Yes you were. I gave "it's annoying" as an example of something that does not constitute justification. You replied by talking about killing to eat. You consider the proper response to someone talking about swatting flies to be to tell them that you think it's okay to kill things to eat. There's no direct connection, which leaves only that you were trying to change the subject.
The only reasonable motive to change the subject from swatting flies to hunting is that you are afraid that expressing your opinion on swatting flies would lead to a loss of respect.
If "it was annoying" is a justification for killing a non-person is "he was annoying tens of millions of people over a span of years" a justification for killing the recording industry executives who keep signing boy bands? Or maybe just ruining their careers by planting evidence of larceny? That way lies madness.
I was what? Are you saying I was implying that killing a mosquito without eating it isn't morally justifiable? Because if so I'm sorry that I wasn't clear, but please don't jump to obviously silly conclusions. I'm not always clear because sometimes I try to rush my responses because I don't always have much time to reply but want to express something before I forget it. I admit, that this often causes me to be less clear than I would like. I'm sorry for that.
In regards to why I ignored your comment about mosquitos? I thought it was silly. I really didn't care to examine your example and countered with my own instead. I though we could all agree without problem that killing a mosquito for pretty much any reason doesn't require justification, excepting in the case that you enjoy killing in general for which there is no justificaiton. You just enjoy killing, and that's pretty damn evil / psychopathic.
Also, I was not trying to pin down what IS or ISN'T morally justifiable. That's going to be incredibly difficult, and likely impossible for any clear majority to emerge with a consise and consistent system for that. My point was to try to see if we could all agree with defining killing that isn't justifiable (whatever we define that to mean) as being evil. Because if we don't agree on that then I'm not sure how to proceed.
Again, I'm sorry I had a non-sequitor. I guess I wasn't thinking clearly and was rushed. I thought the mosquito example was silly and didn't really care to address it and wanted something that was a little more serious in so far as a majority of people on the planet clearly think killing animals for food is fine, but there are many such as PETA and vegatarians who disagree with it.
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You ever see "Braveheart" The Scotts were considered barbarians and Wallace was perfectly capable of diplomacy so was De Bruce. So was Conan for that matter. I suppose it depends on the type of game that you're playing, but historically, most barbarians weren't suicidal. Diplomacy is an option, even for barbarians.
To build on this, that probably would have been a good point to pull an intimidate check.
Paladin: "Drop your weapons and surrender! You are under arrest for the theft of the sword of Andúril."
Barbarian: "Don't know what you're talkin' bout. Best be gettin' on your way captain shiny-pants."
Paladin: *drawing sword* "I said surrender, barbarian! You are under arrest!"
Barbarian: "Boy, if you don't sheathe that sword in your scabbard, I'm going to have to sheathe it up your arse." (Rolls a 20)
Paladin: *shocked* "How dare you!"
Guard sergeant: *seeing the size of the barbarian's sword and the rest of the PCs backing him up* "Perhaps we should withdraw, sir."
Paladin: *seeing the same* "We shall meet again, you filthy lout."
Barbarian: "Oh I bet we will."
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Yes you were. I gave "it's annoying" as an example of something that does not constitute justification. You replied by talking about killing to eat. You consider the proper response to someone talking about swatting flies to be to tell them that you think it's okay to kill things to eat. There's no direct connection, which leaves only that you were trying to change the subject.
The only reasonable motive to change the subject from swatting flies to hunting is that you are afraid that expressing your opinion on swatting flies would lead to a loss of respect.
If "it was annoying" is a justification for killing a non-person is "he was annoying tens of millions of people over a span of years" a justification for killing the recording industry executives who keep signing boy bands? Or maybe just ruining their careers by planting evidence of larceny? That way lies madness.
I'm confused. What is the point you are trying to make here? Do you consider mosquitoes and other insects to be no different than people in terms of the value of their life?
I'm confused. What is the point you are trying to make here? Do you consider mosquitoes and other insects to be no different than people in terms of the value of their life?Yes you were. I gave "it's annoying" as an example of something that does not constitute justification. You replied by talking about killing to eat. You consider the proper response to someone talking about swatting flies to be to tell them that you think it's okay to kill things to eat. There's no direct connection, which leaves only that you were trying to change the subject.
