So the whole mindless beast phase was LE, just a different divine role? Or was the mindless beast phase still LN, and he became LE after recovering?
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Yet when you subscribe to alignment as objective forces then staying evil would require as much dedication to the force of evil than staying good would.I don't think it's a bad thing that Good gods are held to higher standards than Evil ones, nor do I think we should expect symmetry there - it's the nature of good and evil. It's hard to be good and easy to be evil.
If someone spends their whole life as an upstanding citizen, donates to charity, does volunteer work, etc, and then one time murders a person in cold blood, we don't characterize them as "mostly good".
I would also like to restate that for a deity especially there's a big difference between their actions and their tenets. I think you could have a Good deity who personally mistrusts dwarves, but not one who extolls their followers to hate dwarves. The difficult part, of course, is that this is a god and a religion we are talking about, so it can be very hard to separate a deity's character from their tenets - after all, aren't the followers of a god typically going to try to emulate that god to some degree?
Why ?
Creative Director
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So the whole mindless beast phase was LE, just a different divine role? Or was the mindless beast phase still LN, and he became LE after recovering?
The second phase of his journey, where he was a god of monsters during the era of Azlant, was a time where he was lawful evil and "a mindless beast." Those aren't the words I would have chosen for him, though, since I agree that makes him sound unitelligent (and thus neutral, not any form of evil). I think a better way to say it would have been "a sadistic beast" or "a ruinous beast" or "a horrific beast," etc.
The second phase of his journey, where he was a god of monsters during the era of Azlant, was a time where he was lawful evil and "a mindless beast." Those aren't the words I would have chosen for him, though, since I agree that makes him sound unitelligent (and thus neutral, not any form of evil). I think a better way to say it would have been "a sadistic beast" or "a ruinous beast" or "a horrific beast," etc.
When you say those aren't the words you would have chosen, is this a retrospection, or did an editor or something make you change it?
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I think the point is that evil (and good) require intent. If you have an automaton that just goes around destroying every structure it encounters, that's not evil it's just following its programming. A cultist of Rovagug that does similar things for the glorification of the Rough Beast or whatever is, however, evil.
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The second phase of his journey, where he was a god of monsters during the era of Azlant, was a time where he was lawful evil and "a mindless beast." Those aren't the words I would have chosen for him, though, since I agree that makes him sound unitelligent (and thus neutral, not any form of evil). I think a better way to say it would have been "a sadistic beast" or "a ruinous beast" or "a horrific beast," etc.When you say those aren't the words you would have chosen, is this a retrospection, or did an editor or something make you change it?
I wasn't the writer or the developer or editor of the article in question in the first place. I wasn't that involved at all with the "Ruins of Azlant" Adventure Path.
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I was referring to this, which lists you as the author.
Achaekek went mad and consumed his own impartiality to become little more than a mindless beast for many eons to follow.
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I was referring to this, which lists you as the author.
Achaekek went mad and consumed his own impartiality to become little more than a mindless beast for many eons to follow.
Then that's a poor word choice, I guess, although also the Windsong Testaments are meant to be in-world texts that may or may not be true—they're not meant to be things that tell the GM facts about history. They're written by unreliable narrators, because while the prehistory of creation as presented in that story is my favored creation myth, it's not the "OFFICIAL" one and there are others out there.
It's often tricky to convey in-world mythology in a way that doesn't come across as us the publishers of the game giving a GM cold hard canonical facts.
If I had a time machine I might instead have said "little more than a ravenous beast," perhaps, but still... you can be lawful evil and act in a way that makes others think your'e little more than a mindless beast.
So is it official canon that he's had an alignment shift then? Or is that just part of the myth?
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So is it official canon that he's had an alignment shift then? Or is that just part of the myth?
He started this cycle of reality as lawful neutral, then turned lawful evil as mortals emerged onto the scene, yes.
At least until someone says otherwise. I don't control the entire setting. No one person does. I certainly hope that the next thing to do a significant bit of work on Achaekek uses this installment of "The Windsong Testaments" as a source, but I can't guarantee that. Sometimes folks miss things. Sometimes folks change things.
But at this particular point in time, since you're asking me... yes. It's official he went from lawful neutral to lawful evil.
And while we're being pedantic... "little more than a mindless beast" still means you weren't actually mindless... just little more than mindless. If we were talking about a thing with ability scores, that's flavor-chat for "intelligence score of 4" in my head... low enough to be "little more than an animal" on the intellect scale, but high enough to be able to make decisions about being evil or not.
But deities don't have rules so instead we describe and define them with story.
I'm not trying to be pedantic, I apologize if I appear that way. Achaekek is one of the very few evil deities I find particularly engaging, and so I'm just curious/interested.
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I don't think it's a bad thing that Good gods are held to higher standards than Evil ones, nor do I think we should expect symmetry there - it's the nature of good and evil. It's hard to be good and easy to be evil.
I was never a fan of this mindset/approach/philosophy, probably due to associating suffering- at least with respect to denying pleasure- with good, and enjoying pleasure with evil.
