Do actions have consequences in PFS?


Pathfinder Society

Silver Crusade 1/5

I had a player slaughter two of Gradmaster Torchs guards in Red Manits Prey. The PC's Knew one of the three guards was a

Spoiler:
Red Mantis Assassin]
So the Ninja just killed the two guards to the left of Grand master Torch becuse they were in his way to get to the
Spolier:
Red Mantis Assassin
Does anyone think that Grand Master Torch would impose on the PC to join the Shadow Lodge in order to repay the debit that he owed Torch for killing his bodyguards?

On a side note does anyone think that the wonton killing of two inocent guards have any affect on the Ninja's alignment for his acts?

Liberty's Edge

I've slaughtered city guards before while worshiping Abadar. And occasionally I get stuff off my chronicle sheet. But not really.

What do the spoilers do?

Grand Lodge 5/5

I'd note on the character's Chronicle that they killed two innocents (Evil act) to let future GMs know if the character takes evil actions in the future.

Liberty's Edge

He was taking bribes! Well, they... and no one noticed! And I'm multiclassing into paladin to make up for it!

Grand Lodge 5/5

Alignment infractions do not require anyone to notice other than the GM for it to be noted on the Chronicle sheet.

Liberty's Edge

I guess...

Shadow Lodge 4/5

lucky7 wrote:

I've slaughtered city guards before while worshiping Abadar. And occasionally I get stuff off my chronicle sheet. But not really.

What do the spoilers do?

As a non-evil character, "slaughter" is not a word you want describing your interactions with the city guard. Doubly so for a follower of Abadar. Your GM was probably right to mark your chronicle, but apparently didn't get the point across as to why they did.

3/5

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No one ever seems to be all that concerned when the Neutral characters consistently do Good acts or the Chaotic characters thoroughly obey the law or sign-on to a moral code.

Shadow Lodge 4/5

Timothy McNeil wrote:
No one ever seems to be all that concerned when the Neutral characters consistently do Good acts or the Chaotic characters thoroughly obey the law or sign-on to a moral code.

Is that what you want? Stricter enforcement of all alignments? "Evil" actions are more closely monitored because they are the ones most likely to prove disruptive to the game, both in and out of character. If you're the GM and you want to "warn" a monk because he's acting too Chaotic, then go for it.

Grand Lodge 4/5 5/55/5 ***

Also, it is relatively rare for a character to do something so extremely opposed to their alignment as a murder is to non-evil. Granted, some classes have alignment requirements that could impact their abilities, but only "evil" has the punishment of being banned from play entirely. That is largely the reason why it is viewed, for right or wrong, more closely than other alignment issues. That, and as Lemur said, it is the one most closely tired to disruptive play.

I encourage a GM to take the same notification/notation action against a player who's character's actions are "egregiously" out of phase with their declared alignment. If your monk does something chaotic, that is analogous to murder/evil, then it should be recorded.

5/5 5/55/55/5

Timothy McNeil wrote:
No one ever seems to be all that concerned when the Neutral characters consistently do Good acts or the Chaotic characters thoroughly obey the law or sign-on to a moral code.

Good requires both motivation and action. Neutral is fine just doing good deeds just for the pay, and obeying the law so they don't get a club to the head.

Silver Crusade 3/5

I would say it should depend on the why and the how. Keep in mind, folks, we're Pathfinder agents. We murder sentients all the time, and it doesn't affect our alignment. Was the PC defending themselves? Stopping an evil act from occurring? Dishing out justice for something the assassin did before? Did the PC give the guards warning? Were there alternatives to killing the guards? These are a few of the many questions anyone should ask when evaluating an action's morality.

I don't think I know enough about the OP's situation to make this call, but I do feel that many GMs don't really ask these questions enough, and swing either too lenient or too harsh on good characters that kill.

Sovereign Court 4/5 5/5 ** Venture-Lieutenant, West Virginia—Charleston

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As a side note, in regards to the OP's situation, I really doubt that Torch would be interested in bringing these murderers into the Shadow Lodge. If anything, he'd be trying to get them kicked out of the Society.

Dark Archive 4/5 5/5 ****

Netopalis wrote:
As a side note, in regards to the OP's situation, I really doubt that Torch would be interested in bringing these murderers into the Shadow Lodge. If anything, he'd be trying to get them kicked out of the Society.

