What alighnment is Varsuvius?

[EmeraldPhoenix]

What alignment is V right now?

Because I'm thinking Lawful Neutral, or maybe True Neutral. (s)he's not going our of h is/er way to be evil, but c'mon, killing somebody without a fair trial JUST to help recover party members? lying to paladins? leaving your party to try to accomplish things on your own, despite knowing that they need you? These are not things that scream "Good".

So what will be the outcome, do you think? Good or Evil?

IDEAS! :smallsmile:

[magic9mushroom]

What alignment is V right now?

Because I'm thinking Lawful Neutral, or maybe True Neutral. (s)he's not going our of h is/er way to be evil, but c'mon, killing somebody without a fair trial JUST to help recover party members? lying to paladins? leaving your party to try to accomplish things on your own, despite knowing that they need you? These are not things that scream "Good".

So what will be the outcome, do you think? Good or Evil?

IDEAS! :smallsmile:

Well, we know V was Good at the start of the comic, because otherwise Unholy Blight wouldn't have Sickened her. The first hint of Neutral comes along when Miko and Vaarsuvius bang heads over the ogres: V's attitude cannot in any way be considered Good there. Other non-Good acts include her opinions on disposal of the Linear Guild and her disintegration of Kubota. These IMO add up to Neutral, but not Evil. After all, she hasn't gone down the obvious route to UAP by taking a gate of her own, has she?

Lawful-Chaotic seems fairly clear-cut to me. Most of the acts that you listed as Evil are in fact Chaotic acts. And given V's attitude towards authority, Chaotic seems obvious.

[Zevox]

I'm of the opinion that V is and has always been True Neutral*. She has never been particularly benevolent or altruistic, nor has she ever been especially cruel or uncaring, though she can display all of those traits at various times. That, to me, pegs her as solidly neutral on the good/evil axis.

Law/Chaos is harder to determine, partially because that axis itself is more poorly defined to begin with. From my perspective, V has never done anything to display herself as particularly strongly lawful or chaotic, either. She is simply highly rational and pragmatic. She can sometimes display aspects of each, but she does not consistently act in ways comparable to known lawful characters (i.e. Durkon, Roy, the Paladins, etc) nor known chaotic ones (Elan, Haley, Belkar, etc). Thus I consider her neutral in this regard, too.

*Yes yes, the Unholy Blight thing. Based on what I read of the Giant's reaction to readers pointing out what that incident would mean for V's alignment to him, I suspect that was an error on his part.

Zevox

[MickJay]

I'm thinking True Neutral as well. At first I treated his snarky comments as good-natured rambling, but there was little of "pure" goodness in V from the start, and lots of neutrality. If V got sickened with the "good guys" by mistake, then I'd say he was TN from the beginning.

[David Argall]

Well, up until the current strips, a number of people were even willing to argue that V was evil.

Now it seems entirely reasonable to think that V was intended to be neutral from the start [with 11 a writer error], but it is entirely possible to contend she has been good [CG in particular] from the start. He has just not been stupid good, and does not get diverted from the greater good by some trivial goods along the way. [V dusted Kubota, who was a known villain, and was threatening to continue his murderous ways. That marks him as chaotic as he avoids a useless trial that might have had an incorrect and unjust result. It really is no different from her shooting Kubota as he was about to stab someone.]

We all see a major danger of V turning evil here, but his most immediate actions are pretty easy to classify as good. and this might produce an interesting result.

Somehow Qarr rescues V in the ensuing fight, but is reduced to negative hp and V is out of healing potions. Since she owes Qarr for saving his life, and has no other way to help the imp, she accepts the imp as his familiar [a violation of several rules, but that is no new event for this strip], which gives the imp enough hp to survive.
This allows us to have a variety of entertaining conversations of good V and evil Qarr, which may be a need for the comic if Belkar is scheduled for retirement soon.

[King of Nowhere]

I always considered V to be chaotic. He has no respect for autorities, conventions, or rules, and is very sensitive to trying to limit hir actions. He don't care of what other people think of hir, or what they expect hir to do, and often disobeys hir leader, whom V personally respect.

