Is Channeling Energy a Good / Evil act?

[Bizbag]

The choice of a cleric to channel positive or negative energy is bound in their alignment and their deity's alignment (and the paladin's lack of choice in the matter is bound to their alignment). In the 3.5 ruleset, a section read the following:

Quote:

Even if a cleric is neutral, channeling positive energy is a good act and channeling negative energy is evil.

This text does not exist in PRG, but the act remains tied to the alignments in question at character creation.

So my question is this: in PRG, is using the Channel Energy ability an act of Good/Evil on its own?

[Gilfalas]

Bizbag wrote:

This text does not exist in PRG, but the act remains tied to the alignments in question at character creation.

So then no. It has apparenly been removed from the PFRPG version.

Since spells and other powers that are aligned still specifically call it out it seems clear that simply channeling energy of either kind is not an intrinsically aligned action.

While it seems the ability to grant channeling either positive or negative energy is thematically tied to a deities alignment, I believe that is RAI.

IIRC the actual +/- planes are mildy good and evil aligned respectively but that may be me remembering previous settings and not Golarion but that would fit in with the concepts of good gods granting non evil powers and evil gods granting non good powers of various sorts.

[DM_Blake]

Nope, the only abilities that are "good" or "evil" acts are the abilities that explicitly say so. For example, summoning an archon is always "good" and summoning a devil is always "evil" - the Summon Monster spell says so.

Channeling has no such explicit text so it is not inherently good or evil to use this ability, just like it is not inherently good or evil to use a fireball spell.

BUT, what you do with it could be good or evil - that's an ethical/alignment question that can come up with just about anything (fireballing a bunch of orcs attacking a defenseless farm is probably good, fireballing a bunch of defenseless farmers is probably evil, etc.). So perhaps using your channeling ability might be a good, evil, or neutral act depending on WHAT you're doing with it, but the ability itself is not explicitly aligned.

[Beopere]

RAW they are not aligned, but I find that PF isn't super consistent with that.

All mindless undead, that I know of, are evil. Certainly the iconic zombie and skeletons. How can they be evil, unless their nature of negative energy is evil? No spider, ant, (stupid) ooze, or any other mindless creature is evil, they are neutral.

Thematically in mind, zombies should be neutral, or negative energy clearly evil.

[DM_Blake]

It's possible that the negative energy isn't the evil part of skeletons and zombies. Maybe the negative energy simply infuses them with "un-life" and that soulless/un-life condition is what makes them evil.

On the other hand, the there are obvious parallels between "positive energy" and good creatures that use it and good effects that it causes, and likewise there are obvious parallels between "negative energy" and evil creatures that use it and bad effects that it causes, all of which argue for the fact that these energy types are very inextricably linked with alignments and perhaps all uses of these energies should be tagged with alignment descriptors.

But so far they haven't.

[Zhayne]

The use of positive or negative energy is not inherently a good or evil act. Note that Cure spells lack the good descriptor, and Inflict spells lack the evil descriptor.

[Zhayne]

Beopere wrote:

RAW they are not aligned, but I find that PF isn't super consistent with that.

All mindless undead, that I know of, are evil.

Yeah, this is a total inconsistency. You can't have a moral leaning if you're incapable of making moral choices. They should be neutral. Free-willed undead, of course, can be any alignment they choose.

The whole alignment system is one big 'we didn't think this through'.

[DM_Blake]

Zhayne wrote:

The whole alignment system is one big 'we didn't think this through'.

That is the godsawful truth right there.

And hundreds of game developers over 4 decades have taken a crack at it and still nobody's really thought it through.

Maybe, it's just unthinkable. Literally.

The U.S. Justice System has had 6x as long and 10,000x more people working on pinning down ethics and they still haven't gotten all the kinks worked out - how can we expect a game to do better?

Me, I just forget about alignment rulesalmost all the time - once in a while it comes up, such as an archon with a circle of protection from evil, or a paladin using detect evil, or some such - even then, I mostly just wing it (and I let people know this in advance before they make a paladin, etc.). Except when a particular rule rears its ugly head, the rest of the time alignment is just a vague system of ethics.

You know, just like in our real world.

It solves so many game problems.

[Shain Edge]

Zhayne wrote:

Beopere wrote:

RAW they are not aligned, but I find that PF isn't super consistent with that.

All mindless undead, that I know of, are evil.

Yeah, this is a total inconsistency. You can't have a moral leaning if you're incapable of making moral choices. They should be neutral. Free-willed undead, of course, can be any alignment they choose.

The whole alignment system is one big 'we didn't think this through'.

Actually, there should be a 10th Alignment, or one that is a distinct lack of alignment that any 'mindless' undead and constructs would have, being 'None' which is not quite 'Neutral'. In that those do not have any sense of self will, no 'choices' and not even a sense of self preservation.

Neutral being specifically a lack a primal desire to exert yourself outside of your own needs. 'None' being that you have no desires at all to even attempt to affect a change.

[Shain Edge]

DM_Blake wrote:

Me, I just forget about alignment rulesalmost all the time - once in a while it comes up, such as an archon with a circle of protection from evil, or a paladin using detect evil, or some such - even then, I mostly just wing it (and I let people know this in advance before they make a paladin, etc.). Except when a particular rule rears its ugly head, the rest of the time alignment is just a vague system of ethics.

I pretty much ignore alignment as well. The only thing I use it for is to indicate to the players that I don not allow any evil or chaotic neutral characters for play styles. It's generally not good to let some PCs have the chance to back-stab other PCs.

Though I suppose there is a fun time when the campaign is set up for that specific purpose, on rare occasions.