Or, just as likely, he'd have the PC "removed" for the offense. Perhaps immediately... and in this case, perhaps the RMA would have helped. If Grandmaster Torch was truly offended, perhaps he'd take a direct route... or with the right bardic performance, could have made the PC's life very difficult...

That, and a strong suggestion that the others stay out of it...

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Morgrym Anvilstrike wrote:

I would say it should depend on the why and the how. Keep in mind, folks, we're Pathfinder agents. We murder sentients all the time, and it doesn't affect our alignment. Was the PC defending themselves? Stopping an evil act from occurring? Dishing out justice for something the assassin did before? Did the PC give the guards warning? Were there alternatives to killing the guards? These are a few of the many questions anyone should ask when evaluating an action's morality.

If I'm defending myself against Aspis agents, kobolds, whatever that's either trying to kill me, or have me as the main course for dinner, that's not murder.

Most exceptions to that principle can be chalked up to the times I play an Andoran. :)

Liberty's Edge 1/5

Actually, the two groups I've played with so far have generally been pretty concientious about *not* killing sentients we run across. There are exceptions, of course; if the mission is to stop a group of raiders from raiding and there's no authorities to take them to then killing them may be the only option. But I and my fellow good-aligned PCs have often gone out of our way to stabilize hired goons and the like after a fight is done.

The rules for unconciousness and dying make it pretty easy, in most cases, to avoid killing people if you care to. I can see no justification for a lawful or non-evil character to purposefully murder city guards, innocent bodyguards, and the like. Just remember that "defeat" doesn't mean the same thing as "kill."

2/5

My Rage Prophet has Bleed, just to ensure that at least one soul feeds the Mother of Monsters, but he's likely to save any other sentients from death in order for the lesson to have meaning.

Paizo Employee 3/5 5/5

When I GM (or play for that matter) I usually have no idea what characters' alignments are, excepting that paladins must be good and no one can be evil. So only evil acts will ping on the "outside of alignment" radar since that's the only thing I'm sure is an issue. It's not that we're watching it more closely, it's just that evil is the only one that's going to stand out as definitely outside of someone's alignment.

Grand Lodge 2/5 RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

Elvis Aron Manypockets wrote:
When I GM (or play for that matter) I usually have no idea what characters' alignments are, excepting that paladins must be good and no one can be evil.

Well, monks have to be lawful (unless they have the martial artist archetype), and shifting out of that means they need an atonement to shift back before they can take any more monk levels.

Similarly, barbarians have to be non-lawful, and becoming lawful immediately removes their ability to rage.

That's fairly significant, don't you think?

Silver Crusade 1/5

The only problem that I would see that If GM Torch went after the Ninja in question he would have been turned into red mist and the PC's would have failed the scenario. THe Ninja was an uber optimzed two weapon fighter that has the Ninja trick that gives him improved invisibilty so unless GM TOrch has some way to do an invisibilty purge in one round after going after the ninja he would simply get sliced to pices if the ninja chosse to go after him.

Paizo Employee 3/5 5/5

Jiggy, I'm still fairly new to GMing & haven't played any alignment dependent classes so only knew about the paladin - didn't leave them out on purpose. It actually underscores my main point, evil acts stand out as not allowed for anyone so ALL evil acts will get our attention. Other alignment infractions are dependent on how well we know the classes and who's playing what (even more complicated with multi-class & players who introduce their characters with fluff but no mention of actual class). And for me watching for lawful / non-lawful is much less ingrained and harder to define. Thanks for the enlightenment though.

The Exchange 5/5

Also realize that Clerics have to stay within one alignment step of thier god. Which means Clerics of evil gods have to be very careful about doing good deeds (and perhaps should have them noted? so that they can be tracked?). Also any clerics of neutral goods might have a problem if they are one step away on the L-C axis. For example, a cleric of Pharasm who is L/N would loose all cleric abilities for shifting to Good. as would any that were N/G if they shifted to Law or chaos. But we don't track these right? So if that N/G cleric of Pharasm is doing things Lawfully - obeying laws, respecting athority etc., he's going to have to go seek an Atonement.

I wonder - what other classes would have problems?

