Alignments and gothic Drama?

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The Lesser Evil
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Re: Alignments and gothic Drama?

Post by The Lesser Evil »

I think there is a question to consider here:
what source of authority are you considering to have precedence here?

A paladin (or lawful in general) doesn't necessarily mean obedience to every system of laws. There are several levels of law, such as Divine Law vs. the Laws of Man (and even within these, there are quite a few- customs, local law, baronial law, royal law, etc.) A 3.5 paladin's code of honor is to respect local authority to a certain extent if the authority is legitimate. Plenty of governments in Ravenloft might not be considered legitimate by the standards of a paladin's code or deity.

A paladin and their church may be the best source of reasonable moral authority- D&D/Ravenloft is a very different world from the one we live in where we can depend upon (in theory, at least) a central codified rule of law with the infrastructure that can apply oversight with some degree of fairness.

In Ravenloft, we often don't have that level of organization or infrastructure simply because of the contemporary age it's set in. In addition, this being the Demiplane of Dread, where there is some sort of structural overhead, it's overwhelmingly misinformed, corrupt, or both. Often even blatantly so (the Kargat in Darkon, the Devil Strahd, the military of Falkovnia, Elena Stranglehold, the Dark Twins, Von Kharkov's bridal lottery, etc.) There's a good argument for fair trials not even being feasible a lot of the time.

As far as alcoholism and grimness goes, well neither being a grim, fatalistic sourpuss nor having alcoholism should be cause for a paladin to fall in and of themselves.

As far as murder and torture goes, I guess it depends on the circumstances and definition you're using. The difference between our society and that of Ravenloft should be taken into account for the definition of "murder", in that in a lot of places that might leave the paladin and her church as the best forces for law or morality in an area. (Summary executions shouldn't necessarily be considered the same as murder.) And a lot of times over the course of an event of stopping a creature in the middle of performing evil acts, the hero will commit what could in our modern court systems today consider "murder". As far as torture goes, most times that isn't really effective anyway, in that it only gives you want you want to here rather than what is accurate.

You can look on the powers check guidelines for some help here. You'll notice if the target is an evil character or a monster, a lot of the "acts of violence" are inconsequential as far as needing powers checks go. Unfortunately, the definition of torture is vague enough to make it hard to distinguish from what might be an assault, extortion, or threats of violence.

So basically, depending on how far the paladin goes, he might not really even qualify for doing a powers check, let alone losing paladinhood.
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Nox
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Re: Alignments and gothic Drama?

Post by Nox »

Dark Angel wrote:
Nox wrote:Fact is that actually the Sentire (highest rank priest in the region) is quite close to him, so it wouldnt fit if the church discomunicate him (i just told him that the Sentire himself attended the funeral of his parents, also spending part of the day with him in prayer, mostly because they Sentire SHould be proud of him, since he's one of the few paladin in the land, and he did many good act), in short, I painted this man as good and friendly. Maybe it is a facade? but if this is the case i'm not that good in creating twisted plots, i need some help. How would the PC find out about the falsity of his former superior? What could be the so close-minded vision of this church (ezra, Home faith)?
One thing to hold the NPC true to character would be to keep him as he is without any loss of respect or belief of the paladin (I like to have at least one major NPC in all my games that will never betray or deceive the group no matter what, granted they never know this NPC exists or who they are once found). Depending on the faith of the paladin, his obvious changes in behavior and drunkenness may not distance himself from what is essentially a mentor figure (or close to it), but would be frowned upon by other members of the faith. Is there a 'second in command' who wants to run the church his way? Does he see the paladin's relationship to the top dog as a means to make that happen? Not only would you still have the PC betrayed by his church, the paladin may also be forced to make a choice: push the Sentire away or accept his assistance. The Sentire may accept the consequences of his decision (would may leverage him out of the church as well) and the paladin may distance themselves out of friendship. Little twists and turns like that can make a simple situation more complex and political in nature (which I consider a win-win as a sword +5 and the greatest armor class in the game will not stop a (figurative) political assassination).

As far as keeping him a paladin, go for it. The addiction to booze part would cause a loss of abilities and not a fall from grace. This feeds into the eventual return of powers (after reasonable actions were completed) as the fuel of the "heretic paladin deal with the dark powers". Hope some of these suggestions help.
The Lesser Evil wrote:I think there is a question to consider here:
what source of authority are you considering to have precedence here?

A paladin (or lawful in general) doesn't necessarily mean obedience to every system of laws. There are several levels of law, such as Divine Law vs. the Laws of Man (and even within these, there are quite a few- customs, local law, baronial law, royal law, etc.) A 3.5 paladin's code of honor is to respect local authority to a certain extent if the authority is legitimate. Plenty of governments in Ravenloft might not be considered legitimate by the standards of a paladin's code or deity.

A paladin and their church may be the best source of reasonable moral authority- D&D/Ravenloft is a very different world from the one we live in where we can depend upon (in theory, at least) a central codified rule of law with the infrastructure that can apply oversight with some degree of fairness.

In Ravenloft, we often don't have that level of organization or infrastructure simply because of the contemporary age it's set in. In addition, this being the Demiplane of Dread, where there is some sort of structural overhead, it's overwhelmingly misinformed, corrupt, or both. Often even blatantly so (the Kargat in Darkon, the Devil Strahd, the military of Falkovnia, Elena Stranglehold, the Dark Twins, Von Kharkov's bridal lottery, etc.) There's a good argument for fair trials not even being feasible a lot of the time.

As far as alcoholism and grimness goes, well neither being a grim, fatalistic sourpuss nor having alcoholism should be cause for a paladin to fall in and of themselves.

As far as murder and torture goes, I guess it depends on the circumstances and definition you're using. The difference between our society and that of Ravenloft should be taken into account for the definition of "murder", in that in a lot of places that might leave the paladin and her church as the best forces for law or morality in an area. (Summary executions shouldn't necessarily be considered the same as murder.) And a lot of times over the course of an event of stopping a creature in the middle of performing evil acts, the hero will commit what could in our modern court systems today consider "murder". As far as torture goes, most times that isn't really effective anyway, in that it only gives you want you want to here rather than what is accurate.

You can look on the powers check guidelines for some help here. You'll notice if the target is an evil character or a monster, a lot of the "acts of violence" are inconsequential as far as needing powers checks go. Unfortunately, the definition of torture is vague enough to make it hard to distinguish from what might be an assault, extortion, or threats of violence.

So basically, depending on how far the paladin goes, he might not really even qualify for doing a powers check, let alone losing paladinhood.
Thank you both, i think i'll follow your advice and keep the Sentire close to the player no matter what.

For what concernes the good nad evil act, I think you vision of the ravenloft alignment makes sense, and probably i will adopt it aswell.
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