Goblin Squad Member
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Just stumbled across this while doing some research...
(By the way, many of the people in these "evil" groups will operate under the philosophy that they are really the "good" group, and that the alignment system of the game is a joke, designed to highlight hypocrisy and designer stupidity, and when they're not out attempting to kill as many inexperienced and unprotected characters and destroy as many badly organized Settlements as possible, they'll expound on these "truths" at length in every forum available to them.)
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Goblin Squad Member
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Evil always think they are "Good"
Im not sure why that makes the designers stupid or hypocritical.
Reading a bit more in that post reminded me of something some of us has discussed on TS.
The Factional warfare system is meaningless PVP.
Fighting for NPC's with a cause that does nothing in the game is meaningless. The NPC factions are not going to conquer PC territory. Sure the NPC's will have towns of their own but I doubt we can conquer those. Sign up for as many factions as you can just so you can PVP with as many people as you can. There is no point other then the PVP itself.
Kinda meaningless other then for RP reasons, which I can think of many legitimate RP reasons that are more meaningful but you will still suffer the consequences.
Just as bad as RvB.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I would disagree, Andoucet. Even in a game with absolute good and evil, people can come up with excuses for why they "ping as evil" on the paladin's radar (your god just disagrees with me; I may have just commited some evil act, but I'm really good; and so on), or maybe they've never been the subject of an alignment detecting spell and thus aren't aware their true alignment is evil. I think it's entirely possible that some evil characters think their actions are noble and just, and thus that they are good.
But it seems like Ryan's quote is talking about players, and not characters.
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Goblin Squad Member
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The Factional warfare system is meaningless PVP.
Fighting for NPC's with a cause that does nothing in the game is meaningless. The NPC factions are not going to conquer PC territory. Sure the NPC's will have towns of their own but I doubt we can conquer those. Sign up for as many factions as you can just so you can PVP with as many people as you can. There is no point other then the PVP itself.
Kinda meaningless other then for RP reasons, which I can think of many legitimate RP reasons that are more meaningful but you will still suffer the consequences.
I only know what they've told us about the factional warfare system so far. We know that Enforcer and Champion roles at least will be faction based. The Champion flag might be as it was - a rep-only hit for killing unflagged alignment enemies. Or it might change to a rep-only hit for killing unflagged faction enemies. Enforcer though, could easily remain as a Law-based criminal hunter.
If faction warfare is just there to let PvPers kill each other, I agree there will be little reason to do it. I assume that there will be rewards for joining factions, and those rewards have in game effects. And since no one can join all factions, GW has space to balance those effects.
Will it be unbalanced against people who don't join factions? Maybe a little. The long-term alignment PvP flags gave the wearer additional powers and a rep boost; it was a reward for risk. I'd expect faction members will have benefits as well.
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Goblin Squad Member
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"Evil" characters don't think that they are good, they think good guys are deluded and that Evil is the truest state of the universe. Goodness is an arbitrary set of restrictions placed on sentient beings by self-righteous and nose-y "good" deities.
Evil is Truth.
according to evil people that is
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Goblin Squad Member
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I also think the faction based pvp is still a gray area. I hope GW makes it look like a lot what was to become the longterm pvp flags. A few examples:
factions are alignment based, you have to be certain alignment to join
you can only have rank 6 with one faction, could a character even rise above rank 3 with other factions?
faction based buffs according to alignment/faction theme
faction gear, wooooot!
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Goblin Squad Member
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faction gear, wooooot!I hope not. This would undermine player crafters being the source of all meaningful gear.
Faction recipes would be much more acceptable in my mind. Even if it was only a cosmetic change. Being able to wear Plate Mail of the [Insert Holy Order] would be much more invocative for a Paladin than just wearing the plain metal gray suit.
Though I wouldn't like to see being able to wear the cosmetic change as being faction restricted, only making it. I think it would be interesting to see if they would propagate amongst the general population, or if the crafters with access to the appearance would police themselves and keep it within the org.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Faction recipes would be much more acceptable in my mind. Even if it was only a cosmetic change. Being able to wear Plate Mail of the [Insert Holy Order] would be much more invocative for a Paladin than just wearing the plain metal gray suit.
Though I wouldn't like to see being able to wear the cosmetic change as being faction restricted, only making it. I think it would be interesting to see if they would propagate amongst the general population, or if the crafters with access to the appearance would police themselves and keep it within the org.