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I was never a fan of this mindset/approach/philosophy, probably due to associating suffering- at least with respect to denying pleasure- with good, and enjoying pleasure with evil.I don't think it's a bad thing that Good gods are held to higher standards than Evil ones, nor do I think we should expect symmetry there - it's the nature of good and evil. It's hard to be good and easy to be evil.
It is indeed an easy trap to fall into--the idea that suffering is virtuous and pleasure sinful. I do not agree with this mindset either, however I believe there is a simpler reason. In this world there are a great many ways to harm others, intentionally or otherwise, and a careless individual will much more cause harm than not. On the other hand, living one's life to cause or allow as little suffering as possible to others requires a great deal more care and attention.
I was never a fan of this mindset/approach/philosophy, probably due to associating suffering- at least with respect to denying pleasure- with good, and enjoying pleasure with evil.I don't think it's a bad thing that Good gods are held to higher standards than Evil ones, nor do I think we should expect symmetry there - it's the nature of good and evil. It's hard to be good and easy to be evil.
I think it's more that it's a lot easier to act altruistically for selfish reasons than it is to act selfishly for altruistic reasons. For example, Ardad Lili has "aid women who have been unfairly maligned", but I don't think she's doing it to make Golarion a better place.
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this is only loosely connected, but Ezakein Tobyn as a cleric of Desna always felt off due to his treatment of his daughter, especially with her current anathemas.
I know not every god knows what all of their followers are doing at once but idk it always rubbed me the wrong way.
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this is only loosely connected, but Ezakein Tobyn as a cleric of Desna always felt off due to his treatment of his daughter, especially with her current anathemas.
I know not every god knows what all of their followers are doing at once but idk it always rubbed me the wrong way.
Yup. Tobyn is not an excellent role-model for worshipers of Desna. He did indeed become an ex-cleric as a result of his treatment of his daughter, and his failure as a father and a cleric pretty much set into motion the events of Burnt Offerings—had Tobyn not been an awful person, Nualia would have likely not fallen to evil, and the Thistletop goblins would not have been organized into a fighting force.
I suppose I could/should have been more explicit about that in Burnt Offerings, but I sort of assumed that him being a bad father and bad cleric was obvious by the way he acted. I did go into greater detail about his fall from grace in the Sandpoint book though...
...In so doing, [Ezakien] not only fell from Desna's grace but also nurtured Nualia's growing hatred...
Ezakien's awful leadership, hidden under a veneer of pleasantness, may have caused Sandpoint more problems than Chopper did when he went on his kill-crazy rampage. At least Chopper didn't poison a town's spirituality.
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this is only loosely connected, but Ezakein Tobyn as a cleric of Desna always felt off due to his treatment of his daughter, especially with her current anathemas.
I know not every god knows what all of their followers are doing at once but idk it always rubbed me the wrong way.
Yup. Tobyn is not an excellent role-model for worshipers of Desna. He did indeed become an ex-cleric as a result of his treatment of his daughter, and his failure as a father and a cleric pretty much set into motion the events of Burnt Offerings—had Tobyn not been an awful person, Nualia would have likely not fallen to evil, and the Thistletop goblins would not have been organized into a fighting force.
I suppose I could/should have been more explicit about that in Burnt Offerings, but I sort of assumed that him being a bad father and bad cleric was obvious by the way he acted. I did go into greater detail about his fall from grace in the Sandpoint book though...
...In so doing, [Ezakien] not only fell from Desna's grace but also nurtured Nualia's growing hatred...Ezakien's awful leadership, hidden under a veneer of pleasantness, may have caused Sandpoint more problems than Chopper did when he went on his kill-crazy rampage. At least Chopper didn't poison a town's spirituality.
Ohhh I didn't know that, I always wondered if that was the case. It is good to know that is the case. ^^
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I was never a fan of this mindset/approach/philosophy, probably due to associating suffering- at least with respect to denying pleasure- with good, and enjoying pleasure with evil.I don't think it's a bad thing that Good gods are held to higher standards than Evil ones, nor do I think we should expect symmetry there - it's the nature of good and evil. It's hard to be good and easy to be evil.
...What?
How do you get from "it only take a few evil acts to ruin a good reputation" to "enjoying pleasure is evil"?
That's not... remotely anything I said or even suggested.
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This is only tangential, but man do I want some more insight into Achaekek's whole... whatever his deal is. One of the most fascinating bits of the setting.
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More Achaekek lore possibly implies more Grandmother Spider lore as well. I'm in.
*hugs Directorsaur*
Red Mantis adventure when????
While I don't mind the linking of Grandmother Spider to Achaekek... that's not my doing. It's also not a story I should tell, since it's NOT my story to tell. One of the best parts about sharing stuff like this is finding out what sorts of stories other amazing writers come up with.
If I were to tell more Achaekek stories, they'd be mine, not someone else's. I'm not the expert on Grandmother Spider and am not comfortable writing about her.