And after the last comics, I'm going for chaotic good. A CG has his own personal moral code, and will do what seems right. It is not necessary that YOU agree with that code to make it good. The audience's agreement would only make it lawful.
Under V's code, it is ok to summarily zap bad people, as long as you're sure they're bad, or using every way to prevent them for coming back. V may not seem to be particularly good, but he's working toward a good end, and he's doing what he thinks is best to ensure this goal. And he's not really using evil means, I can't count zapping Kubota as bad.
I don't agree with some of hir decisions, but, as I said, if everyone agreed on his moral code, what kind of chaotic would it be?

[T-O-E]

Vaarsuvius could be any alignment. The DnD law/chaos + good/evil system is extremely vague.

I'm going to go with: True Enigma.

[Vemynal]

^i like david's idea under his spoiler^^

[Decoy Lockbox]

From my experience with D&D wizards, V is being absolutely saintly. Its sometimes hard to be nice when you have the raging power of the cosmos flowing through yours veins. For example, why bother being nice to people when you can force them to like you with magic? Why bother walking when you can fly all day (with the overland flight spell)? Why not do whatever you want, knowing full well that no jail cell can contain you? Every wizard I've ever played or have seen played has eventually succumbed to power madness.

So given what I've just said, I would classify V on the special wizard alignment scale as Lawful Good, which is essentially the equivalent of Lawful neutral for mere mortals.

[Assassin89]

Early in the comic, V was good or neutral on the good-evil axis. Currently, V could be neutral, considering earlier actions, but I am not the judge on such a matter.

[Underground]

From my experience with D&D wizards, V is being absolutely saintly. [...] Which means very, very little, as the typical D&D wizard can make Darth Vader look nice.

[Flame of Anor]

At the time of strip number that-one-with-the-Unholy-Blight, Vaarsuvius was definitely Good. At this point, I see two possibilities. Either 1) Vaarsuvius is slipping to Neutral but doesn't know it or 2) Vaarsuvius is still Good but a bit deranged.

Personally, I think that 2) is much more likely. Also, I'm sure s/he is and has always been Chaotic.

[Zechikin]

Neutral good is known as the "Benefactor" alignment. A neutral good character is guided by his conscience and typically acts altruistically, without regard for or against Lawful precepts such as rules or tradition. A neutral good character may cooperate with lawful officials but does not feel beholden to them. A doctor that treats soldiers from both sides in a war would be considered neutral good. - Wikipedia

I'd guess neutral good. Yes, he doesn't much like authority but he'll tolerate it when it isn't conflicting with his own goals or messing with his life. Unlike Belkar he doesn't chase lawyers around with little knives. :smallcool:

And as far as being good he wouldn't be so wracked with guilt if he were true neutral, here (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0623.html) he did what he had to to save himself but his conscience won't let him live with it.

Anyway, those are my thoughts.

[Optimystik]

I think V is closer to evil than ever.

Qarr is practically begging him for mercy, has made no attempts to defend himself by attacking or fending off V, and even offers to leave. Yet V not only continues his assault, he continues to use lethal force.

The sole mitigating factor in our wizard's defense is that Qarr is a fiend. But if OotS (and SoD in particular) has taught us anything, it's that needless violence based solely on a monster manual entry does not a Good act make.


From my experience with D&D wizards, V is being absolutely saintly. Its sometimes hard to be nice when you have the raging power of the cosmos flowing through yours veins. For example, why bother being nice to people when you can force them to like you with magic? Why bother walking when you can fly all day (with the overland flight spell)? Why not do whatever you want, knowing full well that no jail cell can contain you? Every wizard I've ever played or have seen played has eventually succumbed to power madness.

That sounds much more like a sorcerer's attitude to magic than a wizard's, at least to me. Wizards have to pay for every spell with blood, sweat, gold and long hours of study; as a result, they tend to respect the forces they control too much to squander them needlessly.

V himself exemplifies this attitude very well. He becomes very indignant when speaking of his art to Elan (#126-7), Miko (#207) and even Qarr. He doesn't like his magic wasted on frivolities (#213) - he's not the type that would go around charming people merely to improve their opinion of him, or even fly around everywhere unless there was no better way to go about his task.