Scarab Sages

Just respecting some laws doesn't make you lawful nosig. At least, in my opinion.
Actually enforcing laws is lawful, to me.

But I think a reason we don't have people track stuff other than evil is the lack of definition for the other alignment extremes. Heck, we barley agree on what is evil. Imagine the debates started if we had people track law, chaos, and good as well.

The Exchange 5/5

Zauron13 wrote:

Just respecting some laws doesn't make you lawful nosig. At least, in my opinion.

Actually enforcing laws is lawful, to me.

But I think a reason we don't have people track stuff other than evil is the lack of definition for the other alignment extremes. Heck, we barley agree on what is evil. Imagine the debates started if we had people track law, chaos, and good as well.

LOL! so true. and I think you have got it exactly.

Liberty's Edge 1/5

Zauron13 wrote:

Just respecting some laws doesn't make you lawful nosig. At least, in my opinion.

Actually enforcing laws is lawful, to me.

But I think a reason we don't have people track stuff other than evil is the lack of definition for the other alignment extremes. Heck, we barley agree on what is evil. Imagine the debates started if we had people track law, chaos, and good as well.

We rye agree as well... :P

Sorry could not resist.

Scarab Sages

Ha, just saw my typo there. Silly swype!

5/5 5/55/55/5

The difference between neutral and one of the extremes on the ethical axis (law/chaos) are hard to bring out in one scenario. Someone acting for the greater good could very easily act with or against the law at any point. You'd need more continutity than the episodic nature of PFS allows and more role playing than many scenarios provide to sort out the difference

Liberty's Edge 1/5

I do feel that if we are making evil acts on chronicles we should be marking acts of all alignments. This is because if I am Lawful Good, for example, if you only ever mark the acts you perceive as evil then you only see the one Evil act I perform per scenario , not the 12 insanely Good acts I performed in the same scenario. Over time this could cause a GM down the line to decide that I have built up an "obvious" evil tendency, even though I have played a blatantly good character to anyone who has seen the whole continuity of the character.

I am explicitly not including Paladins in this due to the excessive nature of their code.

3/5

Mystic Lemur wrote:
Timothy McNeil wrote:
No one ever seems to be all that concerned when the Neutral characters consistently do Good acts or the Chaotic characters thoroughly obey the law or sign-on to a moral code.
Is that what you want? Stricter enforcement of all alignments? "Evil" actions are more closely monitored because they are the ones most likely to prove disruptive to the game, both in and out of character. If you're the GM and you want to "warn" a monk because he's acting too Chaotic, then go for it.

No. I just think that people feeling the need to manage the alignment of other people's PCs is a ludicrous sentiment in an OP campaign. This isn't a discussion about disruptive behavior (unless I have missed everything written on this thread up to the point of my post).

I will warn players about evil acts (while simultaneously pointing out the ridiculousness of the Society being Neutral, but all of the PCs having to be Good or Neutral...which means that there are Evil Pathfinders, but the PCs cannot be them) largely because the regular practice of them seems to kill the RP element of the game. "Let's torture them to get the information" isn't good RP for me.

Anyway, I played in an OP campaign where the motto was "Actions have Consequences". They did. What the players did in mods, Battle Interactives, and LARPs had an effect on how the story was presented. And how players chose to handle things in-mod could lead to multiple different endings (instead of the PFS singular ending). That is not where this campaign is. And I don't feel the need to bigfoot someone else's playing style or enjoyment just because I happen to be judging that session. Will I warn the Paladin about evil acts? Every time. Have a asked a player how his Lawful Monk squares his actions with his code? Yes; I think I have done that with two different players now. But I have only had to deal with two disruptive players [one whom I have known for close to 10 years and has sporadic bouts of "only my interpretation is right" and the other who I have judged twice -- in Wisconsin -- whom I had to ask her to stop bullying her fellow players (OOC) or leave the table], and their problems had zero relation to alignment issues.

I know that is anecdotal. I know that my experiences are not universal. But I am of the informed opinion that trying to manage a PC's alignment from the position of GM (except where it is either spelled out in the adventure or at odds with the class or PC's deity) is not a great idea in OP play. I am aware that there are rules for it. Doesn't mean that the judge should be super eager to implement them.

