A unnamed town was being attacked by giants who throw rocks! PC’s are on the wall dealing with the threat from range. A Guard cowering and screaming while taking cover behind the wall. PC CN Rogue kills the guard just to stop the screaming. (Using Syrinscape for audio, muted the screams out once this happened). I believe this to count as an evil act, should I knock his character down to CE for this? What are your thoughts.
I’m relatively new to DMing, this is the only group I’ve done it for. Going on 2-3 years now. I’ve never had to adjust anyone’s alignment before.
One act (usually) doesn't affect alignment. It definitely was an evil act, frankly I'd have the guards investigating because a human dagger will look suspiciously different from a giant boulder. Even the Int dumped guards should be able to notice something odd.
There was another guard up there who he successfully intimidated with a nat 20. Also, he killed the guard with a rock, making it look like it was done by the giants. They are well known heroes in the town, so the intimidate went a lot further.
A single action should not be the cause for a forced alignment shift especially for a neutral alignment. While this would in fact be an evil act I don’t think it would be enough to shift chaotic neutral character to chaotic evil. Neutral means you can do both acts that qualify as both of the opposed alignment. Would you shift his alignment to chaotic good for giving money to a beggar?
If he continues this type of behavior on a regular basis, that is a different story. Also consider if he ever does any good deeds. If he only does evil and neutral acts than his alignment should probably be changed. If on the other hand he does a mixture of all types of actions then his alignment should not be changed.
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Intimidate lasts 1d6x10 minutes. By design, it's not permanent, even if you roll a natural 20 (which isn't even an auto-success on skill checks unless you've house ruled it that way). It even includes the sentence, 'After the intimidate expires, the target treats you as unfriendly and may report you to local authorities.'. This PC just murdered one of their coworkers in front of them, in a premeditated way (killing them with a rock so it would look like a giant did it), and then basically threatened to do the same to them. I'd have them fold as soon as the PC is no longer in town and give them a very cold reception next time they show up (there or in the city nearby that shall also remain unnamed, if this is the scenario I think it is).
As for the alignment shift, premeditated murder of a town guard just for screaming seems like it's bigger than just one act. It's murder, of an ally, for a trivial reason, in a way calculated to cover your tracks, on top of threatening the other guard to keep their mouth shut. Where was that Intimidate check to tell the screaming guard to shut up, or doing nonlethal to knock them out? Shifting to Evil seems pretty reasonable to me.
I'd put him to evil. He just killed a man in cold blood for absolutely no reason except he was being a bit annoying. That is a pretty heinous act, especially considering the complete lack of justification.
Although I'd have interfered earlier when the player said he was going to do that. Made sure the player realized the ramifications of his act.
It's evil. He's evil. Neutral is finding a balance between good and evil, not doing a good thing then doing an evil thing, then doing a good thing. This is blatantly evil. It is the act of cold, calculated murder and lack of remorse.
Out of game, was the player drunk because it's a very stupid thing to do? In game, as GM you must let the consequences of players' characters actions follow there course. In this case the character will be reported for murder and thanks to magic will in all likelihood be found guilty of murdering a town guard.
Changing the character's alignment is irrelevant, it's not going to stop the player doing stupid things.
Alternatively, you could call a time out, describe the consequences and suggest a narrative revision of events so the murder never happened. Then state that next time you will play the consequences through to there conclusion.
Chaotic-neutral, huh?
-- Is the player a male under the age of 25?
<coin-flip>
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Perhaps the player was just having a bad day and your screaming tape was grating on his nerves.
I assume that scene was from the Rise of the Runelords AP which means the campaign is quite far along and you know whether this was a one-off thing where the player took his PC out of character.
His character probably shouldn't be shifted automatically to evil but there should be repercussions. You could talk with him about how to roleplay what happens next --
why did his character do it (the player could create an after the fact in-game explanation)?
does he feel any guilt? were there any witnesses?
will the PCs be attending the funeral of all those killed by giants (or thought to have been!)?
does the PC run into the wife and six kids of the dead guard who ask him what happened?
etc.
From a roleplaying perspective having a terrible secret and being wracked by guilt about it could be interesting. Maybe it motivates the character to be more heroic in the future ... not by becoming good but rather to make amends for the terrible thing he did, which fits with the CN alignment.
On the other hand, if everyone prefers to brush it under the rug, "let's pretend that never happened!", that's fine. It's just a game, so whatever works best for you.
Unless there are details you've neglected to mention: Knock him down to evil.