The only reasonable motive to change the subject from swatting flies to hunting is that you are afraid that expressing your opinion on swatting flies would lead to a loss of respect.
If "it was annoying" is a justification for killing a non-person is "he was annoying tens of millions of people over a span of years" a justification for killing the recording industry executives who keep signing boy bands? Or maybe just ruining their careers by planting evidence of larceny? That way lies madness.
No, I believe he thought that I was implying that in my earlier posts. Which I guess was due to my posts not being clear.
To be clear, there is a incredibly large difference in the value of a human life and the life of a mosquito, and I think there is very little justificaiton needed for killing a mosquito.
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I don't know about the rest of you but what I read here is the OP who is using the alignment and intelligence of the character to hide behind doing whatever it is the player pleases. It seems that the player was going to attack, regardless of what happened, and now that he did, he's using the character as a shield.
As a player he made the decision that the GM was going to arrest them and then perform a PC Death march. This is an OOC decision. His character is too stupid to know different, but then states the authorities showed no id, had no warrant etc, as if that would have made ANY difference in his actions. The player made his mind up, acted to avoid what he thought was railroading, and forcing the PCs into a situation. Not the character. The PC stated they found documents on the Paladin that said the church was pursuing the PC group for some reason. So it seems to me that the GM had put thought into why the Paladins were after them, and that there was a story element to it. The PCs stole a sword. The church wants it back. Could it have had some sort of significance for the religion? Also, the OP says that it was a group of Paladins, but we only know for sure that one was, the one he killed.
I think the OP wasn't remotely interested in the post question, he was simply looking for someone to justify his actions, so he could go back to the GM and say "SEE I WAS RIGHT!"
In my opinion, there may have been some novice mistakes made by a novice GM (as the OP says it was a new GM), but the metagaming by a "veteran" player and roleplayer is the bigger offense.
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I don't know about the rest of you but what I read here is the OP who is using the alignment and intelligence of the character to hide behind doing whatever it is the player pleases. It seems that the player was going to attack, regardless of what happened, and now that he did, he's using the character as a shield.
As a player he made the decision that the GM was going to arrest them and then perform a PC Death march. This is an OOC decision. His character is too stupid to know different, but then states the authorities showed no id, had no warrant etc, as if that would have made ANY difference in his actions. The player made his mind up, acted to avoid what he thought was railroading, and forcing the PCs into a situation. Not the character. The PC stated they found documents on the Paladin that said the church was pursuing the PC group for some reason. So it seems to me that the GM had put thought into why the Paladins were after them, and that there was a story element to it. The PCs stole a sword. The church wants it back. Could it have had some sort of significance for the religion? Also, the OP says that it was a group of Paladins, but we only know for sure that one was, the one he killed.
I think the OP wasn't remotely interested in the post question, he was simply looking for someone to justify his actions, so he could go back to the GM and say "SEE I WAS RIGHT!"
In my opinion, there may have been some novice mistakes made by a novice GM (as the OP says it was a new GM), but the metagaming by a "veteran" player and roleplayer is the bigger offense.
Well, that and it turns out that the OP has started numerous threads recently under several aliases all dealing with the same subject. He is actually lifting a lot of the supposed "adventures" he's played from the plot of the "Berserk" manga.
Perhaps more humorously is that there's basically nothing to "deal with" either. He's a barbarian. Being Chaotic Evil literally does nothing directly to him. In fact, he's not even 5th level yet so it doesn't even cause him to ping on detect evil.Until a Divine Hunter pulls a smite evil sniper shot on him from across a ravine. And even if he doesn't detect as evil yet, I am sure the murdered Paladin's brothers and sisters in arms would be willing to spend one of their daily smites on Korgoth based on the reasonable assumption that he's a blood simple mass-murderer (with eleven deaths attributed to him) who needs to be taken down.