Faction recipes and faction controlled sources of materials.
Like poisons. Want powerful poison and the means to make it? The Red Mantis Assassins might be a faction that you really should join. Yes, you might be able to find enough of the really rare components to make a batch, but if you're found to have a source, you might become a target. Of course, the Red Mantis might have a factional enemy that also has poison making capability...
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Goblin Squad Member
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Not if all you earn from faction PvP is components / schematics used in the creation of faction gear.faction gear, wooooot!I hope not. This would undermine player crafters being the source of all meaningful gear.
I can only respond to what is written. If Aeioun had written components/schematics, I wouldn't have commented.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I also think the faction based pvp is still a gray area. I hope GW makes it look like a lot what was to become the longterm pvp flags. A few examples:
factions are alignment based, you have to be certain alignment to join
you can only have rank 6 with one faction, could a character even rise above rank 3 with other factions?
faction based buffs according to alignment/faction theme
faction gear, wooooot!
That sill does not make it meaningful human interaction... Faction Gear, even if only a cosmetic change is meaningless. May as well just gank people for their gear anywhere in the game.
If you can PVP with multiple factions, I would assume that means you can obtain the rank required to be PVP flagged.
Faction buffs and etc similar are also meaningless, just a small bonus that you will likely gain from other areas if you were non faction and PC only. Either way it is still not meaningful human interaction.
This discussion probably needs its own thread, but I figured the title of nothing made it fit.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Faction recipes and faction controlled sources of materials.
Like poisons. Want powerful poison and the means to make it? The Red Mantis Assassins might be a faction that you really should join. Yes, you might be able to find enough of the really rare components to make a batch, but if you're found to have a source, you might become a target. Of course, the Red Mantis might have a factional enemy that also has poison making capability...
I still haven't decided if I'm sold on the idea of factions, but if we are to have them, I like where you're going with this. I would want factions to be more living and breathing groups that we, the players, flesh out further than NPCs are capable of doing. Tying desired perks like poison to them might be one way. Of course, there are those who will argue that such perks are simply carrots to get players to join factions when it's the players who should be manufacturing and controlling these perks in a player run economy.
I haven't heard enough to be convinced one way or the other yet.
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Goblin Squad Member
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In PF & DD, evil IS evil, and good IS good. There is no "moral relativism", in these games based on a manichean cosmogony. So no, evil can NEVER think themselves good.
The problem with that statement, at least as it relates to human psychology, is that Belief and Knowledge can be very well compartmentalized. Opinion and fact can exist at the same time in contradiction. While only the truth is true, it is ordinary for people to act as if it is the opinion that is fact. It is very possible, and in fact is a very common occurrence in the real world, that people think things that are demonstrably untrue. They then view the world with the bias that they are correct and require overwhelming evidence to the contrary to change their minds.
In PF & DD, morality is certainly more absolute than the real world. But that does not change the perception of them. It is very possible for a man to go around torturing and murdering criminals in his city believing that what he is doing is a good act because it is benefiting the common good. But regardless of how good he thinks he might be, his soul is thoroughly stained with evil. And he probably will never realize it unless he is confronted with the topic from an external source. And then if that external source is easily dismissed, he will do so. "What did that paladin really know anyways? They are hardly perfect themselves, those hypocrites. He probably cannot even tell evil from good, he just makes it up and pretends divine magic is telling him!" Most folk will not be having their alignment detected on a daily basis, or even ever in their lives.
What is true and what we think is true are separate entities. The mere fact that an absolute truth exists does not mean that everyone accepts it, or even recognizes it.
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Goblin Squad Member
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What is true and what we think is true are separate entities. The mere fact that an absolute truth exists does not mean that everyone accepts it, or even recognizes it.
Then if even the gods, who are the epitome of their particular alignment, can be guilty of twisting absolute truths to meet their own needs or interpretations, does there need to be a force greater than deities, such as Moorcock's Balance?
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Goblin Squad Member
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What is true and what we think is true are separate entities. The mere fact that an absolute truth exists does not mean that everyone accepts it, or even recognizes it.Then if even the gods, who are the epitome of their particular alignment, can be guilty of twisting absolute truths to meet their own needs or interpretations, does there need to be a force greater than deities, such as Moorcock's Balance?