So given what I've just said, I would classify V on the special wizard alignment scale as Lawful Good, which is essentially the equivalent of Lawful neutral for mere mortals.

Arcane ability is no excuse for looser morals. If anything, more power should hold you to a higher standard, as your actions gain more and more ramifications the closer you come to imposing your will on reality.

[Optimystik]

I'd guess neutral good. Yes, he doesn't much like authority but he'll tolerate it when it isn't conflicting with his own goals or messing with his life. Unlike Belkar he doesn't chase lawyers around with little knives. :smallcool:

And as far as being good he wouldn't be so wracked with guilt if he were true neutral, here (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0623.html) he did what he had to to save himself but his conscience won't let him live with it.

Anyway, those are my thoughts.

I agree with the Neutral, but not the Good part. An NG character would have no issue with helping dirt farmers (#213), he wouldn't threaten his own teammates with violence (#596), wouldn't willfully abandon an innocent to an unknown fate (#554) and certainly wouldn't murder a villain that had already surrendered (#595). At best he is TN at this point.

Speaking of TN, here's the alignment's description, courtesy of Neverwinter Nights.


A neutral character doesn't feel strongly one way or the other about good vs. evil or law vs. chaos. She thinks good is better than evil - after all, she'd rather have good neighbors and rulers than evil ones- but she's not personally committed to upholding good in any abstract or universal way. A wizard who devotes herself to her art and is bored by the semantics of moral debate is neutral. Neutral means you act naturally, without prejudice or compulsion.

Emphasis mine, as it fits Vaarsuvius to a tee. As for feeling guilt, that alone isn't enough to make him good - even vampires feel guilt from time to time.

[David Argall]

Qarr is practically begging him for mercy, has made no attempts to defend himself by attacking or fending off V, and even offers to leave. Yet V not only continues his assault, he continues to use lethal force.

The sole mitigating factor in our wizard's defense is that Qarr is a fiend. But if OotS (and SoD in particular) has taught us anything, it's that needless violence based solely on a monster manual entry does not a Good act make.

Actually, it may be telling us the reverse.
Consider 228. Miko says "...they detected as evil, so I killed them." Miko remains a paladin.
So we have two possible conclusions here, that killing Qarr is perfectly acceptable for a good alignment, or
Miko did not state the full facts of the cases where she killed evil monsters. [She might have had adequate grounds for killing them anyway, and detecting for evil was a way to find the ones that might be spared.] It is possible that both are true.

[jeffh]

The sole mitigating factor in our wizard's defense is that Qarr is a fiend. But if OotS (and SoD in particular) has taught us anything, it's that needless violence based solely on a monster manual entry does not a Good act make.I don't see the paladins in SoD losing their paladinhood, and the same book tells us the gods specifically set up the goblin races and the like as easy ways for (predominantly Good-aligned) adventurers to gain XP. Whether we agree or not, their actions seem to be being depicted as within the boundaries of OotS-Good (though I doubt they would be considered shining examples of same either).

Maybe in the Order of the Stick universe, Good just means "approved of by [a sufficiently large subset of] the gods" - a possible solution to Plato's Euthyphro dilemma, but one that most real-life philosophers have found very unappealing.

[Firewind]

Considering all of the trouble that Qarr caused with Kubota V is quite justified in trying to kill him. Who says the imp won't turn on him? Sparing him would be a stupid good action and siding with him is the evil road. Simply killing him is more of a neutral action considering the other options.

And i always thought that V was TN. Let's be frank V knows some things that a frankly way too much information bordering on squick. I'll point you to V's comment on the disintegrated remains of the dragon in the link above. sorry but a Good aligned character should NOT know that XD

V also admits to messing with the fabrics of reality during the Miko/Trial arc out of pure boredom. That hardly seems like a good or evil action to me. a good character would stay well clear while an evil character will mess with it purely for their own gain. V just did it because she could really.

