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@Cheaseweasel: One of the reasons that some people don't like playing with paladins is because some people play paladins badly. They have their paladin tell everybody else what to do, say that it's 'their way or the highway' and generally be complete dicks.
It's not paladins that are the problem, but players who play their paladins that way, and DMs who make them play that way under threat of falling.
But at least that player whose paladin is a problem stops being a problem when he stops playing a paladin! According to what you have posted on this thread, every time you play, it's 'your way or the highway' every single campaign!
The other players either play the way you want, or you'll take your metaphorical bat and ball home!
That is what got you the negative responses!
Having read some of your posts in the 'Gamer Life' section, I feel that you can understand the concept of 'injustice', may have even suffered some yourself. When you say you always play evil-ish PCs because you find 'good' uninteresting, I feel that your missing an opportunity. I bet you could really get your teeth into a good PC, maybe even a paladin, if that PC was motivated by his intolerance of injustice. That injustice could be wide-ranging and general in nature, or it could be more limited in scope; pick a prejudice and be determined to stamp it out....for the greater good, of course... : )
Your first post in this thread really bothered me, and reading the rest of these posts it obviously bothered others also. I hope I've made it clear why (in the nicest possible way).
Just out of curiosity, do your fellow players ever have their PCs get sick of the way your PC treats theirs and engage in PvP?
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I do find it interesting that a Paladin "falls" for committing an evil act, but not a Chaotic one. Since the restriction is to be Lawful Good, shouldn't the Law-Chaos side have an equal effect?
I've also noticed that there are many threads about Paladins and "falling," but where are the threads about Clerics, Druids, Monks, and the classes that can "fall?"
Any time I as GM put a situation that a Paladin could "fall" in, a Good or Lawful Cleric or other class would be in the same situation. Note that none of these are the "fall/fall" situations, but situations where the player should know better.
Yeah, interestingly in actual play, I've only ever seen a Druid fall, not a Paladin.
But we're usually pretty cagy about how we talk about things around the Paladin. We tend to make sure that the Paladin's *player* doesn't even know when we're up to questionable things, let alone the character.
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Mal,
It's not unreasonable for me to not play in an heroic campaign, no matter how hard you try to make it sound that way. I'm not "tell(ing) everybody else what to do, it's (my) way or the highway."
But no, I'm not going to waste my time in a game I will not enjoy; it isn't a case of "taking my metaphorical bat and ball home;" I'm simply not leaving home with or without them to go have no fun.
...Er...'Okay, my friends. I'd love to play a game with you. But if you don't play it my way then I won't play at all. If any of you want to play something you like (a paladin, for instance), then I'll refuse to play.'
Most friends are used to a bit of 'give and take'. I don't see you doing any giving.
Remember, this impression of you is informed by your own description!
And a news flash for you: I have played good characters and, once, a Paladin. I have it on the authority of the folks I was playing her with that she was, in fact, an awesome Paladin. So, no, I'm not missing an opportunity. I'm choosing the exercise my options the way I want to. Have played good characters before and they are, simply, not interesting.
I am working on stamping out a prejudice: the one that says evil PCs are badwrongfun. It's for the greater good. [/sarcasm]
Well, fair enough. It was only a suggestion; you can play what you want. : )
But, that's the point, isn't it? You can play what you want, but if anyone else plays what they want then you refuse to play if you don't like their choice!
Finally. Your sheer gall and assumption leave me slack-jawed. The assumption that I treat my fellow players' PCs badly is just the kind of prejudice to which I referred. My PC treats the other PCs as valued allies, because that is what they are. Let's hop off the Evil=Dumb bus for a second and examine rational behavior for a villain with long-term plans, shall we?
I treat the other PCs with honor and dignity, because I need their support. Which would be true regardless of my character's alignment. Did you think I'd backstab, steal from, or even embarrass my party members? Just because I'm evil? Are you an idiot? 'Cause I'm not.
I'm often the only, or one of two, evil characters in my usual groups. I'm not going to be a douche to the people who have my back in a fight, just to satisfy some requirement that I play Evil/Stupid, anymore than playing a Paladin meant I had to play Lawful/Stupid.
This rant might have been more credible if you hadn't also posted:-
I don't leap to murder as my first resort... but yeah, people who oppose me do have a remarkable frequency of accidental deaths, if they aren't willing to bend to my plans.
Usually I can get what I want without having to kill anyone
Those who cannot be manipulated, I will threaten; should they refuse to cooperate, those threats and worse are carried out. Eventually they break, or become such an obstacle that they must die
Of course, if you defy me, and your loved one ends up a suicide after I cut him/her off from the supply of opiates I've addicted them to, you may feel that I am, indeed, a dick.