Well Paladins in my campaigns probably would declare a smite on him anyway due to the way we handle alignment and the mechanics behind it, but that's a fair point in core games.
That said, if you're concerned about your alignment being evil because someone might use an anti-evil ability on you I'm not really sure what to say. I admit fully that being a good-guy in Pathfinder is a bad thing for your health (it generally means you are going to get railed so much harder by the bad guys since things like unholy blight tend to be popular SLAs and such for baddies). I guess if the campaign centers around fighting Paladins then I guess having an evil alignment would kind of suck if the Paladins opted to smite occasionally without testing the waters.
On a side note...
It's nice that Jacob re-organized all of the OP's posts because I think I missed some while skimming through the thread. That said, the initial posts imply that the paladins were the aggressors in the sense that they were being threatened ("throw down your weapons and be arrested" being one example), which is what I was going off of when discussing that I think the barbarian did in fact act pretty chaotic neutral in resisting their arrest and fighting for his freedom, even if it was violent (and I say this as someone who plays characters who talk first, talk second, fight a bit and hope to talk it over half way between or after the fight, and then attempt to minimize casualties on both sides).
Of course, I think the OP's really needs to do some reflection on his hostile attitude (bashing on his GM isn't going to make his GM any better at GMing), and he's off base in a lot of ways (Int 3+ is enough to understand morality and is within the range of non-damaged human Intelligence. If he had the mental capacity of a dog then "I'm dumb" would be a valid excuse, but 7 Int is leaps and bounds beyond that).
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This is also one of the problems with the idea of "forced alignment" as it goes against everything that the alignment system is. For example, let's pretend for a moment that I'm a vampire, you're my victim, and I turn you into another vampire. When you become a vampire your alignment changes to Evil, but being a vampire has literally no further effect on your personality beyond whatever you want to explore with that change, so if you now as a vampire don't kill people (vampires can very easily feed on both nonsentient creatures as well as not kill their victims), then your alignment will just naturally shift back to whatever fits your personality.
Except that "forced alignment" is part of the very same game system (cf Helm of Opposite Alignment) that the alignment system is.
Alignment is not only a label. It is a description of the character's personality. When you become a vampire, and thus evil, your whole personality changes on this specific axis.
Allowing characters to ignore forced alignment change and keep their exact previous personality is merely a houserule. And one I greatly dislike at that, because it voids any moral struggle within the character.
Speakin' as a....what's that? Barbarian, if that's what they're callin' us now...I woulda tried to talk the guy down. And if that didn't work I'd just have to kcik his ass. I'd pull my punches of course. No sense in needless killing. Certainly no sense killin' what seems to be a decent enough guy.
I mean hey, I like fighting as much as the next Shoanti, but I need a damn good reason to take a life. Hell, the fact that I was trying not to kill should be sayin' a lot to that paladin. And being misled ain't enough.
And I'm pretty sure I could take him. He ain't gonna be smiting me and I've knocked out plenty of enemies before without cracking their skulls open.
Except for that one goblin way back, and that was one hell of a fluke. Damn, I still see that one in my dreams. @#$%in' hell.
This is also one of the problems with the idea of "forced alignment" as it goes against everything that the alignment system is. For example, let's pretend for a moment that I'm a vampire, you're my victim, and I turn you into another vampire. When you become a vampire your alignment changes to Evil, but being a vampire has literally no further effect on your personality beyond whatever you want to explore with that change, so if you now as a vampire don't kill people (vampires can very easily feed on both nonsentient creatures as well as not kill their victims), then your alignment will just naturally shift back to whatever fits your personality.Except that "forced alignment" is part of the very same game system (cf Helm of Opposite Alignment) that the alignment system is.
Alignment is not only a label. It is a description of the character's personality. When you become a vampire, and thus evil, your whole personality changes on this specific axis.
Allowing characters to ignore forced alignment change and keep their exact previous personality is merely a houserule. And one I greatly dislike at that, because it voids any moral struggle within the character.
Actually, no it isn't. The helm of opposite alignment makes a special exception that other instances of alignment change do not. It is a mind-affecting curse.
