin for raw materials. Of course, battlefields are also popular places for grave-robbers—or for necromancers themselves—to seek corpses.
Yeah, it did come off as rude.
A Dev pointing to existent rules is different than a Dev saying 'this should work like this even though it doesn't so so anywhere in the rules' like here.
My 'disclaimer' is a reference to the fact that Devs often overrule eachother or end up issuing contradictory faqs or errata. The unofficial faq has many examples of this.
This is not a knock on the Devs, just a fact.
I also don't find SKR's reading of that descriptor line as entirely intuitive, but I'll accept it as that is the way it is intended.
Sorry then, as I said, it's a hot button of mine. You can read through that thread and see where there was at least one other person who ignored all attempts by SKR to clarify. Still, I shouldn't assume others are being jerks, so my apologies.
Whenever anyone comes in here and asks any alignment question- everyone chimes in with a different opinion, and no one ever concedes anything, nor is anyone's mind ever changed. Many use or argue modern day morality in a medieval setting, other insist upon period morals.
Really, alignment threads should be banned.
Guys this forum taught me I should never play a fighter because of paladins so I'm going to need you all to nail down this alignment thing pretty carefully and thoroughly because I don't want to turn my paladin into a fighter because I now know thanks to you all that fighters should never be played.
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What about a evil cleric who summons a good creature and forces it to "Kill those good guys over there?" I guess he becomes good?You can't summon creatures with an alignment opposed to your own (using Summon Monster).
You are right that the Evil Cleric mentioned above cannot cast such a summon.
His Evil Wizard buddy has no such problem though.
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I have been reading some other threads, and I am stunned by people's ideas of what is and is not an "Evil Act". Let me make sure I am being clear: what I am talking about is an act that will cause your character to detect as, and therefore be smited as, evil.
I always thought this was cut and dry, black and white, but I am realizing different people see things differently. However, as a rule, what do you see as "evil acts"?
I use the the following as my guide:
Betrayal; murder; worshipping evil god/demons/devils; animating or creating undead; using an evil spell; consorting with demons/devils; using others for personal gain; bullying/cowing; gain pleasure from causing despair, pain and suffering; tempting good individuals to do evil acts; Cannabialism (which in a fanatasy world means eating of the flesh/drink blood of a intelligent creature).Other patterns of behavior that lead to evil: lying, theft, and cheating.
Now, a lot of people are going to cry foul, saying these are things that all adventurers do. I am just curious to see what arguements are made.
(opens can of worms....let the chaos commence)
I did not read anything pass the original post so I am not sure your question was answered or not, but here is the answer.
Evil is an abstract word, unlike say a chair. I can point at a chair and we all agree what it looks like and what its purpose is.
Evil is an emotion or a mental concept, it only exists in your mind. You cannot point at something and say it is evil because someone else may not agree with you. It is called perspective. Therefore the decision boils down to one person and one person alone, the GM.
Suppose you have a Cleric of Groetus.......as I have just made. Groetus is a CN god who will bring about the end of the world. The cleric does not kill for fun or profit. Evil characters and creatures debase or destroy innocent life, whether for fun or profit. and doesn't pursue killing for convenience or an evil god Evil implies hurting, oppressing, and killing others. Some evil creatures simply have no compassion for others and kill without qualms if doing so is convenient. Others actively pursue evil, killing for sport or out of duty to some evil deity or master. Rather he thinks he is helping to cleanse the world and return it to its natural and most desirable state. He does so out of his moral conviction of what is right and not out of any sort of animosity, jealousy, or personal aggrandizement. Is he evil?
Suppose you have a Cleric of Groetus.......as I have just made. Groetus is a CN god who will bring about the end of the world. The cleric does not kill for fun or profit. Evil characters and creatures debase or destroy innocent life, whether for fun or profit. and doesn't pursue killing for convenience or an evil god Evil implies hurting, oppressing, and killing others. Some evil creatures simply have no compassion for others and kill without qualms if doing so is convenient. Others actively pursue evil, killing for sport or out of duty to some evil deity or master. Rather he thinks he is helping to cleanse the world and return it to its natural and most desirable state. He does so out of his moral conviction of what is right and not out of any sort of animosity, jealousy, or personal aggrandizement. Is he evil?
Yes, cleansing requires genocide. Genocide is usually evil.
Therefore he desires evil means.His goal is profited by his evil wishes* (thus he kills for profit).
He kills to help his evil-light diety* (thus he kills for Groetus)
If he never kills then you could argue neutral though.
I argue Groetus is evil-light, as he desires evil (end of world): officially all followers are madmen.
Yes, cleansing requires genocide. Genocide is usually evil.
Therefore he desires evil means.
His goal is profited by his evil wishes* (thus he kills for profit).
He kills to help his evil-light diety* (thus he kills for Groetus)If he never kills then you could argue neutral though.
I argue Groetus is evil-light, as he desires evil (end of world): officially all followers are madmen.
