There are indeed examples of good undead, but it can be generally assumed that they're exceptions, and rare ones at that (ghosts being among the few that aren't automatically defaulted to evil).
I was going for a no given that negative energy is strictly asociated with evil. Also the juju oracle changes was exactly to reinforce this "no good undead in my lawn you whippersnappers" golarion attitude.
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@Dekalinder
About 10 years ago Mona published an adventure in Dungeon called "Practical Magic" by Jason Nelson (in Forgotten Realms) where a necromancer in Marsember animates zombies & skeletons and such for practical purposes, ie., street sweeping, street-lantern lighting, manufacturing simple, cheap, mass-produced products, that kind of stuff. The NPC's argument is that these mindless undead can be a valuable part of the operations of the city, providing a valuable but dirty job for the citizens at no cost. It's all pragmatic, practical.
That adventure set a real precedent for undead being non-evil, at least, and in fact a beneficial resourse for a good-aligned city in a famously good-aligned kingdom.
Food for thought, though some DMs obviously won't want it in their games.
Beyond ghosts, another example I can think of:
In D&D 3.5, non evil undead are sometimes lumped in their own category: the deathless.
In D&D 3.5, non evil undead are sometimes lumped in their own category: the deathless.
That was an awful idea. You should not speak its name.
My understanding is that, in Golarion canon, there are a tiny number of nonevil undead creatures. Most of those are nonevil ghosts, and there are a tiny handful of nonevil vampires. I don't know how many are actually "good." If there are any, I would assume that number is very, very small.
...Exactly small enough to account for the exceptional individuals about which stories (i.e. adventures) are written!
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There are in my campaign. Mostly because I'm so very tired of the same old ancient tropes. Vampires are evil? Why? Because that's what some Transylvanian believed back in 1689. I'd rather have vampires as neutral predators who hunt people with the same enthusiasm as wolves hunting deer and spouting all the b+!&%+&s apologetics that human hunters use when they try to justify shooting Bambi with anti-aircraft cannons like it's some kind of 'sport'. " Is it evil? No. But you still sound like a bit of a tosser when you're subjected to any kind of analysis.
Which really just falls back to moral relativism. Are Vampires evil? I mean they eat people, man! So people think they're evil. Are people evil? Pigs sure as hell think so. Are pigs evil? You ask an apple that.
Vampires are just higher up the food chain. Sure, some of them are evil and will deliberately torture people before they eat them because that's how they get their rocks off. But most of them just want to eat and don't find any enjoyment in playing with their food. And some of them think that sentient creatures deserve rights and consideration and are endlessly annoying about their dietary choices at vampire feasts. You know, your annnoying hippy vampire buddy who makes a huge production out of eating pigs and glares at you like you're an a!#&%%@ when you chow down on some halfling.
Moral relativity is just more fun.
"When a man wants to murder a tiger he calls it sport; when a tiger wants to murder him he calls it ferocity." - George Bernard Shaw
I suspect you're just stirring the pot here, but there's a clear distinction between humans using pigs for food, and another species using humans for food -- humans are far more intelligent than pigs, and by any measurement have passed a threshold beyond which ending lives without good reason is generally seen as immoral.
Furthermore, humans need to eat SOMETHING to live, and that something had better include protein. While it is certainly possible to live without eating meat, especially with modern technology and nutrition science, in a world without those advantages, eating meat is a more sustainable alternative. In contrast, Pathfinder!Vampires do not need to feed on blood to survive! Look at the bestiary entry -- there is no mention whatsoever of a requirement to feed; the description simply notes the inclination. Blood of the Night may have more information about it (I haven't read that yet) but based on the information available, there is no indication that vampires have the same driving biological need to feed on humans that humans have to feed on other forms of life.
Thus, Pathfinder!Vampires who feed on humans do so, presumably, simply out of the pleasure of doing so. This is evil -- taking the life or at least some of the health and well-being of another intelligent creature solely for your own enjoyment.
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Plus, pigs don't think people are evil because pigs have no conceptualization of good or evil.
Plus-plus, Transylvanians didn't come up with the mythology of vampires as we know them (though many, many societies believed in similar creatures) - it was an Irish author who set the most famous vampire in Transylvania, though he had never been there himself.
Vampiric mythology as we know it is more of a Slavic invention, and believe me it wasn't just because they ate people that the Slavs (my ancestors) thought they were evil. It's because they were awful, horrible, ugly inhuman things that arose from disease and curses and perpetrated evil actions against their own family members and neighbors.
