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Okay so. . . I’m not here to start a fight, not here to bash champions, just here with a question.
So recently started playing a liberator champion through extinction curse. Going fine so far, all the other players are thrilled that I let them move around and reduce damage, it’s great.
But the Anathemas get me. What if my dude encounters an unabashed slaver?
*You must respect the choices others make over their own lives, and you can’t force someone to act in a particular way or threaten them if they don’t.*You must demand and fight for others’ freedom to make their own decisions. You may never engage in or countenance slavery or tyranny.
So if I encounter a slaver what do I do? Respect his right to be a slaver, or demand his slaves be set free? I can’t intimidate him into setting his slaves free, because that would be coercion, but I have to fight him. Do I just have to punch every slaver I find without talking to them?
“Hi!” *punch* “I respect your right to choose to be a slaver!” *punch* “I hope you respect my decision to kill you for that decision!” *punch* “Please note I’m not forcing you into any life decisions!” *Punch* “Just killing you for one you made!”
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Well, the tenets of good come higher up the list
You must never knowingly harm an innocent, or allow immediate harm to one through inaction when you know you could reasonably prevent it.
You have a mandate to protect innocents that is higher up the priority list - being a slave definitely constitutes being harmed.
Additionally, I don't think that respecting people's life choices is supposed to mean respecting the choice to deprive others of their choices - I know it is an interpretation of the intent of the code rather than the exact wording of the code, but I think that it is fine to make an exception when the life choice in question violates the next item on the list and the spirit of the current item on the list.
I think you are in the clear as long as your intent is focused on freeing the slaves rather than punishing the slaver - if you just beat up the slaver and leave the slaves to their fate that would be an issue.
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The Anathema are listed in order of importance, so you give priority to whichever is listed first.
But yes, there's an extra twist here because "I want to be slaver" includes enslaving; so while you respect the slaver's choice (ugh), you also must respect each slave's. Assuming the slaves want freedom, they're appealing to two of your anathema (and likely w/ more people and one of which is explicit and adamant) vs. the slaver appealing to one...awkwardly at best.
"Sure, you can be a slaver, as long as you let any slaves free that want to be freed."
"You can't interfere with my life choices!"
"Nor can I let you interfere with theirs. Quite the conundrum, amirite?"
I suppose the more difficult portion of this is remaining calm in the face of slavery, not forcing or threatening, which are such easy traps for PCs to fall into.
"I'm going to go release them now. It'd be great if you'd lend me your keys, but I can empathize with you not wishing to. Whoa, whoa, whoa, what's with the blades, buddies? C'mon, think about how the slaves feel."
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Just recalled the political conundrum of tolerance for intolerance.
Intolerant groups often play (or prey) upon the principle of tolerance to fight for acceptance of their intolerant views! Scholars have wrestled with this seeming paradox, but IMO it's rather simple: If one is pro-tolerance, then one must be anti-intolerance. Subcultures which exclude others will by default exclude themselves from inclusive cultures.
Applying that reasoning here, the slavers' "freedom to steal freedom" is nothing a pro-freedom Champion needs to support, much less allow. But, like in real life, a good (or Good! in this case) person should try to finesse between attacking the idea vs. the person. Sometimes their identity's are intertwined with their toxic ideas too much to untangle, but one must give it a go, right?
Heck, a slaver w/o slaves is no longer a slaver, so no longer an issue.
Lore: Job Placement might come in handy. :-)
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So if I encounter a slaver what do I do? Respect his right to be a slaver, or demand his slaves be set free? I can’t intimidate him into setting his slaves free, because that would be coercion, but I have to fight him. Do I just have to punch every slaver I find without talking to them?
“Hi!” *punch* “I respect your right to choose to be a slaver!” *punch* “I hope you respect my decision to kill you for that decision!” *punch* “Please note I’m not forcing you into any life decisions!” *Punch* “Just killing you for one you made!”
And yeah, that is certainly one way of playing it. You couldn't use the threat of violence to coerce him into freeing his slaves, but as long as you intend to kill him in order to free the slaves, that would definitely fit within the bounds of anathema.
Some other things to consider: Is slavery legal in the area that you are in? Because that can change things. If slavery is legal, then your first step would be article 2 of the Liberator cause: It's time to go and change those laws. Leave the little law-abiding entrepreneur alone to live his life as best as he can. Go for something bigger.
