So my group is playing WoTR and our wizard got ahold of a magic item that turns people Chaotic evil if they fail a save. He studied and adjusted the magic to make his own version that turns people neutral good. Our party has been pretty split on the item and my character the de facto leader took beyond morality and is only concerned with winning the war against the abyss and creating a utopia of sorts and has good out of his ways to bring people under his wing to redeem them through any method he can get ahold of which usually just means a Diplomacy check repeatedly. So the magic item was used for the first time tonight against a demon that rolled really bad and fell under the effect, it then started begging for death.
The group excluding myself and the followers I'd gathered killed him after about 15 minutes of bickering about it. My question is this, do you all consider this to be a good act?
Real Life society is still debating assisted suicide. You're likely to get differing opinions.
Personally, I'd look at it like this: You used a viable weapon to defeat something evil. That part is certainly good.
The use of the item to turn the creature's alignment feels akin to mind control. As such, I wouldn't count the demon's pleading as being relevant as it wasn't really the demon asking, it was something else you had changed it into that was begging for death.
End of the day, it was a demon, it needed to die. The method wasn't exactly honorable. The overall encounter was a neutral good act IMO.
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The view of assisted suicide will differ from person to person. I'm of the opinion that if a person is suffering from a debilitating disease; No cure; Chronic life long pain and suffering; It's well within reason for them to ask for a release from it. In my eyes, as a GM, I would say it's a neutral act.
This sounds like murder. You, and your followers sitting back, watching your group kill the "suffering", good demon are just as guilty.
Now, since I know someone else will bring it up, forcing a person to change their behavior/alignment is NOT good. It's akin to brain washing, and depending on your view could be an evil act itself; Even if the result is a "GOOD" alignment. Redemption is something you EARN; Not something forced on you.
I suppose that demon was less than happy when you killed it and his now neutral good self ended up back in hell.
No.
You killed a Good character, even if he was begging for it (likely because he felt remorse over his previous actions).
The Good option is to let him live, coax him through the pain, and make sure it goes on to do good things in life to atone for its past sins.
Killing him is Neutral at best.
This wasn't assisted suicide, or granting someone mercy. It was ripping a major part of a creatures personality (in case of an aligment outsider, its very being) from it forcefully, and afterwards killing the tortured remains.
It most certainly wasn't a good act.
But since it was a mean to slay a demon, it wasn't evil either.
Defeating an evil creature is certainly not always a Good act. Brainwashing is an Evil act, pretty much no ifs, ands or buts.
Assisted suicide is not what this is about.
"I tortured him for weeks for the sheer fun of it. When he begged me for death, I killed him. But now I wonder... did I commit an evil act when I killed him in accordance with his wishes?"
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the mind violation was an evil act because you stripped the demon of their right to choose.
the demon was suffering with remorse and begged to die
the demon was granted a mercy killing to end the suffering the player caused, which while good in the fact they ended suffering, they caused the suffering in the first place, making it still evil possibly neutral.
the mind violation was an evil act because you stripped the demon of their right to choose.
Why is it evil to violate the mind of a demon?
Mind you, we are speaking about a creature that good characters readily maime and kill, and that paladins are morally obliged to destroy to the fullest of their ability.Do you suggest that removing someones freedom of choice is intrinsically worse than killing them, or forcing them physically?
Mind control and the like are tools that are in a dark grey area morally, and often people use them in a rather evilish manner to morally problematic ends. But defeating a being that are pure evil and chaos isn't such an end.
Because the target of the action has no bearing on whether the action itself is an evil one or not, objectively.
And yes, loss of self is worse than death.
the mind violation was an evil act because you stripped the demon of their right to choose.Why is it evil to violate the mind of a demon?
Mind you, we are speaking about a creature that good characters readily maime and kill, and that paladins are morally obliged to destroy to the fullest of their ability.Do you suggest that removing someones freedom of choice is intrinsically worse than killing them, or forcing them physically?
Mind control and the like are tools that are in a dark grey area morally, and often people use them in a rather evilish manner to morally problematic ends. But defeating a being that are pure evil and chaos isn't such an end.
at least if you beat up the demon, redeem it through kindness, or kill them, they have a choice to refuse redemption but stripping their freedom of choice, denies them that freedom.
denying anything their right to choose, even the purest of evils, is evil in my book, it is akin to what Aaron does to other people's characters against their wills.
you don't have to be evil to use mind control, but demons should have a right to confess their actions and a right to decide whether or not they wish to atone for them, just like anybody else.
using mind control to strip a creatures will and brainwash them to your desires, whether those desires are good or evil, as long as the creature has a fragment of a mind or soul, is an evil act.
nonmagical coercion, i would have no problems with, but using an item to brainwash a demon into their opposite, is just as evil as a demon doing the same to a paladin.
... So the magic item was used for the first time tonight against a demon that rolled really bad and fell under the effect, it then started begging for death.
The group excluding myself and the followers I'd gathered killed him after about 15 minutes of bickering about it. My question is this, do you all consider this to be a good act?
Rules of Chivalry and history show that releasing someone from life if they are suffering was part of the Knights Code. You forcing an alignment change on the demon...to me that's more questionable than you showing mercy on it.
Using this item...it sounds like you are about 3 steps away from reenacting 1984: Golarion Style. Way worse than propaganda.
OTOH...you know the alignment rules in Pathfinder are pretty...non punishing. Unless you are a Paladin/Anti-Paladin...
Regardless of your alignment you can do whatever you want...and at worse, you alignment on your character sheet shifts...