Is the christian notion of rapture evil? I think my character views his cleansing in much the same light.
I don't really know what he profits, it is kind of a pain in the ass to do Groetus's work and he doesn't really get much in return besides most people thinking he is a nut job. If accomplishing a goal is the same as profiting, why not just change the definition to kill for a goal? That would have a lot of PCs in the evil realm.It seems you are trying to reclassify the god to make him fit your preconceived notions.
Cannibalism: (from Caníbales, the Spanish name for the Carib people,[1] a West Indies tribe formerly well known for their practice of cannibalism)[2] is the act or practice of humans eating the flesh or internal organs of other human beings. It is also called anthropophagy. A person who practices cannibalism is called a cannibal. The expression "cannibalism" has been extended into zoology to mean one individual of a species consuming all or part of another individual of the same species as food
According to a wiki on cannibalism , thats the definition.
Expanding that for a fantasy setting, for intelligent creatures, and the examples above of :
Red Dragon meat, Awakened Evil Dire Boar, Talking Dinosaurs
None should be "evil"
Eating "good/kind/nice" creatures would be evil, but eating monsters kibble, or evil creatures not... unless you are killing intelligent creatures JUST to eat them.
It's not just the act, but the morality behind the act. Either on the feaster's part.. or the feasted.
Oh, and as far as PFS goes... if you have any uncertainty bout "what is evil". When you sit down at the table, ask for clarifications for any actions ahead of time.
From what I've read on these forums, there are a great amount of inconsistencies with the rules, depending on what GM you get.
I've read multiple threads where GM's have strayed off path of the modules "to make it more interesting", or made poor rules interpretations. ( which boggles the mind, considering how most the seasonal adventures read )
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The solution is obvious.
Since paladins are good (it says so under Alignment heading on the class description) whatever a paladin does must be good.
The question is not "is killing babies evil?" but "what made those particular babies evil?" and it's an academic question at best, because the paladin has already killed them.
While this approach may seem distasteful to you at first, it saves an enormous amount of time and energy at the table. Remember, it is not your responsibility, as a GM or a player, to teach sociopathic munchkins to be virtuous. It's just a game.
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According to the CRB it's arguable they're the same. All it mentions is killing, the act of ending a life. There are a lot of options available to even fighters to subdue enemies without killing them.But we also have to keep in mind that there are few (if any) good-aligned deities whose favored weapon is the sap.
When a deity is Good, and imparts their clerics with proficiency in longswords or scimitars or bastard swords or whatever, we have to assume that it's possible to use that proficiency for its intended purpose without forcing yourself away from the alignment of said deity by doing so.
As long as you're acting within the confines of the deity's domain and ethos then I can agree with that. For example, I think it's Iomedea who believes that most anyone can be redeemed. For her I would say that those cleric's would only use lethal force against the most staunchly "unsavable," those who have time and time again committed acts of unrepentant evil, made blood pacts with evil beings, etc.
Whereas for Sarenrae I would think her clerics would be a bit more quick to act.
However, in most of the backgrounds of these gods we only see them being quick and harsh against fiends, devils and the like. Essentially: outsiders who's very being is built with evil energies to destroy and corrupt. I haven't seen a single chronicle where they've killed humanoids or intelligent creatures who are by nature neutral and can choose either good or evil at any moment nearly as quickly as I see most people play their characters.
Close. You've just got them switched. Sarenrae is the goddess of redemption and you're right that she encourages not using lethal force if redemption is possible (one trait Sarenrae-worshiping PCs can take actually allows them to do nonlethal damage with swords without penalty at will, indicating that Sarenrae's church teaches special techniques to use swords without killing). However, if redemption is impossible, she and her followers will BURN you to stop your evil.
Iomedae's less about redemption and more about retribution, as she's in charge of justice. She has no problem with just executions when redemption would take too long or to provide solace for the victims. Grant quarter when it is asked for, and turn them over to justice. Then move on to the next wrong to right.
Also, Shelyn, with her focus on love and understanding, is a big fan of doing non-lethal damage. She teaches that all beings can feel and experience love, and that it's always a positive experience, so her followers share their love with even the worst villains.
You raise a very good point too, that so far the gods don't act against a neutral race out of spite or anger. Even Torag doesn't just destroy the orcs, despite the fact that his favored people have been at war with them for millenia. He and the dwarves are content to just beat them back whenever they get uppity, and orcs are a race that are generally evil. Come to think of it, I can't think of any gods that behave like Wastri or Zarus from 3.5, gods where racism is inherent in their portfolio. While there's at least one elven goddess who refuses to acknowledge non-elven accomplishments and doesn't grant power to non-full-blooded-elf followers, she's painted more as just a snob than a bigot. She just ignores the other races, not exhort her followers to kill them. No gods in Pathfinder really exhort their followers to slay creatures capable of moral choice. It's always directed at the divine servants of their antitheses, angels, devils, demons, etc., that apart from a few rare and extreme cases, are always their alignment.