For the record, I've got no criticism of the way you play your evil PCs. I even admire your approach.
But the way you play your PCs is not the issue. The issue is that you have no more right to tell others what they can or can't play than they have to tell you what you can or can't play.
Whether you realise it or not, refusing to play if the others don't do what you want is an attempt to manipulate what they do, and that's why you got all this negative reaction.
I've tried to steer clear of just badmouthing you; I believe the quotes taken from your own posts count as fair comment. I'm not interested in insulting you as a person. I'm interested in shining a light on the kind of behaviour in which you tell us you indulge.
I'm not going to say that you are a selfish person; I don't know you well enough. I can say that that behavior is selfish!
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I can understand that you are sincere, and yes you have every right not to play.
The impression I'm getting is that you usually play with people who are your friends in real life.
When friends get together to do something (RPGs or otherwise), then they intend to do it together. This is normal behaviour for friends.
When one of those friends feels uncomfortable about doing something, usually the rest agree not to do it, out of consideration for their friend. Also normal behaviour.
It is expected that, during the course of their friendship, different friends are given consideration over different issues, and it is expected that this all roughly evens out over time.
In the regular RPG group, some friends might prefer a different style of game than others. 'Okay, this time I'll agree to play what you want even though that's not my kinda game, but next time we play the kinda game that I like, even though that's not your kinda game'.
The reason friends do this is so that they get to play with their friends despite not having identical tastes. It would be strange if their tastes were identical.
What would happen if all your friends had the same attitude as you? None of you would get to play, ever!
Your friends understand that. They want to play, with you because you are they friend. Because you are not prepared to show consideration for their wishes, even though they show consideration for yours, they back down and 'play it your way'! Because the alternative is the highway.
How many of your friends would like to play a paladin, but choose not to so that you don't refuse to play? How many of your friends would like to play a good-aligned party for a change, but cave in because they don't want to exclude you?
How many of them have a friend you never see, because he refuses to play an evil game?
Those quotes of yours you claim I misused; if one of your fellow players had his PC act in such a way that he 'got in the way' of your PC's plans, are you saying you wouldn't have your PC do those things that you posted he would? What would you do? The only evidence I have of how your PC would react are those things you posted! You never said anything about treating your party any differently, nor did you give the impression that you would be kinder to them than you would all the NPCs in the world.
After all, every time the subject has come up, you've demonstrated that people either do what you want, or they suffer (IC) or you refuse to play (OOC).
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Reminds me of an old oriental adventures game I was in we had a samarai and a ninja in the same party.
The samurai was human the ninja had night-vision, the ninja would string guards/people into trees and kill them while the samurai was saying things like...
"Did you hear something?"
and the druid would answer "Chipmunks most likely"
No the samurai never caught on........
That's pretty much how I play my paladin. If there's any dodgy work to be done he's kept in the dark.
Might be a little metagame-y at times, but it's by far the easiest way to keep the game going.
And his low wisdom and perception back it up, somewhat. He's somewhat naive and gullible when it comes to his friends in that he believes his friends when they tell him something.
And it also prevents the campaign from derailing too badly as the rogue can't do anything too evil in broad daylight.
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Cheeseweasel, without renaming the thread, "So You Have An Evil Guy In The Party", may I ask:
How do you justify exempting your "allies" from your extortion-manipulation-murdering ways? And are any NPC's ever exempted for similar reasons?
Does it break the verisimilitude of the game that you do so?
What do you do if an ally takes a more measured approach to the situation?
What if there is a situation where murderdeathkill would cause more problems than it would solve?
Do you, or should you, ever use more... hospitable... methods to attain your goals? Or do you/should you always maintain your sociopathic ways?
No reason to full-on derail the thread. We can just look at it in reverse. =)
He already answered that question. He's not chaotic stupid.
Cheese noted that he didn't kill them because they were powerful allies who had his back in a fight. Greed can be another factor. Powerful adventuring parties gather a lot of loot.
In the game world, there are plenty of powerful persons (not only PC's) who could be beneficial to a like-minded person. What I was asking was whether PC's received special treatment merely by the dubious meta-gamey virtue of their being PC's.
I don't leap to murder as my first resort... but yeah, people who oppose me do have a remarkable frequency of accidental deaths, if they aren't willing to bend to my plans. Usually I can get what I want without having to kill anyone, because people hate conflict, and want to believe the best of other people. A sad flaw in the altruistic, but one which I don't hesitate to use to my advantage...