Some other options if you don't want to go around punching people for valid personal reasons (because it may derail the campaign or irritate your other players):
Downtime quests to go and break some of those slaves free. Probably by smuggling weapons or other equipment to them and letting them free themselves.
Social encounter with said slaver where you try and convince him (persuade, not coerce) that employing his workers instead of enslaving them is more profitable in the long run.
Downtime quest to set up a slave freedom movement in the area.
Ultimately, if the GM knows that you are playing a Liberator Champion and places you in the path of a slave owner, the GM is expecting, anticipating, and planning for something to go down.
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"If slavery is legal, then your first step would be article 2 of the Liberator cause: It's time to go and change those laws. Leave the little law-abiding entrepreneur alone to live his life as best as he can. Go for something bigger."
Liberator does not say that in the slightest.
You must demand and fight for others’ freedom to make their own decisions. You may never engage in or countenance slavery or tyranny.
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Worth noting that "fight for their freedom" doesn't always mean with you using swords. You could work to stage a revolt. Build an underground railroad. Petition local government or businesses to put pressure on the slaver.
Now, this is Pathfinder, so swords will almost certainly be involved at some points. Just think it is important to understand that edicts/anathema contextualize your RP. They don't force you to be a maniac.
(Slavers get sent straight to the sun, tho.)
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Ayup, mine was more in response to letting the "widdle small fry fry 'law' abiding slavers go about their ways cause their law abiding".
Well, if the laws of the area allow slavery, then killing someone for owning slaves would be murder. Which violates Good tenet #1. So talk to him, sure. Try to change the laws, great. Grumble about it and move on because there is nothing more that you can do here, probably what is going to happen eventually.
What would you suggest doing instead?
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… killing them.
You are absolutely misreading the Champion, especially the Chaotic Good Liberator. Laws don’t stop them.
“Grumble about it and move on” is the most failure thing you can do as a Champion short of actually falling.
Well, I think the killing would be a byproduct of you acting to free the slaves and the guards preventing you, with it escalating from words to blows. All the while you do not threaten nor coerce, yet neither are you deterred if your aim's achievable.
I do think it'd be funny if the slaver tried to invoke the law to stop a Liberator. "You can't free them, it's against the law."
"Hah! I'm a new flavor of Champion, buddy, who holds no law above what's right and proper."
(Deep philosophical debate ensues re: nature of ethics and morality based on consensus vs. platonic truths, eventually solved w/ swords, not words.)
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(Deep philosophical debate ensues re: nature of ethics and morality based on consensus vs. platonic truths, eventually solved w/ swords, not words.)
If movies have taught me anything, it is that the correct way to have a philosophical debate is to start by debating the issue, then completely forget the issue and have a sword fight to decide who is right without actually addressing the issue.
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If movies have taught me anything, it is that the correct way to have a philosophical debate is to start by debating the issue, then completely forget the issue and have a sword fight to decide who is right without actually addressing the issue.
(Deep philosophical debate ensues re: nature of ethics and morality based on consensus vs. platonic truths, eventually solved w/ swords, not words.)
Worked for Plato.
You are absolutely misreading the Champion, especially the Chaotic Good Liberator. Laws don’t stop them.
On the contrary it could be argued that Laws are very probably going to stop them unless they manage to fundamentally change them e.g. by toppling the system. Not as in short term stopping them from doing what they consider to be right at the specific moment, but long term stopping them by persecution, trial and penalty (prison, death).
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It does mention murder as an evil act, but it doesn't define what counts as murder and under whose laws that is determined.
A resistance movement trying to topple slavery in an evil nation run by devils might technically be committing murder under the laws of that nation, but the members of the movement might consider it a legitimate war where killing enemy combatants isn't murder.
There are also plenty of examples in history where followers of deity's didn't consider killing someone who is an enemy of the faith to be murder - most chaotic good deities could theoretically define slavers as enemy combatants.
I think a chaotic aligned Liberator is more likely to have a definition of what is right that isn't based on what the local laws are, while I could definitely see a Paladin feeling like they can't do anything because the local laws tie their hands.