Had this been, say, a fight in which the NPC was trying to kill the PC for no good reason, it would be different. Had the NPC seriously endangered the PC and others with his screams (e.g. they are trying to hide from a superior opposing force), I would probably let it slide as long as the PC didn't make a habit of it. The PC jumped straight to murder out of annoyance. Was there no reason the PC could not have:
- ignored the NPC
- tried to convince him to shut up
- knocked him unconscious
- had him removed from that position
?
As a GM, this is the point where I would say something to the effect of "You're going to murder a helpless, harmless guy because he's annoying you? That's a flat out evil act with no mitigating circumstances."
Now in my early days of gaming I was the poster child for "I'm not evil, I'm CN" (what do you expect from 13 year olds?) and the rest of my group was pretty much the same, and we had a ton of fun doing things that way back then. It's important to make sure your expectations of the game are clearly conveyed to the players so no one feels you're being unfair and they don't mess up what you intend to be a more serious game.
Bjørn Røyrvik wrote: Unless there are details you've neglected to mention: Knock him down to evil. I think the fact that PC used a rock to kill the guard to make it seem like a giant did it is even worse. If it had been an act of passion (inflamed by the guard's cowardice or whatever), it would still have been evil but less evil than a calculated act done with the forethought of not getting caught.
But, again, if the player can put some positive spin on it to have his character express remorse -- like he hit the guard over the head with the rock meaning to knock him unconscious because his screaming was demoralizing the other defenders, but miscalculated his own strength and accidentally killed the man.
How could a rogue kill the guard with a rock and make it look like a giant? A typical hill giant is hurling rocks two-handed, so a medium creature can't wield one.
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If the rogue had done a single good deed would his alignment changed to good? Alignments are not moods and should not shift multiple times a day. An alignment shift should be a significant event for a character not a daily occurrence. If this is part of a pattern of behavior than the alignment should shift, if it is single instance than the player should get a warning.
Don’t get me wrong this was definitely an evil act and there should be consequences to his actions. Since there was a witness to the act and presumably the witness was a friend of the victim let that come out. Even with the natural 20 on the intimidate roll it is not going to last that long. Rolling a natural 20 on a skill does not doing anything more than the result indicated on the chart. It does not even guarantee the skill will succeed. Critical skill is a mythic ability and unless this was a mythic rogue with the mythic path ability than the fact that they rolled a natural 20 is meaningless.
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Consequences: the (formerly) intimidated guard tells his superior about it. They investigate, and notice the dagger wound (I doubt a rock would obliterate that). Some magic, and they confirm who did it.
The guards assess the PCs' capabilities. They're not powerful enough to bring them in. They call for help. The local religions lends some paladins or even inquisitors in exchange for favors. They pay an other visiting adventuring band for assistance. They contact the noble in charge for troops, who might have to go to their senior noble, up the chain.
They use magic and carrier pigeons to distribute descriptions, so now that PC is an outlaw. Everywhere that PCs goes, people refuse to serve them food or rent to them, at least not without being intimidated, and of course the local guards would be contacted a few minutes or hours later. The PCs can read, so they'll see these posters, and might decide to turn the PC over as they realize they've been found out. (Or maybe the CE PC did this secretly enough the other PCs are shocked?)
And all of this assumes the guard is just a guard. What if they're related to someone important? Like a high-ranking nobleman, or a powerful former adventurer? What if they're dating someone important?
Eventually the PCs are surrounded by superior-seeming forces, and told to hand that PC over. Either there's a fight, or the CE PC surrenders. If there's a fight, and the PCs win, they've now committed a much larger crime. There's angry paladins hunting them. An adventuring party is hunting them, recruiting new members if necessary. Troops are hunting them.
I once had PCs do something this stupid in a Modern campaign (they killed a customs inspector who annoyed them). They were hit by a SWAT team. They lost, but only after killing half the SWAT team, which only made things worse.
I don't see why the alignment issue is such a big deal in this case. It's not like said PC was a paladin or a cleric. The real-life consequences are a bigger deal.
Well sure, the guards might not be able to capture him now, but he needs to sleep, no?
Let them rest for the night, then in the wee hours of the night, the guards (or the townfolk) come, tie him up like a sausage, drag him to the towns square, have a Kangarou court and proceed to hang the guilty party...extrapoint if the rope is already around his neck before the start of the proceeding.
That will:
A) Teach him (and the other players) that there are consequences to every actions - especially an evil one;
B) Depending on how the other players resolves this, they will be either on unfriendly terms with the town or outright hunted down.
C) if this character survive, the rest of the party may want to deliberate to see if they still want to adventure with that loose canon (especially if they were unaware of the killing or did not bring swift justice if they were).
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