Those who cannot be manipulated, I will threaten; should they refuse to cooperate, those threats and worse are carried out. Eventually they break, or become such an obstacle that they must die. But violence is only applied when other methods have been tried and have failed. The principle of least effort rules that violence be avoided...
Of course, if you defy me, and your loved one ends up a suicide after I cut him/her off from the supply of opiates I've addicted them to, you may feel that I am, indeed, a dick. But, well, you can't please everyone, and you know, the whole "can't make an egg sandwich without breaking a few eggs" thing...
So, from my reading of this, either his fellow PC's always have the identical goal of helping Cheeseweasel achieve his ends... or they receive treatment not afforded to NPC's. I'm just looking for some clarification, which I believe could contribute to the overall discussion (in sort of a backwards way) that this thread is (or was originally) about. Essentially, if you have someone in the party whose alignment and goals are inflexible and occasionally in conflict with the party, how do you work with/around that? That seems to apply here, despite his not being a Paladin...
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Cheaseweasel; the way you describe playing evil PCs is cool. That's not the problem. The problem is that the way you behave towards your RL friends is poor.
Your friends back down and play the kind of game you want, but I don't see any 'give and take' from you; just 'take'.
It's not that you like to play evil PCs, it's that you influence your group, by refusing to play if they don't toe the line, so that they can't play what they want to play.
You say that you don't 'take your bat and ball home', you just don't take your bat and ball out of the house if your friends want to play a good party. But what if your group are into a campaign (one that you deem as acceptable) when one of the other players starts to role-play his PC, and that his PC's actions happen to interfere with your PC's (predictable) plans for world domination? What if his PC dies and he wants to replace it with a good PC, or even a paladin?
How do you respond? How does your PC respond? Do you take your bat and ball home then? Do you have your PC be as evil to them as you describe your PC acting to those that 'refuse to be manipulated'?
Or is it that your friends wouldn't do that? Because they don't want you to leave, because you are a friend.
This isn't a one-off incident. This is a manipulative pattern of behaviour, and I'm not talking about a made-up character manipulating his enemies, I'm talking about the real you manipulating his real life friends to get your own way. Every. Single. Game.
You remind me of Sheldon from The Big Bang Theory! Every time that group talks about doing something as a group, it has to be Sheldon's way or he won't play, and the rest always cave. It sounds like, when deciding on the campaign, your friends always cave in to your demands.
You say that your friends can always play a 'good' campaign if they want to; you're not stopping them, you just won't play. How many times has that actually happened? How many times have you said that you won't play if someone else plays a good PC, but they went ahead and played without you?
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And back to Mal.
I have no problem with other people playing good CHARACTERS; I'm not going to play in a good CAMPAIGN. I realize the difference is subtle, but you ought to be able to see it.
If somebody replaces a character with a PALADIN, yep, I'm out.
I'm tired of being accused of being manipulative for refusing to play not-fun campaigns; kindly get bent on that point.
And I've sat out one campaign with one group and three in the other with which I play (admittedly, one of the three had to do with the setting, not alignment issues).
You may also get bent on judging how I treat my friends, as you're in no position to comment upon it, aside from a tiny slice of our relationship having to do with gaming, and upon which you rely heavily on inference since you have no empirical data.
I'm not exactly sure what 'get bent' means, though I imagine that its something like 'you can keep your opinions to yourself', in this context.
No.
You say that if someone were to replace their PC with a paladin then you'd be out! This has to be seen to have an influence on the choices your friends make. I know you don't like to hear it, but you are manipulating your friends.
I fully and freely admit that my judgement of how you treat your friends is entirely limited to the gaming table (or your pointed absence from it), and I never thought or said otherwise. If I inadvertantly gave the impression that I was judging the rest of your life, then I apologise for the misunderstanding.
The only 'empirical data' I have about you is the stuff you posted!
The reason I feel I have the right to comment about the way you treat your friends while playing, is that you posted it! I didn't provide any comment about you or the way you play that wasn't a direct response to something you posted in a public forum intended to allow us to comment on each other's posts.
I've read some of your posts in other threads, and you seem an okay guy. But when you post how you behave, this gives me (and every other poster) the right to comment on it. Maybe, in hindsight, you should have kept this behaviour to yourself, if the comments your posts drew was so negative. But your first post here made it seem you were proud of your behaviour.
Ethic dilemma can work 1 time, 2 time, but then you can't put your paladin in difficult situations just to have him not working at 100%. And why the warrior should always be selfish? Warrior can be lawful good too, but should not be weaker to the paladin with the same aligmnent restriction.