To be honest, at this point in time, I'm more interested in NOT writing more content for Pathifnder and giving as many other people a chance to have their voices heard. I've had plenty of chances. You'll still be seeing my "voice" in the form of a developer of adventures, of course, but I'd really really really love to see other voices doing adventures and Golarion lore now.
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I was never a fan of this mindset/approach/philosophy, probably due to associating suffering- at least with respect to denying pleasure- with good, and enjoying pleasure with evil.I don't think it's a bad thing that Good gods are held to higher standards than Evil ones, nor do I think we should expect symmetry there - it's the nature of good and evil. It's hard to be good and easy to be evil.
...What?
How do you get from "it only take a few evil acts to ruin a good reputation" to "enjoying pleasure is evil"?
That's not... remotely anything I said or even suggested.
It's not a very far trip. Self denial and/or a plethora of rules regarding when pleasure is okay has been associated with good for a very long time.
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I'm not really responsible for how you misinterpret what I'm saying.
Which, to restate, is that it's harder to be good than evil because to be good you have to be consistently good, while to be evil you really only need a few horrible acts.
Sort of like "the good guys have to win every time; the bad guy only has to win once".
Nothing about that has anything to do with what qualifies as a good act or an evil act and I'd thank you to not put words in my mouth. Especially since I also think the whole "anything fun is evil" puritan mindset is awful.
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The existence of the balisse angel, explicitly specified as being formed from the souls of people who commited Evil acts and were redeemed, seems to me to make it fairly clear that Good and Evil in Golarion do not work that way.
Which, to restate, is that it's harder to be good than evil because to be good you have to be consistently good, while to be evil you really only need a few horrible acts.
I do not believe their intention was to imply that redemption after committing acts of evil was impossible. Rather, I would suggest they were speaking in the short-term of what behaviours were likely to cause one to become either good or evil, not define good as 'never having done evil'. In this light, the balisse is not a counter example, since an evil creature can indeed choose to commit to performing consistent acts of good. The point seems to be about illustrating that goodness requires more dedication than evil, not reinforce any manner of purity culture.
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I think the easiest way to state it, is that it's easy to imagine a moral event horizon where one commits an act so evil that they immediately lose their good alignment, but hard to image a moral event horizon where one commits an act so good that they immediately lose their evil alignment.
Not that the second is impossible - just that examples are much harder to come up with.
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I think the easiest way to state it, is that it's easy to imagine a moral event horizon where one commits an act so evil that they immediately lose their good alignment, but hard to image a moral event horizon where one commits an act so good that they immediately lose their evil alignment.
Not that the second is impossible - just that examples are much harder to come up with.
Those kinds of acts usually fall under the redemption equals death trope.
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"I offer to the people of this world a pact. If you accept, then I will, for as long as I exist, ensure your people know no disease, injury, illness, and even death. To power the magic that makes this possible each year on the day of the longest night I shall take from you randomly half of the lives that would have died without my intervention. Those unlucky few face a terrible death drawn out over the course of the year until the next group is taken.
I ask nothing else of you and can offer nothing more. Do you accept?"
For the sake of argument let's say it is impossible to tell if the suffering really is necessary. Is the being making this offer good, evil, or neutral?
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Yeah. Redemption = Death is the forerunner there.
Though saying that, I've often been more a fan of situations where that doesn't happen, and the character ends the story or arc having to work their way back toward being a better person and trying to make up for what they did. It's probably the cynic in me, but that trope being employed so often has somewhat cheapened its value in my eyes.
I hate Redemption = Death with an absolute fiery passion; if I could wholesale delete a single trope from existence in all of media, it might well be that.
"I offer to the people of this world a pact. If you accept, then I will, for as long as I exist, ensure your people know no disease, injury, illness, and even death. To power the magic that makes this possible each year on the day of the longest night I shall take from you randomly half of the lives that would have died without my intervention. Those unlucky few face a terrible death drawn out over the course of the year until the next group is taken.
I ask nothing else of you and can offer nothing more. Do you accept?"
For the sake of argument let's say it is impossible to tell if the suffering really is necessary. Is the being making this offer good, evil, or neutral?
"For the sake of this argument, let's say that it is impossible to tell the one fact that would decisively determine the answer."
Yeah, no thanks, not gonna bite.
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"For the sake of this argument, let's say that it is impossible to tell the one fact that would decisively determine the answer."
Yeah, no thanks, not gonna bite.
The hidden knowledge is realistic. If we were given this offer IRL we'd have no way of knowing if the suffering is required or not. We'd need to judge the value of the offer based on only what the being actually does without a way to guess at their motives.
This is exactly a trolly problem. Do you pull the lever if you're the person this being makes its offer to?
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Who tied the victims to the tracks?
Who causes death, disease, and suffering?
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If we can't agree on if an act that saves many but causes some smaller number a period of suffering is good, evil, or neutral then how can we discuss the morality of any act? Most questions of morality don't give us perfect insight into the motives of all involved, so shouldn't we look only at the balance of the acts?