THis just... I just... good lord...

[High Priest Mikhal]

I can sum up the problem with that approach in one word: Har'Akir. Defiling a tomb in Har'Akir is considered an Unholy Act of Desecration even if the individual defiling the tomb doesn't believe in the Akiri Pantheon. Even an atheist archaeologist from Lamordia who enters a sealed of tomb of Mummy Dea'rezt to catalogue the hieroglyphics, will need to make a Powers Check, and if he fails will be punished/rewarded by the Dark Powers.

Actually that's only true for those who know about the proper rituals for Akiri tombs. Also it's not an act of desecration if one leaves the proper offerings and stays out of areas that are sealed off. Breaking into said sealed areas, yes, that's desecration even if someone is ignorant about it. Most tombs actually have areas for visitors to leave offerings to the dead and pay them honor; someone who couldn't possibly know that isn't going to get slapped down by the Dark Powers because that's something culturally based. If they had been informed beforehand or made a successful Knowledge (Religion) check to realize such things, then they would be desecrating the tomb. That's one of those gray areas where powers checks are concerned.

The same goes for other cases. Lets say that Leftenant Fritz of the Talons grabs a six year old child and following the orders of Vlad Drakov impales the child on a metal pike so that Vlad can enjoy dinner. Fritz feels no pangs of regret, since he's "just following orders". He may also justify the execution by rationalizing that the child "belongs" to Vlad, and the Kingsfuhrer can take the child's life if he wishes. Maybe the child's parents were late paying their taxes, or housed Gondegal for a meal. Whatever the case, Fritz doesn't see this act as murder, and sleeps soundly . The Dark Powers disagree, and the next morning Fritz wakes up to discover that he has a stigmata on his abdomen and his rear end in the places where the child was impaled.

That's an example of objective morality at work, not personal beliefs. As I said in my post, it doesn't go the other way. Torture (impaling is up there with crucifixion as one of the worst ways to die) and murder are evil acts despite what one believes.

The main place that personal beliefs make a difference is when someone violates an oath, tenet or vow. A paladin who ignores a plea for help (at a time when she isn't busy helping someone else), a priest who only prays when he wants to renew his spells slots, an Avenger (in 4E) who lets a foe of his order go free, an Anchorite who wears non-metal armor, a Knight of the Shadows who refuses to attend a meeting of the Circle for any but the most urgent reasons. These would all fall under breaking a vow, a tenet or an oath. Why do the Dark Powers enforce such religious (or chivalrous) beliefs? Why do they enforce them when it comes to Evil religions like Zhakata or the Wolf God, as well as Good and Neutral ones? These are some of the mysteries about the Dark Powers, but it does fit in with the nature of Gothic and Romantic literature, where devotion to an ideal (religious or secular) is held in high esteem.

I look at the % of a power's check and see it as the Dark Powers looking for something.

The Intent/belief is important I believe because the Dark Power's want to find someone who has Evil intent to further twist them. If they give a boon to someone with good intentions what's the likely hood for them to fall down a spirally vortex of evil compared to someone with evil intentions?

That's how I see it

Now those actually answers my question. Thanks.

As for what the Dark Powers are, that's been left deliberately unanswered so it's up to each individual DM to answer that question if so inclined. Overgods, like Ao of Forgotten Realms, are so obscure and potent they're more akin to universal forces than gods per se. I just prefer to think of them as such potent entities they're literally beyond comprehension.

Oh and according to Gaz IV, the Dark Powers may have let Soth go because he was such a disappointment as a darklord. Especially when Inza, who isn't what I'd call a worthy darklord but got the mantle, proved herself more willing to pursue damnation in the pursuit of personal gain.

EDIT: A little factoid I forgot about the religious powers checks. It's explicitly stated in the rules that religious violations require a character to know they're doing something wrong for a powers check to be called for. Those who don't know they're violating a religious taboo and don't have a way of knowing shouldn't be punished. It's only when they do know, and the religion in question is both non-evil and not their own, that a powers check is called for. As for the example of breaching a sealed chamber in a temple, that's a secular violation akin to theft at best, grave robbing at worst.

[Ryan Naylor]

I have a hard time seeing any possible way for the DPs to be of Good alignment. The fact that innocent people are imprisoned with Darklords rules that out for me.

... Unless to ascribe to the belief that they're not real people. They look like people, they act like people - they pass the Turning test on the game-world level - but on the metaphysical level, they're just puppets animated by the Dark Powers to give the heroes and villains that are their real interest something to do. In that case, they might be good, locking away all these villains for whatever reason and keeping them busy with meat puppets and heroes.

Having said that though, I tend to swing towards the LN view myself, but it depends on my campaign needs.

[alhoon]

I have a hard time seeing any possible way for the DPs to be of Good alignment. The fact that innocent people are imprisoned with Darklords rules that out for me.