Vampires in those mythologies were not being stigmatized because of their diet. They were truly evil, murderous beings.
There are hordes of them, they arose just after I found a helm of opposite alignment and went on a rampage.
They are very happy being good creatures and helping the living improve the world.
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There are hordes of them, they arose just after I found a helm of opposite alignment and went on a rampage.
They are very happy being good creatures and helping the living improve the world.
What's funny is that there was actually a vampire in the Forgotten Realms setting that did put on a helm of opposite alignment, became lawful good, then opened a tavern in Ravens Bluff.
I'm sorry, that just popped into my head after reading your post.
Plus, pigs don't think people are evil because pigs have no conceptualization of good or evil.
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Its funny, but a few years ago, man was supposed to be the only animal with language, but now we know differently. Who knows, maybe one day we'll discover pigs do understand evil.
Or..Evil may just be a human delusion, like the flat-earth and the existance of James Jacobs...
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There are in my campaign. Mostly because I'm so very tired of the same old ancient tropes.
Non-evil undead (and especially non-evil vampires) is a very recent and powerful trope. I, for myself, prefer undead being based on tradition rather than on blockbusters.
Having rare exceptions fits my needs perfectly.
I was going for a no given that negative energy is strictly asociated with evil.
Negative energy is not evil per se.
The Fallen from Wrath of the Righteous volume 3 are technically evil, but it's hard to read their flavor and really see most of them as evil. They just want to a decent burial and the change for an afterlife.
IMHO they would work better as neutral
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Not exactly good, but there's a mummified Iroran monk in
Generally, unwilling undeath is seen as disrespectful to people and their remains, while the sorts of people who willingly turn to it tend to do so for bad reasons. Considering how lichdom in Golarion is hinted at requiring the person to do dangerous things to their own and other's souls, it generally isn't something that can be undertaken with clean hands.
Usually, even if it's to maintain a permanent vigil on something, it'd be morally better to set up bunch of guards than to undeadify yourself and stay there forever (and risk losing touch due to loneliness).
Of course, there's always the possibility of someone who's held on to their morality despite losing their mortality. Or a vampire who thinks she's being sporting about their diet, until she locks the doors on the competitors who ask to opt out of her bout.
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The Fallen from Wrath of the Righteous volume 3 are technically evil, but it's hard to read their flavor and really see most of them as evil. They just want to a decent burial and the change for an afterlife.
IMHO they would work better as neutral
Why do people always want to see Evil creatures acting like bloodthirsty psychopaths ?
I believe that everyday we rub shoulders with many evil mundane humans. They just pursue their own dreams and desires rather than try to kill as many people as they can.
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Or..Evil may just be a human delusion
When I was a doctoral candidate I wrote a paper arguing that "evil" does not exist in humanity -- in the human condition (neither does "righteous" -- what we think of "good" when we define the opposite of evil).
In the human condition we have anti-social, certainly, and that can lead to depravity, etc. But "evil" DOES NOT EXIST.
Hitler was anti-social and depraved, just like Himmler, Bush Jr., Tiberius, and Gaddafi -- but none were "evil" because there's no such thing in the human condition.
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Or..Evil may just be a human delusionWhen I was a doctoral candidate I wrote a paper arguing that "evil" does not exist in humanity -- in the human condition (neither does "righteous" -- what we think of "good" when we define the opposite of evil).
In the human condition we have anti-social, certainly, and that can lead to depravity, etc. But "evil" DOES NOT EXIST.
Hitler was anti-social and depraved, just like Himmler, Bush Jr., Tiberius, and Gaddafi -- but none were "evil" because there's no such thing in the human condition.
Do you still hold to the belief that evil does not exist? Also, what about Godwin's Law?
Or..Evil may just be a human delusionWhen I was a doctoral candidate I wrote a paper arguing that "evil" does not exist in humanity -- in the human condition (neither does "righteous" -- what we think of "good" when we define the opposite of evil).
In the human condition we have anti-social, certainly, and that can lead to depravity, etc. But "evil" DOES NOT EXIST.
Hitler was anti-social and depraved, just like Himmler, Bush Jr., Tiberius, and Gaddafi -- but none were "evil" because there's no such thing in the human condition.
Of course, some would argue that anti-social is the best/purest way to be. . . after all, according to certain French philosophers
"Hell is other people"?I don't know about the rules in Golarian but the concept that all Skeletons/Zombies/mindless undead are evil always chaffed me. I mean-- there is no rule that a TN or even a NG character couldn't animate skeletons with the spell.