When placed upon the head, this item's curse immediately takes effect (Will DC 15 negates). On a failed save, the alignment of the wearer is radically altered to an alignment as different as possible from the former alignment—good to evil, chaotic to lawful, neutral to some extreme commitment (LE, LG, CE, or CG). Alteration in alignment is mental as well as moral, and the individual changed by the magic thoroughly enjoys his new outlook. A character who succeeds on his save can continue to wear the helmet without suffering the effect of the curse, but if he takes it off and later puts it on again, another save is required.
Only a wish or a miracle can restore a character's former alignment, and the affected individual does not make any attempt to return to the former alignment. In fact, he views the prospect with horror and avoids it in any way possible. If a character of a class with an alignment requirement is affected, an atonement spell is needed as well if the curse is to be obliterated. When a helm of opposite alignment has functioned once, it loses its magical properties.
The item itself is literally magical brainwashing and specifically calls out that it mentally changes the character's persona. This is a unique and highly specific example and does not at all reflect the examples that I have given.
That said, if alignment isn't going to mean anything it might as well not exist. If you don't actually have to be a good person to be good, or a bad person to be bad, then alignment fails and is outmoded. However, when used as described in the actual alignment rules, this is not the case.
According to the actual alignment rules you have to be a good guy to be good, a bad guy to be bad, and nothing else matters. Which means that when you slay that evil drow / vampire / orc / pit fiend, it was evil because it was actually evil and for no other reason.
Send some fruit baskets to the widows you have left in your wake. That might be a good first step in becoming good again.
Just make sure the baskets are big enough so that it isn't seen as you're mocking your victim's relatives.
Or even better put some money in it along with the fruit.
Send some fruit baskets to the widows you have left in your wake. That might be a good first step in becoming good again.Just make sure the baskets are big enough so that it isn't seen as you're mocking your victim's relatives.
Or even better put some money in it along with the fruit.
Hm, makes you wonder what the price of a life is. While I'd estimate it as being about 8,010 gp (the cost in spellcasting services to have raise dead plus two restoration spells cast). :P
Though Skyrim would have us believe the value of a life is less than that of a mammoth tusk. (^.^)"
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Send some fruit baskets to the widows you have left in your wake. That might be a good first step in becoming good again.Just make sure the baskets are big enough so that it isn't seen as you're mocking your victim's relatives.
Or even better put some money in it along with the fruit.Hm, makes you wonder what the price of a life is. While I'd estimate it as being about 8,010 gp (the cost in spellcasting services to have raise dead plus two restoration spells cast). :P
Though Skyrim would have us believe the value of a life is less than that of a mammoth tusk. (^.^)"
The normal bounty for killing someone is 1000 gold if you get caught. Mammoth tusk is only like 150 gold.
However, pretty much any enchanted weapon you make is more valuable than anyones life in the game.
Send some fruit baskets to the widows you have left in your wake. That might be a good first step in becoming good again.Just make sure the baskets are big enough so that it isn't seen as you're mocking your victim's relatives.
Or even better put some money in it along with the fruit.Hm, makes you wonder what the price of a life is. While I'd estimate it as being about 8,010 gp (the cost in spellcasting services to have raise dead plus two restoration spells cast). :P
Though Skyrim would have us believe the value of a life is less than that of a mammoth tusk. (^.^)"
Nay, I use Reincarnate as base cost for raising. A scroll cost 1,700 gp so about that much. Rounding up to 2 thousands.
I don't agree you should have to pay for the restoration.
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I had an elf come back as a yuan-ti abomination due to custom reincarnate tables. Good times.
Figuring out how to walk without legs took awhile.
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I've killed Orcs because they were an irritant and in the way, without looting them. That puts their lives at about ant level to me. I'll try and save the peasants for the lord I work for, but I'm not going to be putting any personal funds into raising any that didn't make it.
>:(
Speaking only for myself, I'm currently seeking to bring back 41 dead hobgoblin children and find a way to put gods know how trapped souls to rest in a temple we passed through a month back.
I can't even imagine putting a price on that.