Evil can be... good to play. You can get... good at playing evil characters.
There is no need to be a jerk in-game, not everyone has to be so pristine and good (unless the dm makes it a pre-req, sigh).
LG warriors don't get what the pallie gets, their alignment is a choice, not a series of rewards bound to a code, to make a point to Alec.
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And a news flash for you: I have played good characters and, once, a Paladin. I have it on the authority of the folks I was playing her with that she was, in fact, an awesome Paladin. So, no, I'm not missing an opportunity. I'm choosing the exercise my options the way I want to. Have played good characters before and they are, simply, not interesting.
I am working on stamping out a prejudice: the one that says evil PCs are badwrongfun. It's for the greater good. [/sarcasm]
Well, fair enough. It was only a suggestion; you can play what you want. : )
But, that's the point, isn't it? You can play what you want, but if anyone else plays what they want then you refuse to play if you don't like their choice!
There's a difference between these two things:
1. Choosing not to play a good character, or not to play in a game with good characters
and
2. Stopping the rest of the group from playing that game.
Surely you can see this? Just because one person doesn't want to participate in a particular game, doesn't mean every other potential participant must immediately stop.
I know you don't like to hear it, but you are manipulating your friends.
Again, there is a difference between manipulating one's friends, and refusing to be manipulated by them.
If one's friends insist that you spend your communal "fun" time with them doing something that's not "fun", perhaps they're not very good friends. Ahem.| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Apparently, some of you are reading subtext that I'm not catching. So, Cheeseweasel, I'm assuming the conversations go something like this:
Setting - FLGS Friday Night Magic Tournament
FRIEND: Hey, Cheese! (I take it for granted that your friends call you Cheese) How'd you finish?
CW: 3 and 1. Not too bad. You coming over to play Madden later?
FRIEND: Yeah. Hey, we're getting a new Pathfinder campaign together. Wanna join?
CW: What's the campaign?
FRIEND: Shining beacons of light save the world.
CW: Ugh... pass.
FRIEND: HITLER!!!
Does that about sum it up?
Crusader
Actually, not really; my friends don't call me Hitler at all OOG... and IG, while the high-level parallels ARE there, nobody in the campaign world has heard of Hitler...
I hope you got the joke, there. That was honestly directed more at the flamers attacking you, to point out how ridiculous of an argument they are making.
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Apparently, some of you are reading subtext that I'm not catching. So, Cheeseweasel, I'm assuming the conversations go something like this:
Setting - FLGS Friday Night Magic Tournament
FRIEND: Hey, Cheese! (I take it for granted that your friends call you Cheese) How'd you finish?
CW: 3 and 1. Not too bad. You coming over to play Madden later?
FRIEND: Yeah. Hey, we're getting a new Pathfinder campaign together. Wanna join?
CW: What's the campaign?
FRIEND: Shining beacons of light save the world.
CW: Ugh... pass.
FRIEND: HITLER!!!
Does that about sum it up?
Interesting vision, and perfectly possible.
My vision of that situation didn't look like that at all!
What I got from his posts was:-
The gang gets together, to play PF as a group.
They vote on what kind of game to play.
Six vote for a good-aligned game. Cheese is the only one to vote for an evil-aligned game.
The six back down because if they don't Cheese will refuse to play.
Neither of of know which vision is closer to the truth, but my posts have been motivated by my dislike of the attitude the imaginary Cheese displayed in my vision, based on the real posts by the man himself.
@Cheeseweasel; taking a step back and reassessing our exchanges here, I'd like to apologise to you. It must seem like I'm judging you as a person (rather than judging this specific behaviour and it's assumed consequences). It may also seem like I'm targeting you unfairly, rather than being motivated by my own hatred of that kind of behaviour because of some unfortunate experiences of my own.
As to why I keep going on and on about it....well, you keep posting things for me to respond to. : )
I think one thing we have in common is that we want to be judged (if at all) on the things we actually say and do, rather than on what others have wrongly understood about those things.
I'm content to let the matter drop, and won't bother you about it any longer. That is, unless you post something that makes me respond. : )
Is that me manipulating you? Maybe so, but you are free to choose how to react.