If a NG character animates some skeletons for "the greater good" and uses them to oppose evil how are the skeletons themselves still evil? I think anything mindless should have an alignment of "N" like most animals do.
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That statement is up for argument. One might say that supreme indifference to others, IS the purest form of evil. There's a story that has haunted me from the time I first read it in the '70's about a woman slowly dying on the doorstep of an apartment building because none of the people who heard her cries made the slightest effort to get involved, even to the extent of calling the police.
The damned Bystander Effect, which personally stands out as an example of the existence of evil. Likewise the existence of good when people rise above it.
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A little outside of the current direction of the discussion, but technically there's still nothing preventing a shadowdancer from having an undead shade companion of any alignment at all. I'm not sure if this is an oversight or if the undead shade isn't necessarily supposed to be an actual undead creature.
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Yes they are. It's a case of a good character using evil to fight evil. And an option that he should be using with great reluctance and personal turmoil.
If a NG character animates some skeletons for "the greater good" and uses them to oppose evil how are the skeletons themselves still evil? I think anything mindless should have an alignment of "N" like most animals do.
:/ Every shadow companion for every shadowdancer character I'd want to play is pretty far removed from evil.
The shadowdancer's shadow is specifically called out as matching your alignment. The way I see it, your ties to the plane of shadow are so strong you pull a little bit of it out onto this plane, which takes the form of a shadow that, because of the shadow plane's close association with the negative energy plane, gets affected by the same things that affect undead. Or something.
:/ Every shadow companion for every shadowdancer character I'd want to play is pretty far removed from evil.Yes they are. It's a case of a good character using evil to fight evil. And an option that he should be using with great reluctance and personal turmoil.
If a NG character animates some skeletons for "the greater good" and uses them to oppose evil how are the skeletons themselves still evil? I think anything mindless should have an alignment of "N" like most animals do.
Which is why I think the Shadow companion isn't necessarily undead in the same way.
I hope it's never changed by errata, honestly. I love my paladin X/ninja 2/Shadowdancer X so much, at this point I really would hate to lose the shade aspect.
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Do you still hold to the belief that evil does not exist? Also, what about Godwin's Law?
Sure, why not?
Ultimately the semantics don't matter in real life. Whether or not "evil" is a human creation that doesn't actually exist in the human condition or does, doesn't change the fact that "antisocial" and "depraved" (whatever "depraved" does or does not mean) do exist....Looks up Godwin's Law.
Meh, I don't think it matters. I first thought of the argument as an undergrad before I ever even had an email account. I wrote my paper in um, '00, '01?, before I had ever really been on the internet more than to check email.
For our culture any conversation that leads to someone making a comparison to something evil or bad will inevitably lead to Hitler -- I would argue since at least the 1950s. Thus I would argue that Godwin's Law is like making the astonishing statement that when talking about US presidents people will mention that Washington was pretty good. .... DUH!
"Good and evil...
There's never one without the other."
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Yes they are. It's a case of a good character using evil to fight evil. And an option that he should be using with great reluctance and personal turmoil.
If a NG character animates some skeletons for "the greater good" and uses them to oppose evil how are the skeletons themselves still evil? I think anything mindless should have an alignment of "N" like most animals do.
Why does he need to be super reluctant and personally turmoiled over this?
There is an evil Lich destroying the countryside, slaughtering villagers, desecrating the land, ect, ect. The bodies of its victims are cluttering the streets. . . why does he necessarily need to have a moral conviction against using a little negative energy to bring along some extra swords when he goes to fight this lich?
As I recall in the climax of one of the touchstones upon which the entire fantasy RPG industry is built a good character called upon an entire ARMY of undead to join in his battle against the dark lord. . .
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As I recall in the climax of one of the touchstones upon which the entire fantasy RPG industry is built a good character called upon an entire ARMY of undead to join in his battle against the dark lord. . .Except he bargained with them. He didn't compel or create them and the end he let them pass on.
As I recall in the climax of one of the touchstones upon which the entire fantasy RPG industry is built a good character called upon an entire ARMY of undead to join in his battle against the dark lord. . .Except he bargained with them. He didn't compel or create them and the end he let them pass on.So Animating mindless skeletons stops the soul from passing on? Or did the soul pass on when the creature died?
What id the NG character only animates skeletons on non-sentient creatures?
What if he uses speak with dead to ask the soul's permission to use it to seek justice against the evil lich?
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Many neutral characters (neither good nor evil) are neutral because they are willing to perform evil acts for the greater good. This is the Machiavellian "Ends Justify the Means." In fact, the Blackstaff himself was described as an "Ends Justify the Means" type character, and is LN.