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You are absolutely misreading the Champion, especially the Chaotic Good Liberator. Laws don’t stop them.On the contrary it could be argued that Laws are very probably going to stop them unless they manage to fundamentally change them e.g. by toppling the system. Not as in short term stopping them from doing what they consider to be right at the specific moment, but long term stopping them by persecution, trial and penalty (prison, death).
… that applies to every story and adventuring party ever.
“Well you could stop these minions but there’s more of them AND they have higher level masters and big bads, what are you gonna do about THAT, huuuuuuh?”
Uh, stab them.
Of course the Liberator would want to topple unjust laws, that doesn’t mean ignore all the bad going on on the floor.
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You are absolutely misreading the Champion, especially the Chaotic Good Liberator. Laws don’t stop them.On the contrary it could be argued that Laws are very probably going to stop them unless they manage to fundamentally change them e.g. by toppling the system. Not as in short term stopping them from doing what they consider to be right at the specific moment, but long term stopping them by persecution, trial and penalty (prison, death).
… that applies to every story and adventuring party ever.
“Well you could stop these minions but there’s more of them AND they have higher level masters and big bads, what are you gonna do about THAT, huuuuuuh?”
Uh, stab them.
Of course the Liberator would want to topple unjust laws, that doesn’t mean ignore all the bad going on on the floor.
"I'm going to stab my way up the ladder of escalating enemies, gradually accumulating skills, armaments, and social connections until we're in such a position that we can leverage it against the BBEG whom we could in no way stab now.
Oh, and when I get there, I assume time will have nearly run out on the opportunity to stab...I mean prevent their nefarious plans which will likely feature a sky beam, er...I mean ritual involving a planar gate, long dead or trapped ancient evil, and/or apocalypse.You can read about it in my adventurer self-help book, How to Righteously Stab Your Way to Success: A Champion's Bible."
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Nearly all adventurers are killers, that's just how adventuring works. If your killer can't figure out how to be good, maybe don't play a champion.
Depending on your God and personal view you might look into stealing or destroying a slavers business to get the slaves free, or leave a trail of bodies to let everyone know what happens to slavers(even if guards get involved, you might try to talk them down but you will let them know that you won't be stopped by those who enforce tyrannical laws).
The only time a champion will not act on something they view as wrong is when they don't think they could succeed, or if a greater objective is more pressing. Champions are beacons of light and faith, they are the ones who act when no one else can or will.
Simply put, slavery is evil, even if it's lawful. You are bound by your code to stop evil any way you can.
Other issues include indenture servants, oath bound labor in the river kingdoms, prisoners in forced labor, and serfs. All of them are slaves under different names, but are generally consider, at the veryp least, more morally greyish.
Humbly,
Yawar
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Different names mean different things.
Not always, hence synonyms.
But I agree that list gets extreme to where a Liberator would struggle against any society humanity's ever had."Free the wage slaves!" (stab)
"No, don't hurt my boss! He's pretty cool and I need this job."
I could see such extremism even getting villainous as the (ex-)Champion attempts to liberate everyone from anything, including their accepted responsibilities.
… killing them.
You are absolutely misreading the Champion, especially the Chaotic Good Liberator. Laws don’t stop them.
“Grumble about it and move on” is the most failure thing you can do as a Champion short of actually falling.
A similar character in a game many many years ago actively hired every slave he encountered. They became an employee with a personal bodyguard(physically nearest party member), as a licensed teamster for the party.
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Liberators should bring slavers to justice (even if that requires, like, killing them) once they are sure that they are slavers based on their choices. Getting someone to change their mind and do better is not what Liberators do (that's for Redeemers), and Slavery is one of the single most evil things someone can do from a CG perspective.
Asking what a Liberator should do with Slavers is basically the same as asking what a Liberator should do with Murderers. Though that being said, your first job as a Liberator to free the people being enslaved, and then your second job is to punish the people who were enslaving them.
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Okay so. . . I’m not here to start a fight, not here to bash champions, just here with a question.
So recently started playing a liberator champion through extinction curse. Going fine so far, all the other players are thrilled that I let them move around and reduce damage, it’s great.
But the Anathemas get me. What if my dude encounters an unabashed slaver?
*You must respect the choices others make over their own lives, and you can’t force someone to act in a particular way or threaten them if they don’t.*You must demand and fight for others’ freedom to make their own decisions. You may never engage in or countenance slavery or tyranny.