... Unless to ascribe to the belief that they're not real people. They look like people, they act like people - they pass the Turning test on the game-world level - but on the metaphysical level, they're just puppets animated by the Dark Powers to give the heroes and villains that are their real interest something to do. In that case, they might be good, locking away all these villains for whatever reason and keeping them busy with meat puppets and heroes.

Having said that though, I tend to swing towards the LN view myself, but it depends on my campaign needs.

That's not behavior of a good being. Those "meat puppets" have feelings and sentience whether they were born or created. Torturing a flesh golem that can actually feel pain is IMO as evil as torturing a real person.

[Ryan Naylor]

But the point is they don't have feelings and sentience. They just act like they do. From a behaviourist point of view, they're indistinguishable from "real" people; inside, there's absolutely nothing going on.

[alhoon]

oooh... you mean they're like a computer's animated thingies like those we kill in computer games?

Why would someone go to so much trouble to create such an enviroment if all the DPowers wanted was to trap darklords? They could just... trap them in demiplanes with food and stuff, without creating a complex dynamic system with "routines" that look like normal people.
And even so, the powers of the lost power checks are not that much "teaching" as much as "enticing". If the Power checks were meant to reform someone so they don't go down the path of evil, they wouldn't be tempting IMO.

Also, what about outlanders and PCs? OK, the Dark Powers created a Barovia-like prison for Strahd. This prison is huge as far as prisons go. The castle and at most the village of Barovia would work as well. Also for reasons of their own, populated it with not-really-suffering automatons which they placed under Strahd. Still outlanders and PCs suffer if they're caught by Strahd, since Strahd was made even more powerful.
So we have Strahd that's suffering with the object of his desire eternally just out of his grasp... but with tens of thousands of people that serve no purpose at all if Barovia's purpose is just to be a big prison/eternal punishment for Strahd.
Insert a group of outlanders. Those outlanders, which may be good, are in Barovia. And they draw the ire of Strahd somehow. They are probably going to suffer a great deal, just because the Dark Powers decided to not make Strahd a wimpering old infirm beggar that has to watch his love from afar, but an all powerful vampire lord, with extra powers and immunities to boot.

No, I can't see the Dark Powers as good, that decided to trap evil people in special prisons tailored for them. The Demiplane of Dread is by far NOT a nice place even without the Darklords.

[The Pickled Punk]

I have a hard time seeing any possible way for the DPs to be of Good alignment. The fact that innocent people are imprisoned with Darklords rules that out for me.

... Unless to ascribe to the belief that they're not real people. They look like people, they act like people - they pass the Turning test on the game-world level - but on the metaphysical level, they're just puppets animated by the Dark Powers to give the heroes and villains that are their real interest something to do. In that case, they might be good, locking away all these villains for whatever reason and keeping them busy with meat puppets and heroes.

There are several problems with that approach though. It made sense back when the Black Box was released and all the PCs were visitors experiencing a "Weekend in Hell". But ever since Domains of Dread was released, PCs can also be natives. In fact all six of my players in my current campaign decided to play natives (in the past there has been either an even mix of natives and Outlander PCs or all Outlanders). While there is plenty of horror in forcing the PCs to examine if everything they know if true, I don't think it is good to overuse that.

The bigger issue with the natives being "meat-puppets" there to interact with the Darklords and Outlanders, is that the Dark Powers punish those who harm natives, including the natives themselves. While this might be meant to keep up the charade, if the DPs are really of Good alignment, why are they doing it? Furthermore, if the natives are not real, in the sense of not having souls or a real existense, how could they become ghosts or wraiths? How can they provide nourishment when they get energy drained by a Vampire? (I assume their blood is close enough to be considered real.)

To quote Bruce Wayne, "It just raises too many questions."

[The Pickled Punk]

Why would someone go to so much trouble to create such an enviroment if all the DPowers wanted was to trap darklords? They could just... trap them in demiplanes with food and stuff, without creating a complex dynamic system with "routines" that look like normal people.

That's basically how the Lady of Pain's "Mazes" work. One second you're in you're house, or a bar or the Civic Festhall, or the Foundry, the next you're in an almost identical place with no one else around. Every day a Dabus brings you food and water and leaves. And you're never going to find the way out if the Lady doesn't want you too.

On the other hand the Lady's Mazes are clearly meant to be prisons. The purpose of the Darklords and their Domains have been debated endlessly for over twenty years in the pages of Dragon Magazine's Forum column, on Usenet, on mailing lists and on forums like this one. There is so much left intentionally vague and contradictory that the true reasons for the Dark Powers creating Ravenloft may never be understood. To go back to the Mazes for a moment, its possible for someone to find a portal from Sigil into a Maze; I think there was even a scenario like that in Planescape: Torment. But that is the exception; normally the Lady does not allow such a portal to be opened unless it suits her mysterious purposes. But the Dark Powers bring Outlanders into the Domains of Dread all the time. They've created Mistways that allow travel between the Core and isolated Clusters and Islands of Terror. They even send adventurers to bother really isolated Darklords like Davion the Mad or Maligno. This is a design feature, not a bug like a portal into one of the Mazes.