I always liked the idea of Old Ones from Paladium.
Goblinworks Executive Founder
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The problem with that statement, at least as it relates to human psychology, is that Belief and Knowledge can be very well compartmentalized. Opinion and fact can exist at the same time in contradiction. While only the truth is true, it is ordinary for people to act as if it is the opinion that is fact. It is very possible, and in fact is a very common occurrence in the real world, that people think things that are demonstrably untrue. They then view the world with the bias that they are correct and require overwhelming evidence to the contrary to change their minds.
In PF & DD, morality is certainly more absolute than the real world. But that does not change the perception of them. It is very possible for a man to go around torturing and murdering criminals in his city believing that what he is doing is a good act because it is benefiting the common good. But regardless of how good he thinks he might be, his soul is thoroughly stained with evil. And he probably will never realize it unless he is confronted with the topic from an external source. And then if that external source is easily dismissed, he will do so. "What did that paladin really know anyways? They are hardly perfect themselves, those hypocrites. He probably cannot even tell evil from good, he just makes it up and pretends divine magic is telling him!" Most folk will not be having their alignment detected on a daily basis, or even ever in their lives.
What is true and what we think is true are separate entities. The mere fact that an absolute truth exists does not mean that everyone accepts it, or even recognizes it.
I think your argument is biased by that premise : "as it relates to human psychology". You just can't compare human REAL psychology with "D2O basic human" psychology, just like you can't compare their physical condition. For example, machism is kinda anachronic in these games, because the average woman is as strong as the average man (STR 11).
"What did that paladin really know anyways? They are hardly perfect themselves, those hypocrites. He probably cannot even tell evil from good, he just makes it up and pretends divine magic is telling him!"
Well no. Except if he's been transported from IRL and doesn't know the universal divine difference between good & evil in DD/PF. He could say " paladins are wrong, benevolence and good are lies, the nature is evil (or LN) ", but to not know good & evil doesn't makes sense. Cause it would need him to have a subjective sense of good & evil, he couldn't make up this idea from scrap. Because contrary to our world, there's no reason to think that. It would like you saying "Night is enlightened and day is dark". I guess you can arbitrarily say so, but that'd be stupid.
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Goblin Squad Member
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"Evil" characters don't think that they are good, they think good guys are deluded and that Evil is the truest state of the universe. Goodness is an arbitrary set of restrictions placed on sentient beings by self-righteous and nose-y "good" deities.
Evil is Truth.
according to evil people that is
See, I think this is a better way to frame it. Not that evil characters think that they are good. They think that they are right, or understand the truth of the world, or whatever.
I think it is a flaw of us as players, based on our understanding of our world where good and evil are subjective. Then we try to describe mindsets and worldviews in this different universe that has objective good and evil. We often slip back into our own mindsets and use good and bad or evil in ways that our characters might not even consider.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I always liked the idea of Old Ones from Paladium.What is true and what we think is true are separate entities. The mere fact that an absolute truth exists does not mean that everyone accepts it, or even recognizes it.Then if even the gods, who are the epitome of their particular alignment, can be guilty of twisting absolute truths to meet their own needs or interpretations, does there need to be a force greater than deities, such as Moorcock's Balance?
Poor Xy, thinks he's Thoth...
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Goblin Squad Member
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-snip - post too long-I think your argument is biased by that premise : "as it relates to human psychology". You just can't compare human REAL psychology with "D2O basic human" psychology, just like you can't compare their physical condition. For example, machism is kinda anachronic in these games, because the average woman is as strong as the average man (STR 11).
"What did that paladin really know anyways? They...
I feel that translating human psychology from real human to d20 human is reasonable. Humans are meant to reflect how we see ourselves, or at least medieval themed versions of ourselves, such as to create contrast with other fantastical elements. The point is that not everyone trusts what is true to actually be true. Those things that are true are different, yes, which lays a different expectation for where the bulk of the population would fall. A deeply personal ability like 'Detect Evil' which gives very little , if any, indication that the paladin has even used it is easy to doubt and nay-say.