So if I encounter a slaver what do I do? Respect his right to be a slaver, or demand his slaves be set free? I can’t intimidate him into setting his slaves free, because that would be coercion, but I have to fight him. Do I just have to punch every slaver I find without talking to them?
“Hi!” *punch* “I respect your right to choose to be a slaver!” *punch* “I hope you respect my decision to kill you for that decision!” *punch* “Please note I’m not forcing you into any life decisions!” *Punch* “Just killing you for one you made!”
This won't be a problem. I haven't read all of EC, but I have read a lot of Paizo APs. If you run into slavers, they are the bad guys you are meant to defeat. Several APs primarily revolve around doing so, in fact. I recall one instance with a duergar who tries to hire the PCs to capture an escaped slave for her, but this happens out in the wilderness where there's no consequences for just killing her instead.
My own players basically accepted her offer, then doubled back and killed her while her guard was down. If you were a liberator and encountered that NPC, you'd probably wind up doing that. The only complication is the GM would probably ask you to roll Deception to get through a peaceful negotiation.
I believe there was a PFS scenario that had a LN slave owner... But James Jacob has gone on record as saying that was a mistake that never should have happened IIRC.
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Another point:
"*You must respect the choices others make over their own lives, and you can’t force someone to act in a particular way or threaten them if they don’t."
A slaver is making choices over other people's lives, so those choices are not covered here.
Otherwise, you could have the weird situation that it is always preferable for a Liberator to free slaves violently rather than non-violently (as the latter might involve non-lethal coercion). It would be more logical to suggest that decisions made about other people's lives need not be respected by a Liberator.
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Otherwise, you could have the weird situation that it is always preferable for a Liberator to free slaves violently rather than non-violently .
My Cayden Cailean worshippers firmly believe that violence IS the best solution as long as the slaves aren't at risk. Killing slaver scum is the only way to be sure they won't catch slaves again and sends a clear message to others
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My Cayden Cailean worshippers firmly believe that violence IS the best solution as long as the slaves aren't at risk. Killing slaver scum is the only way to be sure they won't catch slaves again and sends a clear message to othersOtherwise, you could have the weird situation that it is always preferable for a Liberator to free slaves violently rather than non-violently .
Seems legit, unless you stop to kill even those who surrender or are uncapable to react ( constricted, tied up, sleeping, knocked down, etc... ).
That wouldn't probably be a "tennets of good" guy.
For example, the difference between sneaking around a slave trade house knocking down all the guards/slavers to free the slaves
vs
sneaking around a slave trade house deliberately killing any involved person, even knocked down ones ( or sleeping ones ), because they may ( in the future ) call for help or similar.
Kind of depends on whether that constitutes murder, but I think there is a decent case it doesn't. It would definitely violate the redeemer code.
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I feel like the out for a Liberator in hostile territory (like Cheliax) is the realization that you will be more effective at freeing people from bondage (your primary goal) if you do not confront absolutely everybody complicit in this atrocity, because it's a target rich environment and the system is largely against you.
If you're actively involved in some aggressive manumission, whether or not you need to kill the person standing in your way is the sort of call that your God trusted you to make when you became a Champion.
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It’s not a rule like, in the rule book, more of a common sense rule like “Wizards don’t, as a general rule, get involved in melee”.
1) Champions are virtually always in heavy armor…not a requirement of course but is one of their core strengths
2) Champions are “powered by faith”, they literally have god on their side, and as such typically do not fear death. Again, not a rule, but part of the core of being a Champion
3) Champions follow an ironclad code with anathemas that guides their decision making.It is, of course, possible for Champions to sneak, and a crossover champion with rogue archetype is possible… but the basic design of the class is “big guy (or hyper-fit girl) in shining plate, fearlessly confronting the foe”.
Not to say that a Champion *has* to be that, you do you, but the farther afield the character design gets, the harder it becomes to consistently play and survive. ...
My elder daughter has had to remind me that her champion wears light armor. She considers character concepts a challenge in assembling interesting mechanics, so her champion is far afield.
I run the Ironfang Invasion adventure path converted to PF2 rules. The invading Ironfang Legion consists mostly of hobgoblin soldiers who follow the goblin hero-god Hadregash, who advocates slavery. They take slaves from the towns they conquer.