[Optimystik]

I don't see the paladins in SoD losing their paladinhood, and the same book tells us the gods specifically set up the goblin races and the like as easy ways for (predominantly Good-aligned) adventurers to gain XP. Whether we agree or not, their actions seem to be being depicted as within the boundaries of OotS-Good (though I doubt they would be considered shining examples of same either).


Actually, it may be telling us the reverse.
Consider 228. Miko says "...they detected as evil, so I killed them." Miko remains a paladin.

No, I consider killing defenseless monsters to be neutral at best, not good. Only mercy in that situation could be an actively good act. If you sanction what those paladins did as good, you invalidate Redcloak's entire feeling of injustice that gives his backstory meaning - his village would have deserved to be slaughtered despite not having actually done anything evil. Similarly, sanctioning Miko's "kill everyone that detects as evil" philosophy means she was justified in her insane judgments of those around her, which she clearly wasn't.

Saying "the paladin did X and didn't fall" only indicates that the action in question isn't outright Evil; it does not automatically make it Good. Paladins can do some neutral acts, as long as they don't turn neutral behavior into a habit. Miko didn't fall after savagely beating the Order and dragging them back in chains, nor did she fall after her "sin-stained blood speech," or after attacking the clearly non-evil MitD.


Considering all of the trouble that Qarr caused with Kubota V is quite justified in trying to kill him. Who says the imp won't turn on him? Sparing him would be a stupid good action and siding with him is the evil road. Simply killing him is more of a neutral action considering the other options.

I agree, killing Qarr is neutral (at best.) What we do know for sure is that it is not Good. It might be neutral to kill him outright, given Qarr's nature and motives, yet it also might be evil if Qarr really did intend to leave him alone.

Most importantly, V could have chased him off without lethal force if he so desired; he merely used Disintegrate so that he wouldn't be personally inconvenienced by the imp again. That's like shooting a door-to-door salesman so that you can go back to watching your television program in peace - hardly a Good act. Even not counting the fact that it was V stopped him from leaving in the first place, it would be a simple matter for the wizard to dispel his anchor and Dismiss the imp. Hell, tt would have even left him with his 6th level slots intact.

[Oracle_Hunter]

V is Neutral of the "I don't care" (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TrueNeutral) variety. Consider eirs actions:
(1) Killed someone on mere suspicion of villainy.
Violates the "respect for life" clause of Good. Also a non-Lawful act for obvious reasons.

(2) Often considers Belkar's attitudes towards problem solving
Note that ey is the only party member aside from Belkar to do so.

(3) Objects to Quarr's bargain on strictly utilitarian grounds (little reward for a great cost) as opposed to moral ones (associating with devils is bad, m'kay)

(4) Risked life and limb to single-handedly destroy the TI Elementals threatening Azure City, rather than look for back-up
A Good act, since doing so risked eirs own life for others without it being strictly necessary to fulfill eirs ends.

V simply does not care about good and evil or law and chaos - ey is all about efficiency and pragmatism. Go and check the archives; ey never worries about what "the right thing to do" is, but always what the optimal course of action is.

[SPoD]

The OOTS Board Game partially answers this for us. The alignments of all the characters are listed as follows:

:roy: Beleaguered Good
:haley: Chaotic Greedy
:elan: Foolish Good
:durkon: Lawful Bland
:belkar: Selfish Evil
:vaarsuvius: Arrogant Neutral

Now, given that we know the alignments of every other member of the Order in D&D terms, we can see that every one of these is made up of a "real" alignment word (one that is accurate to their D&D alignment) and a comedic describer. Since V's alignment contains "Neutral" in the second position, V is either Lawful Neutral, True Neutral, or Chaotic Neutral. (And given the Kubota situation, I think we can throw Lawful Neutral right out.)

So, V is either True Neutral or Chaotic Neutral by the best record we have. Since neither one of those particularly conflicts with the events in the comic, those are the most likely. Personally, I prefer TN, since V has taken some lawful actions from time to time.