Despoiling nature by creating abominations of undeath is an evil act, no matter the end-goal of that act. Performing an evil act for a good end-goal is the path of a Neutral character.
I whole heartedly disagree. Attempting or wanting to do good is a good trait not a neutral trait. Neutral is its own thing-- its not "lazy good" and "lazy evil" or "good guys who do good with evil means"-- I'd say that trope of an anti-hero who is on a quest for good could be either CG or NG (obviously not LG).
What makes creating undead an evil act? We've established that negative energy in and of itself isn't evil. Its clear that using the bodies of animals you've slain isn't evil or there wouldn't be the tropes of Dragon hide armor, ect.
So why is using the skeleton of an Owlbear you had to kill as an animated skeleton specifically an evil act?
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Despoiling nature by creating abominations of undeath is an evil act, no matter the end-goal of that act. Performing an evil act for a good end-goal is the path of a Neutral character.
Ok, Yellow Musk Creepers - nasty vicious plants.
I change them to undead so I can control them and instruct them to leave the area making it safe is an evil act? Would it also be an evil act to leave them there, potentially having locals get harmed while I search and search for someone with control plants? But isn't control plants a form of slavery? Isn't enslavement regarded as evil? What about leaving a danger unresolved for an indeterminate time, wouldn't that also be evil too?
Yes, that was contrived, but it illustrates that everyone has their own definition of what is good and what is evil. If it's a problem in your game, then talk it through as a group and agree on a common definition for your table that you can all agree on.
Some degree of what is good or not is also part of the acceptance of the norm in society - in societies that slavery is the norm, it would likely not be perceived as evil in general - the treatment of the slaves being another layer.
This same argument can also be applied to law and chaos. In a society that allows people to have multiple spouses, we cannot call it bigamy because in that society there is no such thing. This makes paladins in my game quite a challenge when the player sees them as a law enforcement agent in addition to being a stalwart of good. They take great pains to find out what the laws are to work within them.
Work within the confines of general acceptance and definition of good an evil for your table. It wont eliminate all arguments on this sort of thing but it will reduce them a lot.
There is no black and white with good or evil, just multitudinous shades of interpretation and situation.
Final note to consider - in game terms, good and evil (and neutrality) are terms that allow easy determination of what affects a being and whether they are detectable in some way or other. The game definitions are not trying to define "real life good or evil", they are simply a mechanism for consistency in the game world.
A creature is Evil means Detect Evil will locate that creature. That's it. You the players and GMs take that baseline and determine how the creature's evil manifests in action and deed base don your own perception of good and evil. That is something we cannot define for everyone because everyone is different.
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Now the serious post is out the way...
Player definition:
A "good" undead is a dead undead.
DM definition:
A "good" undead makes the PCs flee and reconsider their tactics! :P
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What makes creating undead an evil act? We've established that negative energy in and of itself isn't evil. Its clear that using the bodies of animals you've slain isn't evil or there wouldn't be the tropes of Dragon hide armor, ect.
So why is using the skeleton of an Owlbear you had to kill as an animated skeleton specifically an evil act?
Because the spells that are used for this have the Evil descriptor in the RAW ;-)
Because the spells that are used for this have the Evil descriptor in the RAW ;-)What makes creating undead an evil act? We've established that negative energy in and of itself isn't evil. Its clear that using the bodies of animals you've slain isn't evil or there wouldn't be the tropes of Dragon hide armor, ect.
So why is using the skeleton of an Owlbear you had to kill as an animated skeleton specifically an evil act?
Which I thought was silly and ridiculous when they added the descriptor to it in 3rd edition and still think is such now that it has persisted there for two rule revisions.
Geb is a whole nation of (mostly) undead, maybe there are some good ones there?
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I'm not sure if this is a hard-and-fast rule, but literally every good undead being I've seen in the setting has been a ghost.
Negative energy might not be evil per-se, but it is literally the negation of life. If you give negative energy form and strength and the implements to harm the living, that's exactly what it will do. Uncontrolled mindless undead don't just stand around doing nothing; when they sense the living, they move to destroy it, because that's what their basic nature demands. Intelligent undead do worse than merely extinguishing life; in many cases, they spread unlife by causing those they kill to rise as more beings like themselves.
Not all are malicious in their actions, but the simple fact of the matter is that positive energy sustains life and negative energy destroys it. And to bring a being into the world whose basic nature is only to kill and destroy can be said to be an evil act.