The hobgoblins chose to fight a war, and they face the natural consequence that their enemies in the war will try to kill them. The party is sympathetic to the hobgoblin's cause to form a nation where they won't be treated as second-class citizens, but believe that the new nation should not have slaves. With respect to the Liberator edicts, the decision to be a slavemaster is not simply a personal choice, because it overrides the personal choice of the slave. Likewise, tyranny robs people of choice. The liberator in respecting the choices others make over their own lives is not taking a vow of non-intervention. She vows to intervene if others disrespect choices.
Let's look at how this is roleplayed. The tailed goblin detective-background liberator-cause champion Tikti grew up in the Goblinsworth Library, a project to raise civilized goblins. She is an avid bookworm and crafter. She follows the goddess Grandmother Spider, also known as The Weaver. The edicts of Grandmother Spider call for acting skilled and clever, thinking for yourself, taking due payment for your work, and humiliating the powerful. The anathema of Grandmother Spider forbid abusing someone you have power over, harming someone who has given you sincere kindness, letting a slight go unanswered, and owning a slave. And because Grandmother Spider is a god of crafting, Tikti can Refocus by repairing her shield after combat.
Her build is strange enough that she is clearly thinking for herself. She is a high-Dexterity champion in light armor. Her animal companion from Steed Ally is a velociraptor Liklik. Tikti specializes in defense and Liklik specializes in offense, so as a pair they are well-rounded in melee. Or Tikti pairs up with other party members to keep them alive. She is very tactical.
The party had no social problems regarding slavery, because the slavers are their enemies in a war. Nevertheless, I recall a social situation that occurred.
The party had defeated the Ironfang garrison in the conquered village Ecru and freed some slaves. Then the party moved on to an adjacent Ironfang camp on anther mission; however, Tikti and an elf ranger needed to sit out that second mission because their players were not available that session. We declared that Tikti and the elf were guarding the slaves rescued in Ecru, waiting for a boat that the party had called for via a Sending spell, and hauling the munitions stored in Ecru down to the docks.
Next game session I had a hobgoblin patrol return to Ecru along the river. The elf spotted them first and hid, but Tikti said that she did not need to hide. She was trained in Deception. She is a goblin and pretended to be a workboss ordering the slaves around as they carried barrels of explosives. She bantered with the hobgoblin patrol as they passed. The hobgoblins had some racial prejudice against goblins but were not going to bother a lesser member of the Ironfang Legion. The patrol moved on and soon realized the garrison was missing, but the other five members of the party returned at that moment. The patrol was caught between the two parts of the party and quickly defeated without risk to the rescued slaves.
Trickery is one of Grandmother Spider's domains.
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Nostalgy hits hard. It had been so long since I last read a Paladin falls thread. And this one is about the CG Liberator even. Superb.
All of the Liberator Gotchas are about "you're supposed to respect an individual's choices, but what if they're choosing to do bad things" which are pretty easy to resolve.
Particulalarly since the Liberator has the following strictures in decreasing order of importance:
-Don't do evil acts
-Don't allow harm to come to innocents through either action or inaction.
-Respect people's choices and don't force or threaten them to do what you want.
- Fight for people's freedom and self-determination.
The last one explicitly mentions "do not countenance slavery" but "slavers are bad" based on the "do not allow innocents to come to harm" clause which supersedes the "let people make their own choices" clause.
So liberators are justified in absolutely ruining the day of people who choose to do slavery just they are justified in absolutely ruining the day of people who choose to barricade the doors and windows or orphanages then set them on fire.
The only thing I would really say make a champion to fall other than a straight up "screw the rules, I do what I want" is either a bad faith attempt to circumvent the rules or a good faith "I'm doing this even though it might upset my deity, because I believe it's the right thing and am willing to make that sacrifice" (which is not a 100% reliable thing to get you to fall).
The climb to get back your powers after those two things are going to be very different. I'm never interested in gotcha games, but I might ask a player "so why does your character think that's a reasonable way to go about that?"
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Come to think of it, stories about fallen Paladins could be great. I have the nagging feeling fallen Champions (at least as far as PCs are concerned) cannot really exist, except as a backstory thing.
Too bad. I really liked the concept of Ex-Class archetypes in PF1.