My thoughts on the matter, up to where I thought the discussion was at the time of my previous post.

1/5

Torch isn't actually part of the Pathfinders when this happens, by the way.

Grand Lodge 4/5 5/55/5 ***

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graywulfe wrote:
if you only ever mark the acts you perceive as evil then you only see the one Evil act I perform per scenario , not the 12 insanely Good acts I performed in the same scenario

IMO that uses the fallacy that alignment is somehow a balancing system where each act of evil can be "washed" by an act of good. I think we are talking more about extreme acts of evil, not kicking a puppy or stealing a few bucks from the offering plate on Sunday (although that could also be perceived as chaotic). We are referring to extreme acts like murder of an innocent, rape, torture, etc. Things that are more likely to immediately strip a paladin of her powers. You just cannot balance that by carrying groceries for the elderly, or saving a kitten from a tree. True evil is typically not something you do on a whim.

If I understand the OP, the PC simply murdered GMT's guards because they were an unintentional impediment to him getting to the assassin. I'm not sure if that means they were physically in the way or if he only knew one was the assassin and didn't know which. Doesn't really matter that they were guards, could have been a commoner, etc. The issue is that they were not acting to injure/kill the PC, he just decided that the quickest, easiest path to "get what he wanted" was to disregard them, kill them, and move on. Sounds pretty evil to me and I certainly would (1) warn the player, and (2) immediately shift his alignment to evil. It would be up to the player to decide what course of action (atonement, etc.) he wished to take at that point.

Liberty's Edge 1/5

I've only GMed Pathfinder Society a couple of times, but as a GM in general I'm honestly pretty lenient about alignment. In order for me to warn a player and ultimately ask them to change their alignment they usually have to do something that makes me do a double take.

For instance:

Me: Alright, you've subdued the asylum inmates, and cleared the way to Dr. Evil's office.

Player: I make sure they're dead.

Me: Ok... wait, what?

Player: I'm going to cast Bleed/slit their throats to make sure they don't stabilize.

Me: Uhh... that's gonna be an evil act

or...

Me: The nefarious neuromancer has enchanted the crowd of shoppers in the market, and they stagger toward you with blank stares and blindly groping hands.

Player: I throw a bead from my Necklace of Fireballs at them. The big one.

Me: Right, next up is... wait, really?

Player: Absolutely.

Me: Er, ok, I'm gonna rule that's evil, just so you know.

1/5

I played the ninja at that table.

We gave the guards warning and one of them attacked. The first "guard" stabbed the Torch before we could do something to stop him. I did something to stop the other two before they had a chance to act.

The Torch was described as looking REALLY bad after that first attack, the rest of the party took out the first guy before the end of the first turn.

Did we know for sure that the other guys were baddies too? No, but I sure wasn't going to wait around to find out. It was not their lucky day.

Those guards probably didn't die BTW, they had only taken two hits a piece. I bet we could have stabilized them by the end of round two.

It is really a shame that we couldn't play this out as we were so short on time.

Grand Lodge 4/5 5/55/5 ***

Lao Akili wrote:
I played the ninja at that table

In the moment, you might feel you made the right decision and baring a paladin in the group, a GM might be hard-pressed to say you acted in an intentional and evil way. However, once the smoke clears, and assuming that you were not able to save the guards, your PCs would realize that they did in fact kill a couple of innocents in their eagerness to save the Torch. Anyone with a conscious would be affected by that. I admit it is a difficult situation, but that is why it is always harder to be good than evil. Would/should it immediately shift the PCs to evil? I don't think so, but you would see a lot of table variation on whether or not to record it on the chronicle sheet. OTOH, for a paladin, it would mean an immediate loss of powers.


Bob Jonquet wrote:
OTOH, for a paladin, it would mean an immediate loss of powers.

A paladin losing his paladinhood for attacking people who he thought were about to kill an innocent may be a little over the line and setting a bad precedant. Thats my 2 cents anyway.

I'm not sure if you can expect PCs to not fight to protect themselves and others in some of these situations. They certainly don't mean to be doing acts of wanton evil, or at least not that I see. Better alive than dead...