The presence of absolutes does not make them easy to follow or understand or even know. This is why items such as the Phylactery of Faithfulness exist and specify that it notes alignment impacts and not just religious impacts of actions. If Good and Evil were inherently known by all sentient beings, then an item wouldn't be needed the DM would just inform. Albeit, some things are just obvious. Others are not. Now I don't know if the equivalent exists in Pathfinder, but the Book of Vile Darkness D&D 3e accessory purposefully mentions The Misguided as Villainous material, a character that thinks they are doing good but is actually causing great harm through ultimately evil deeds.
Now, I will not say Most Evil thinks of themselves as good. I am simply stating that Some Evil might, and it is certainly a minority. A minority of conspiracy theorists may think that paladins are making up the fact that they can detect evil. They may not deny the presence of the magic, or the fact that paladins can use other divine abilities, but they may feel rather strongly that paladins are pulling a load of BS to justify their crusades without drawing too much attention.
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Goblin Squad Member
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What is true and what we think is true are separate entities. The mere fact that an absolute truth exists does not mean that everyone accepts it, or even recognizes it.Then if even the gods, who are the epitome of their particular alignment, can be guilty of twisting absolute truths to meet their own needs or interpretations, does there need to be a force greater than deities, such as Moorcock's Balance?
I am not necessarily versed in the divine lore of Golarion so strongly, but how was the Starstone created, placed and protected with the tests? The gods were already warring with Rovagug at the dawn of mortal life. Without knowing that history, it is hard to say much about the nature of what makes a deity and how strong the tie between alignment is to them.
Looking over the Areas of Concern, very few gods have an alignment listed. Instead, they are aspects of life and the world at large biased by the alignment they hold.
If a Pianist is the epitome of playing a Piano and then decides to quit and take up the drums, does that mean Pianists now play Drums, or does it mean that that one individual should now be called a Drummer? As you say, the deities Epitomize their alignments, but they do not Define them.
If the gods are, however, restricted from such behavior as crossing their moral codes not because of personal choice but through sheer inability to do so, then that certainly detracts from what power we might describe to them as sentient beings.
Ultimately, if a deity were to try to twist the absolute truths of what it meant to be Lawful or Good, that deity would probably very quickly no longer be considered Lawful or Good. And through no longer epitomizing these absolutes, they could lose divine connection to them (loss of domains). I think looking at Cayden Cailean would be a good example, as a recently ascended deity. His domains are all things that existed before he came into being. People still traveled and behaved in good or chaotic fashions and held contests of strength. His ascendance did not cause these things to spring into being, nor did he steal them from another deity. Instead, he became able to tap into the divine domains of those aspects of the universe that he epitomized. He has the Good domain not because he defines Good, but because he strongly represents Good.
Either way, I took that way off topic...
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Goblin Squad Member
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It just makes no sense in my eyes. And I see no precedent.
So your belief is that all sentient creatures have perfect knowledge about what is good and evil? That does not make any sense in my eyes. I suppose we will have to agree to disagree here, unless one of those Pathfinder IP owners can chime in to fill us in on the nature of Knowledge of Good and Evil in their world.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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It just makes no sense in my eyes. And I see no precedent.So your belief is that all sentient creatures have perfect knowledge about what is good and evil? That does not make any sense in my eyes. I suppose we will have to agree to disagree here, unless one of those Pathfinder IP owners can chime in to fill us in on the nature of Knowledge of Good and Evil in their world.
Yep. :) I just think what you're saying is mistaking Right/Wrong with Good/Evil.
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Lagging back to earlier in the thread, IIRC, GW wants PFO content to come from players and their characters. Content in PFO can not be simply PvP kills. There has to be more than that. Players (and through extension, their characters) may find it difficult to interact with other players/characters without some motivating reason to do so. Some players/characters do have the experience, the talent, or the luck to be able to generate their own reason or context so that they want to interact with others in a lively interesting way. That can also be very compelling to others, so much so that they will want to interact as well.
I see factions as a way for GW to provide the ready made context for player/character interaction. If you have no context for your character initially, factions give you a ready made context rich in the lore of the River Kingdoms and Golarion. It will make it easier, especially for those not familiar with Pathfinder, to feel that they "fit" into the game. I hope GW makes factions as rich in lore as possible. That does not mean that we can't write our own history into the future of PFO from that start.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Yep. :) I just think what you're saying is mistaking Right/Wrong with Good/Evil.It just makes no sense in my eyes. And I see no precedent.So your belief is that all sentient creatures have perfect knowledge about what is good and evil? That does not make any sense in my eyes. I suppose we will have to agree to disagree here, unless one of those Pathfinder IP owners can chime in to fill us in on the nature of Knowledge of Good and Evil in their world.