I don't know...I hate alignment, or anything that goes beyond Good/Evil. (This is considering that I feel a lot of things people would bellow and yell about being Good or Evil I honestly see as more Neutral...but whatever)
Ick...I hate alignment changing items, because there is nothing that forces you to keep acting like whatever alignment you changed into.
And thinking more about it I would say an outsider, who are basically defined by their alignment...if somehow had an alignment shift, would change what it is. A Balor would become a Planetar or whatever. Something like that to match the new alignment.
FORCING ANYTHING TO BECOME SOMETHING IT ISN'T IS EVIL. CHANGING ALIGNMENT IS EVIL.
Interesting, so the majority of you here would deem the use of the item itself to begin with an evil act? (Curiosity abounds)
Why is transforming an evil creature who only desires the destruction of literally everything in existence into a Good guy a bad thing again.
Why is transforming an evil creature who only desires the destruction of literally everything in existence into a Good guy a bad thing again.
it's not neccessarily a bad outcome, but Magical Brainwashing of a creature into something so different from it's base personality, whether or not the base creature was evil, is an evil act, regardless of the creatures mind, because you are brainwashing it, and forcing your customs on it without giving them a right to choose. it's a less bloody version of what Torquemada did to non-catholics against their will. "Convert or Die!"
it is forcing someone to make a life altering decision they don't want to make without their consent. it's akin to buying a pretty young female lots of hard alchohol at a tavern so you could seduce her willingly while she is under the influence, if she wouldn't normally want you. it's not the girl speaking, it's the liquor.
First and only thread of the Op, who has three posts to his credit, two of them here.
And now a huge debate about ethics and morality, which has already been done and the thread locked iirc.
So my group is playing WoTR and our wizard got ahold of a magic item that turns people Chaotic evil if they fail a save. He studied and adjusted the magic to make his own version that turns people neutral good. Our party has been pretty split on the item and my character the de facto leader took beyond morality and is only concerned with winning the war against the abyss and creating a utopia of sorts and has good out of his ways to bring people under his wing to redeem them through any method he can get ahold of which usually just means a Diplomacy check repeatedly. So the magic item was used for the first time tonight against a demon that rolled really bad and fell under the effect, it then started begging for death.
The group excluding myself and the followers I'd gathered killed him after about 15 minutes of bickering about it. My question is this, do you all consider this to be a good act?
No reason a NG demon should beg for death. Poor GMing.
No, don't kill good characters. If you were a paladin you would have fallen.
It depends on your DM.
it's not neccessarily a bad outcome, but Magical Brainwashing of a creature into something so different from it's base personality, whether or not the base creature was evil, is an evil act, regardless of the creatures mind, because you are brainwashing it, and forcing your customs on it without giving them a right to choose. it's a less bloody version of what Torquemada did to non-catholics against their will. "Convert or Die!"
it is forcing someone to make a life altering decision they don't want to make without their consent. it's akin to buying a pretty young female lots of hard alchohol at a tavern so you could seduce her willingly while she is under the influence, if she wouldn't normally want you. it's not the girl speaking, it's the liquor.
I'm pretty sure there's no real world equivalent of turning an omnicidal maniac into...not that.
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I'm pretty sure there's no real world equivalent of turning an omnicidal maniac into...not that.it's not neccessarily a bad outcome, but Magical Brainwashing of a creature into something so different from it's base personality, whether or not the base creature was evil, is an evil act, regardless of the creatures mind, because you are brainwashing it, and forcing your customs on it without giving them a right to choose. it's a less bloody version of what Torquemada did to non-catholics against their will. "Convert or Die!"
it is forcing someone to make a life altering decision they don't want to make without their consent. it's akin to buying a pretty young female lots of hard alchohol at a tavern so you could seduce her willingly while she is under the influence, if she wouldn't normally want you. it's not the girl speaking, it's the liquor.
Pot
No.
You killed a Good character, even if he was begging for it (likely because he felt remorse over his previous actions).
The Good option is to let him live, coax him through the pain, and make sure it goes on to do good things in life to atone for its past sins.
Killing him is Neutral at best.
Rynkin beat me to it....this is exactly what i would say, except that i could consider this an evil act given that no one even made an attempt to convince the demon to try "the good option" as Rynjin put it. Unless the demon absolutely refused to see reason in continuing life and atoning for past sins, you kinda have to let him try. If he DOES absolutely refuse to see things this way, leaving him to commit the act of suicide on his own is more honorable than doing it for him.
so,
convince him to survive and atone = good
Leave him to do it himself = neutral
help him commit scuicide = evil
Why is transforming an evil creature who only desires the destruction of literally everything in existence into a Good guy a bad thing again.it's not neccessarily a bad outcome, but Magical Brainwashing of a creature into something so different from it's base personality, whether or not the base creature was evil, is an evil act, regardless of the creatures mind, because you are brainwashing it, and forcing your customs on it without giving them a right to choose. it's a less bloody version of what Torquemada did to non-catholics against their will. "Convert or Die!"
it is forcing someone to make a life altering decision they don't want to make without their consent. it's akin to buying a pretty young female lots of hard alchohol at a tavern so you could seduce her willingly while she is under the influence, if she wouldn't normally want you. it's not the girl speaking, it's the liquor.
I see magical brainwashing as more of a law-chaos divide, with using it being lawfulness to the extreme. Chaotic alignment is all about personal freedom above all else, while lawful is putting order and the society above self. Forcibly brainwashing creatures to obey strikes me as extremist-lawful. Not a good vs. evil thing. It could be used to force evil creatures to be good, or vice-versa. But it will always be the utter antithesis of chaotic alignment.