Grand Lodge 4/5 5/55/5 ***

It could be argued that a paladin is not permitted to make that mistake. Typically a paladin does not seek to avoid consequences because of things like "I didn't know." Once she realized that the victims are innocents, that could have a dramatic impact on her psyche and powers. Its easy for us to dismiss such in-game issues because we are not actually the characters. We can justify just about any action with long, drawn-out debates but, I admit there would be a lot of table variation in that as well and I don't really want to turn this into yet another paladin-code argument, so YMMV

1/5

Bob Jonquet wrote:
Lao Akili wrote:
I played the ninja at that table
In the moment, you might feel you made the right decision and baring a paladin in the group, a GM might be hard-pressed to say you acted in an intentional and evil way. However, once the smoke clears, and assuming that you were not able to save the guards, your PCs would realize that they did in fact kill a couple of innocents in their eagerness to save the Torch. Anyone with a conscious would be affected by that. I admit it is a difficult situation, but that is why it is always harder to be good than evil. Would/should it immediately shift the PCs to evil? I don't think so, but you would see a lot of table variation on whether or not to record it on the chronicle sheet. OTOH, for a paladin, it would mean an immediate loss of powers.

In the same adventure (different group though), I didn't lift a finger to help Torch. Head of the theives guild gets shanked by some other theives?

Boo Hoo Hoo.


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Bob Jonquet wrote:
It could be argued that a paladin is not permitted to make that mistake. Typically a paladin does not seek to avoid consequences because of things like "I didn't know." Once she realized that the victims are innocents, that could have a dramatic impact on her psyche and powers. Its easy for us to dismiss such in-game issues because we are not actually the characters. We can justify just about any action with long, drawn-out debates but, I admit there would be a lot of table variation in that as well and I don't really want to turn this into yet another paladin-code argument, so YMMV

I forgot the paladin exist to fall for breathing in microbes and accidentally killing them.

When you say people deserve to fall for that kind of thing you sort of open up those debates.

Grand Lodge 4/5 5/55/5 ***

MrSin wrote:
When you say people deserve to fall for that kind of thing you sort of open up those debates.

You may have missed my point that there will be table variation. No where did I say that paladins "deserved" anything. I merely pointed out that there are differing opinions on what would/should constitute a violation of code.

1/5

Bob Jonquet wrote:
MrSin wrote:
When you say people deserve to fall for that kind of thing you sort of open up those debates.
You may have missed my point that there will be table variation. No where did I say that paladins "deserved" anything. I merely pointed out that there are differing opinions on what would/should constitute a violation of code.

We could use the Guide to Society Organized play Page 36 as our guide.

Guide to Pathfinder Society Organized Play:
"We believe a deity would forgive a one-time bad choice as long as the action wasn’t too egregious (such as burning down an orphanage full of children, killing a peasant for no good reason but sport, etc.)."

:)

Of course, that probably isn't written with Paladins in mind, for the Paladin to have unknowingly slain two innocent guards to defend Grandmaster Torch when both he and the party were assaulted by the third guard is unforgivable by any Deity and I think it should shift his alignment to Neutral if not Evil.

The right thing to do would have been call a time-out to ask both other guards if they were also going to stab Torch.

Edit: Edit: Removed Edit. Edit-ception.


Alydos wrote:

Of course, that probably isn't written with Paladins in mind, for the Paladin to have unknowingly slain two innocent guards to defend Grandmaster Torch when both he and the party were assaulted by the third guard is unforgivable by any Deity and I think it should shift his alignment to Neutral if not Evil.

The right thing to do would have been call a time-out to ask both other guards if they were also going to stab Torch.

Edit: Edit: Removed Edit. Edit-ception.

Could you imagine that though? in the same 6 seconds Mr Torch was stabbed a guy in full plate and a greatsword turning to 2 other guys who look affiliated with the guy who just stabbed torch and says "Pardon me sir and madame, but are you going to stab Mr Torch too? I have to ask politely or my god will take away my superpowers."

I think in that situation my first thought would be protecting torch and that the other two gaurds were obviously about to kill him too. Its not that your going out of your way to kill innocents, its that your trying to protect torch from a trio of assassins. Usually in the middle of combat you can't just call a timeout. I'm not a big fan of punishing the paladin for protecting people.