Close. What I am saying is that I feel that it is possible for a person in Golarion to mistake Right/Wrong with Good/Evil. Either through ignorance or willful denial.
My bias for defending that angle is that I feel human imperfection can be a deep and interesting subject. And that the quest for knowledge of what is Good and what is Evil could be a very interesting tale for some characters. The notion that a person may want to epitomize good and pursue the paladin's path has much to learn about the natures of good and evil during their training such that they have a better understanding of it than the common man could ever hope to hold. That scholars and philosophers know more about what makes something Good or Evil than would the local blacksmith, though that knowledge does not change their alignments unless they decide to live by their findings. That it could be as much a science as it is an instinct.
Between a world where a man knows he is doing evil and decides to do it anyways and a world where a man believes he is doing good while actually performing evil, I would find the most interesting stories come from a world where both could be true.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I see factions as a way for GW to provide the ready made context for player/character interaction. If you have no context for your character initially, factions give you a ready made context rich in the lore of the River Kingdoms and Golarion. It will make it easier, especially for those not familiar with Pathfinder, to feel that they "fit" into the game. I hope GW makes factions as rich in lore as possible. That does not mean that we can't write our own history into the future of PFO from that start.
Riffing off of this... After I made the comment about the Red Mantis Assassins and poisons, I was thinking - so what kind of presence do the Red Mantis have, or other factions?
Honestly, once certain people (the player characters) were discovered to be repeatedly brought back to life through the Mark of Pharasma, I'd expect existing Goralion factions to recruit such people, but generally be somewhat hesitant to throw useful but mundane agents into the River Kingdoms. Better to recruit the Marked.
So mundane Mantis agents aren't plying their trade; only Marked ones, though the chapter houses might have (unseen) NPC staff or even masters to enforce rules. The factions in the River Kingdoms would be guided by the old rules, with new histories written by players. For example, I could see Mantis assassins needing to pay some fee for every assassination they undertook, as a balance to the poisons and other gear (or intel) they could access through the faction. But at the same time, all Red Mantis assassinations in this part of RK are done by Marked PCs.
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Goblin Squad Member
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So your belief is that all sentient creatures have perfect knowledge about what is good and evil?That's not really such an unreasonable belief. There is certainly a school of thought that we are inherently aware of it when we do evil things (it's written on our hearts).
I would not say unreasonable. Improbable would be more accurate to my stance. Though I also tend to follow a line of thought that a good deal of "evil" in the world was not perpetrated through maliciousness, but merely exists as the result of unintended consequences that were not, and in some cases, could not be foreseen.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Evil always think they are "Good"
Ain't it the truth.
The NPC factions are not going to conquer PC territory.
I'm not sure I would bet on that.
NPC factions could indeed become evolved escalations that conquer territory, including PC controlled territory. In fact I suspect that is already in the plans. I seem to recall something official, maybe it was just Paizo's history of the River kingdoms but maybe it was GW, about a barbarian invasion.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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I would not say unreasonable. Improbable would be more accurate to my stance. Though I also tend to follow a line of thought that a good deal of "evil" in the world was not perpetrated through maliciousness, but merely exists as the result of unintended consequences that were not, and in some cases, could not be foreseen.
On earth, yes, of course.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I would not say unreasonable. Improbable would be more accurate to my stance. Though I also tend to follow a line of thought that a good deal of "evil" in the world was not perpetrated through maliciousness, but merely exists as the result of unintended consequences that were not, and in some cases, could not be foreseen.On earth, yes, of course.
Yes, I should have specified. Our RPGs definitely hold and should hold a great wealth of vile, willfully evil villains to change the world and/or be deposed.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Evil always think they are "Good"Ain't it the truth.
The NPC factions are not going to conquer PC territory.I'm not sure I would bet on that.
NPC factions could indeed become evolved escalations that conquer territory, including PC controlled territory. In fact I suspect that is already in the plans. I seem to recall something official, maybe it was just Paizo's history of the River kingdoms but maybe it was GW, about a barbarian invasion.
I do now recall that as well. Would be cool