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i understand Mal's POV coming from a table where we have a player get miffed at something OOC or meta game related that causes them to leave the table (a situation like someone playing a paladin at cheese's table) and the result is everyone either feels bad or is equally mad that the player who left refuses to compromise
what if theres only 2 or 3 players including yourself, what if your character is essential to the plot of the campaign?
leaving mid-game because you disagree with someones character choice is petty and whiny imo
that said, if you guys are playing CN or CE characters, the DM should advise against someone rolling a paladin and playing like there isnt going to be issue, so i can see your side as well, its totally asinine to try and throw one in mid story
avoiding that situation in the first place to avoid OOC and metagame conflict does make you the bigger person, but if it puts the other players in a situation where there arent enough players and ultimately no one gets to play, well id say suck it up and play something you dont normally play, because id have a problem with you if we cant play because you dont wanna play something good for a change
i have this issue with my group a lot, right now we have a guy who refuses to play PF because he wants to play 3.5, for very petty and immature reasons, and he is doing everything in his power to prevent the rest of the group from playing and he is trying to divide us
My main issues with evil PCs are for reasons of not playing well with other PCs, even if they are evil too. Ultimately they have selfish goals and demand too much attention of the spotlight goals of the party even if they are not 'dumb' evil or perhaps especially since they are not 'dumb' evil.
I do think a paladin in a party restricts other player choices quite a bit though, non-disruptive evil or anti-hero tendencies will be problematic. They usually do not work well in non-heroic campaigns.
Personally I enjoy playing evil characters that are just a bit too willing to serve the greater good, or are pleasant and kind people with a dark side, but I won't play characters like that in a party with a paladin.
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At a PFS game I played my paladin, Malachi Silverclaw (I'm sure I've seen that name before), when a new guy turned up with an interesting build.
I can't remember all the details, but the initial reaction was 'How can he play an evil PC in PFS?'
There was some 'cleric' in there. He was neutral not evil, but channelled negative energy. He could summon some kind of Cacodemon(?) that could kind of suck the soul out of a dying creature and turn it into some kind of magical gem, which remained behind after the summoned creature left on the grounds that it was created while it was here. Or something.
The cleric could then use this magical gem to do something useful....can't remember what.
I found myself imagining what it must be like to witness this demon appearing and sucking the soul out of something, all at the command of an ally. I then tried to imagine what my paladin would think of all this, bearing in mind that there can be no PvP in PFS; I hate PvP anyway.
Luckily (if that's the right word), my paladin was born and, literally, bred in Cheliax, a place where it's not unusual for devils to walk the streets in service to the government. He also is one quarter demon himself (as well as one quarter angel; the half human part is dominant).
So I rationalised that no paladin could survive a day in Cheliax if compelled to attack evil outsiders on sight. Since they do exist in Cheliax, it must be that paladins can choose when to fight and when to 'keep their powder dry'.
I didn't feel comfortable about it, but neither did my paladin.
I chose to give priority to party unity over my knee-jerk reaction, and I suppose my paladin did the same thing.
I hate PvP. I never start it, but if someone tries it on me then I make them regret it. In game, that is!
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Yeah, I do get very attached to my characters!
In the situation above, after hearing about his (not evil, honest!) PC, my initial assumption was that he was simply trying to play an evil PC, disguised as a neutral PC. We all talked about it before we started, expressed reservations and exchanged assurances.
To be fair, during play his PC contributed as much as anyone, helped the party, didn't try anything PvPish, and never showed any evil intent. He even did the Cacodemon trick (with me standing near with drawn greatsword and readied action), but nothing came of it beyond that soulgem trick.
In the end, I think he was just interested in that trick, rather than wanting to play an evil PC. Maybe, long term, he might have played 'smart evil' like you, Cheeseweasel, but I'll never know; we never saw him again.
Thinking about your situation re: paladins (and their accursed detect evil!) in the same party as a smart-evil PC: there are some who think that any ping on the evildar gives license to smite, and it would be hard to be in the same party. On the other hand, if someone played a paladin who realises that being evil is not enough; actions are what count, that would still be challenging but maybe not impossible?
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While I like my gaming groups, I have far to much animus against Paladins. There's challenging and then there's Sysiphian efforts for very little return. Too much time wasted in hoodwinking the Pally, not enough time to manage my schemes.
Yeah, paladins polarise opinion. : )
Don't you have to watch out for NPC paladins?
I kinda dislike alignment specific abilities, in the case of the paladin smite evil and detect evil, somehow it simplifies alignment into easily separated boxes.
I am not against the whole idea of alignment, I'd just like it to be much less transparent from a character's perspective.
Paladins bring forth that glaring simplicity of the alignment system and rub it in people's faces. I'd much rather do away with most alignment specific mechanics or at the very least make them less commonplace.
If only creatures with an evil aura or evil subtype radiate evil I'd be 'ok' with detect evil for example, smite evil I'd rather see replaced by something similar to the cavaliers challenge ability, 'possibly' with a bonus to evil subtype/aura creatures.