1/5

MrSin wrote:

Could you imagine that though? in the same 6 seconds Mr Torch was stabbed a guy in full plate and a greatsword turning to 2 other guys who look affiliated with the guy who just stabbed torch and says "Pardon me sir and madame, but are you going to stab Mr Torch too? I have to ask politely or my god will take away my superpowers."

I think in that situation my first thought would be protecting torch and that the other two guards were obviously about to kill him too. Its not that your going out of your way to kill innocents, its that your trying to protect torch from a trio of assassins. Usually in the middle of combat you can't just call a timeout. I'm not a big fan of punishing the paladin for protecting people.

That made me laugh considerably harder than I expected!

The gist of the entire page in the Guide to PFS is one of leniency and reason. It mentions consistently evil acts (Most would say Disruptive gameplay) that continue AFTER a warning has been issued.

It follows the prime directive of warn first, don't punish for things beyond control. I do like the example of Burning down an orphanage full of children though, because I can imagine players trying to reason it away. "That Orphanage attacked me!"


I have yet to meet a Richard in a PFS, I think the only time thats come up is when someone threatened to change someones alignment to good so they said they had to start burning orphanages to even things out.

1/5

MrSin wrote:
I have yet to meet a Richard in a PFS, I think the only time thats come up is when someone threatened to change someones alignment to good so they said they had to start burning orphanages to even things out.

Change their alignment to Good?!?! Was he playing a Blackguard! Because I have been playing for quite a large amount of my natural life, and I'll tell you that only the nastiest, vilest rogues and all Paladins get threatened with alignment shifts.

Not saying people are completely twisted and insane about Paladins, but you'll never, ever see a cleric wearing a Phylactery of Faithfulness

The feeling of pleasure and power people get holding this over a player is utterly disgusting to me.

The human decency guide for Organized Play does say the words "MUST warn any player whose character is deviating from his chosen alignment." So everyone should keep that in mind when deciding the consequences after a scenario or module.

Silver Crusade 1/5

I do not know why Paladins are being talked about here. A Paladin would not have done what the Nina did period. It is only IMO that the Ninja May have commited an alignment infraction namely killing the two inocent guards. The Third guard that struck GMT with a posioned weapon is and was fair game for any of the party to lay waste too. The party clearly saw what the effects of a single strike on Torch worte and they knew thier primary mission was to protect Torch at all costs.

The two things I could see GMT doing is demanding werguild for the Ninja or starting a whispering campain agisnist the Ninja wtih the 10 and the other Venture capatians. This could have drastic and deadly consequences for Torch as the Ninja in question might take offense and whack Torch and he is far deadlier than some Red Mantis Assassi but that is only one GM's oppion.

1/5

Lou Diamond wrote:

I do not know why Paladins are being talked about here. A Paladin would not have done what the Nina did period. It is only IMO that the Ninja May have commited an alignment infraction namely killing the two inocent guards. The Third guard that struck GMT with a posioned weapon is and was fair game for any of the party to lay waste too. The party clearly saw what the effects of a single strike on Torch worte and they knew thier primary mission was to protect Torch at all costs.

The two things I could see GMT doing is demanding werguild for the Ninja or starting a whispering campain agisnist the Ninja wtih the 10 and the other Venture capatians. This could have drastic and deadly consequences for Torch as the Ninja in question might take offense and whack Torch and he is far deadlier than some Red Mantis Assassi but that is only one GM's oppion.

You were the GM, correct Lou? Actually the majority of my posts point to page 36 of the Guide to Pathfinder Society Organized Play which should answer all your questions. Though it won't tell you that a Paladin would not have defended someone as you imply.

Lou Diamond wrote:
they knew their primary mission was to protect Torch at all costs.
PFS Organized Play wrote:
Characters who commit potentially evil acts (casting spells with the Evil descriptor, killing or maiming someone, etc.) while following specific orders from their faction or the Pathfinder Society, do not suffer alignment infractions.

Did the party have any reason to KNOW the other two guards were innocent? So far no one has mentioned that. Unless Torch himself knew that only that exact guard was a Red Mantis Assassin... then it gets all kinds of confusing.

We're bringing up Paladins (While staying on topic) because it is fun and adding a lot of mirth to the topic.

Edit: Edit: I can make it better, we have the technology.

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