Re: Alignments and gothic Drama?
Posted: Mon Aug 29, 2016 8:37 pm
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.
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.