[Oracle_Hunter]

The OOTS Board Game partially answers this for us. The alignments of all the characters are listed as follows:

:roy: Beleaguered Good
:haley: Chaotic Greedy
:elan: Foolish Good
:durkon: Lawful Bland
:belkar: Selfish Evil
:vaarsuvius: Arrogant Neutral

Oooo, canony goodness! :smallbiggrin:

[Charmy]

:roy: Beleaguered Good
:haley: Chaotic Greedy
:elan: Foolish Good
:durkon: Lawful Bland
:belkar: Selfish Evil
:vaarsuvius: Arrogant Neutral

.

You madame, have won the thread. (and hopefully ended every other thread that seeks to endlessly debate the alignment of the OoTS every strip)

I think the 'filled-in' word tends to indicate which side of their alignment most dominantly makes up their personality, too.

[King of Nowhere]

If we have Rich's word that V is neutral on some axis, I'd take CN. V still displays plenty of chaotic traits, and apparently Rich judges that hir good traits are not enough to fit in good. After all, he knows V better than anyone else here, and V's motivations are still unclear to us.

And I still assume that killing a defensless opponent, if the opponent is someone like Nale or Kubota, is much better than giving them the chance to escape, and is not less than good in any way. Maybe Rich thinks different, and that's why he filled V in neutral. Or rather He did because V really thinks only for hir personal inconvenience, rather than the evil those people would enact if allowed to get away.

[sun_tzu]

I'm of the opinion that V has always been True Neutral, but also that he has been slowly inching toward Neutral Evil lately (executing Kubota because he figured he was probably a bad guy and a distraction from their main goal).

[Ronan]

You said it yourself: True Neutral. He doesn't go out of his way for the party(not lawful), nor did she leave without thinking(not chaotic). Killed Kubota(not good) and refused to bargain with Qarr(not evil)

[Optimystik]

You madame, have won the thread. (and hopefully ended every other thread that seeks to endlessly debate the alignment of the OoTS every strip)

I think the 'filled-in' word tends to indicate which side of their alignment most dominantly makes up their personality, too.

Not only that, it shows which side of their alignment is in flux. Example, Haley's Chaotic "Greedy" puts her near the edge between CG and CN. This assessment fits perfectly with both her tendencies for larceny and her self-claim of "Chaotic Good-ish." Similarly, Roy's "Beleaguered Good" hits upon his tendency to occasionally use chaotic means, like lying to his teammates and not deferring to authority (e.g. CPPD and Hinjo), to get the job done.

[Berserk Monk]

I'm not sure. I'd say Neutral Kick-Ass, but he doesn't seem to be kicking much ass. I'd also go with Chaotic Sexy, but he does have a low charisma, and there is the whole gender thing. So I guess, Lawful Awesome.

[Iranon]

I'd go for Chaotic Neutral. V has a few quirks that aren't commonly associated with Chaotic people, but the underlying attitude definitely fits the alignment. Especially her handlings of inner-group conflicts - with Belkar, Miko, and, recently, Durkon/Elan point that way.
His drastic measures against boredom revealed in the trial point the same way, as does the chat with Sabine at the bar (solving romantic rivalries with her arcane might).

All weak evidence individually, but enough to make me go with Chaotic.

[GoC]

I think V is closer to evil than ever.

Qarr is practically begging him for mercy, has made no attempts to defend himself by attacking or fending off V, and even offers to leave. Yet V not only continues his assault, he continues to use lethal force.

The sole mitigating factor in our wizard's defense is that Qarr is a fiend. But if OotS (and SoD in particular) has taught us anything, it's that needless violence based solely on a monster manual entry does not a Good act make.
Ummm... nope.
Goblins are usually evil. Fiends are always evil. This is a good act under D&D rules.

[Carnivorous_Bea]

Ummm... nope.
Goblins are usually evil. Fiends are always evil. This is a good act under D&D rules.

And considering that the imp is a sentient embodiment of evil, then as long as he's alive and functional, he will be seeking to do harm. Sparing him would be the same as failing to excise a tumor because "it can't fight back." I would say that killing a being with absolutely no redeeming features and concentrated, 100% malevolence as its purpose in reality would be a good act.

As for killing Kubota -- considering that he just outlined how he can mess up the good guys for months, and still get away scot free for his various betrayals and murders, by manipulating the legal system, I wouldn't say disintegrating him was a good-aligned act, but it definitely counts as a good job! :smallbiggrin:

[Underground]

Err, wrong.