[alhoon]

Yes, it is vague and all... but IMO it's clearly non-good since aside of the Darklords you punish people you bring in to test. People may die doing the right thing in Ravenloft. People may be turned to monsters. Having the power to prevent this from happening and not only avoid preventing it, but intentionally bringing people in there to "test" by passing them over the fire isn't good.

[The Pickled Punk]

Yes, it is vague and all... but IMO it's clearly non-good since aside of the Darklords you punish people you bring in to test. People may die doing the right thing in Ravenloft. People may be turned to monsters. Having the power to prevent this from happening and not only avoid preventing it, but intentionally bringing people in there to "test" by passing them over the fire isn't good.

Agreed. Its at best morally Neutral.

Edit: There is one way that the DPs could do all of that and be considered to have Good tendencies, if not a Good alignment: that there is some Greater Good that they alone are aware of that requires that villains like Strahd or Azalin live in Domains full of potential victims, and requires that heroes come to fight those villains. But because this greater good is so difficult to discern, the DPs would basically be Lawful Neutral or True Neutral, but dedicated to the greater moral good. They would still not meet the standard D&D sets out for Good alignment.

[Zilfer]

The question guys is when someone "dies" doing the right thing? Or are they reborn in another domain somewhere? Are they whisked off to 'heaven?'

I mean in the Faerun setting for example it's clear that whenever someone dies they meet the god of death (Kelemvor most likely in my game) then they are whisked away to whatever god they worship. It's even said a person does not have to believe in said god until they die and then they must choose or Kelemvor whiskes them away to the Tower of Bones was it? Or the Crystal tower something like that. Anyways they get to choose where they go.

So we take for example Evil Cleric Zhentarim killed by righteous paladin. Where does that evil doer go? To hell? No he goes to his God's realm to be rewarded in whatever form that realm believes is appropriate. (Now is said paladin evil for rewarding the Evil Cleric by sending him on his way to his god?)

What happens in Ravenloft? The god's can't be felt so we aren't sure any of the gods are real in ravenloft when they die is there an afterlife? Do they go to the Grey Realm like Darkon's church believes?

What if you died doing 'good' in Ravenloft you were taken out of ravenloft and given a new life away from here? Those that die and are evil are doomed to repeatly be reincarnated until they have learned their lesson? The Dark Powers cannot be understood so again you can almost make anything you want out of them.

i mean "Good Gods" had the tendancy to 'use' their followers as well just in the way the Dark Powers might take outsiders and bring them to test the evil doers to see if they perhaps can be redeemed by heroes of other lands because it's not happening by themselves. What if Strahd could be saved by a hero of another land and the Dark Powers are just trying to find the just the right person.... Jander got close a few times making Strahd feel almost human again. xD

What if everyone in Ravenloft was an outsider at one point or another? but has died in ravenloft only to be recycled?

*shrugs* its what you want them to be. If you want them to be good then they could be good. If you want impartial or evil (which I think is the preferred way to see them) then they can be. Of course it also depends on your definition of good and evil because it's always different for everyone. Thanks for letting me rant! >.<

[High Priest Mikhal]

I don't think the Dark Powers give a flip about the soul. Keeping in mind that ghosts and other types of spiritual undead are breaking the laws of life, death, and rebirth so they haven't truly passed on to the true afterlife. The soul is the one thing that can escape, which is incidentally why true outsiders with the Good or Evil subtypes receive phylacteries. Their souls are divorced from their physical bodies so "death" isn't a release for them. Destroy their phylactery in Ravenloft and they cease to exist entirely. Why only Good and Evil outsiders? That's part and parcel of the mysteries of the Dark Powers that will deliberately never be answered. Ebonbane and Gwydion are the sole exceptions since they're already imprisoned and neither has a physical body per se; they're beings of energy, not matter, so even the Dark Powers can't hold onto them if they get free.

Mortals and the unliving (deathless and undead) do transmigrate to the Outer Plane that most closely matches their alignment; the only notable exception is the lich, which suffers the same spiritual oblivion as true outsiders if their phylacteries are destroyed in Ravenloft. They chose to divorce their souls from their bodies and thus suffer more for it if they ever are destroyed. Since no lich in Ravenloft, to my knowledge, has ever successfully ascended to demilich status they're pretty much screwed by their choices. VRGttLich has excerpts of supposed demiliches that could have taken place on other worlds for all we know, and legends are not objective fact. We all know how disastrous Azalin's attempt was. I also doubt others could succeed before becoming darklords themselves.

This is all just IMC. As for those who didn't exist prior to a certain point in time, they do possess souls and will reincarnate as petitioners as normal. How that's possible is, again, a mystery that is deliberately left unanswered. Partially because it heightens the terror of the unknown and partially because it opens debate as to the nature of the mortal soul. That last one is just such a headache I won't go into it with my players. It also bogs the game down.