Fiends are not ALWAYS evil. Only MOST are.

A good example is Fall-from-Grace from Planescape: Torment. Despite being a Succubus and therefore a Demon, she was NOT chaotic evil, but instead lawful neutral.

[Trazoi]

I've always thought the core personality of V was somewhat Lawful Neutral, especially with all the logical reasoning, but with a different authority structure. For V, the laws of logic trump the laws of society.

However I've never properly understood the whole Law/Chaos alignment axis. Apart from the obvious cases of Knight Templar for law and Utter Madman for chaos, it's hard to peg where someone sits on that axis without knowing which laws are important. So with the blatant disregard for the rule of law lately, I could see V being some form of True Neutral. I don't see V as Chaotic Neutral, because V doesn't have the "free spirit" element that I associate with chaotic types that aren't completely bonkers.

[Optimystik]

Ummm... nope.
Goblins are usually evil. Fiends are always evil. This is a good act under D&D rules.

No, it's just arguably not an evil act. That doesn't necessarily make it a good act.

Killing something based on a monster manual entry instead of its actual behavior is Stupid Good. It's also what Miko would do, which proves my point.

[GoC]

Err, wrong.

Fiends are not ALWAYS evil. Only MOST are.

A good example is Fall-from-Grace from Planescape: Torment. Despite being a Succubus and therefore a Demon, she was NOT chaotic evil, but instead lawful neutral.

Irrelevant. Imps are always evil. (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/devil.htm#imp)


No, it's just not an evil act. That doesn't necessarily make it a goodact.

Killing something based on a monster manual entry instead of its actual behavior is Stupid Good. It's also what Miko would do, which proves my point.

You were arguing that V is closer to evil and gave this as as example. That means you believe it was an evil act.

[Optimystik]

Irrelevant. Imps are always evil. (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/devil.htm#imp)

Which still doesn't make Qarr's attempted murder a good act by itself.


You were arguing that V is closer to evil and gave this as as example. That means you believe it was an evil act.

I do believe that. But while I can't definitively prove it is Evil, I CAN prove it isn't Good. Look through the thread, most of my responses describe it as "neutral at best."

[The_Weirdo]

From my experience with D&D wizards, V is being absolutely saintly. Its sometimes hard to be nice when you have the raging power of the cosmos flowing through yours veins. For example, why bother being nice to people when you can force them to like you with magic? Why bother walking when you can fly all day (with the overland flight spell)? Why not do whatever you want, knowing full well that no jail cell can contain you? Every wizard I've ever played or have seen played has eventually succumbed to power madness.

So given what I've just said, I would classify V on the special wizard alignment scale as Lawful Good, which is essentially the equivalent of Lawful neutral for mere mortals.

It doesn't work like that, and the very strip being discussed shows us why: Magic has ways even to deal with itself, and wizards aren't quite powerful without it. Moreover, manage to get close enough to a wizard and he falls.

And before anyone asks, I ONLY PLAY Wizards and magic-users. But I'd be dumb to play them assuming nothing could hurt them. Spells run out. Spells fail. Spells end. And no smart wizard forgets that.

[GoC]

That means you believe it was an evil act.I do believe that.
You've contradicted yourself:

No, it's just not an evil act.

[Optimystik]

You've contradicted yourself:

I meant that it is not demonstrably evil. I believe it is still evil but it can easily be argued not to be solely because Qarr is a fiend.

Here's a useful barometer for these situations: if V was trying to disintegrate, say a mephit that was begging for its life, would people still be calling it a good act? If the only thing that changes the circumstances is the victim's creature type, then it's Stupid Good at work.

[GoC]

I meant that it is not demonstrably evil. I believe it is still evil but it can easily be argued not to be solely because Qarr is a fiend.

Here's a useful barometer for these situations: if V was trying to disintegrate, say a mephit that was begging for its life, would people still be calling it a good act? If the only thing that changes the circumstances is the victim's creature type, then it's Stupid Good at work.

Mephit: Usually neutral.
Imp: Always evil.

Unless of course you are questioning the alignment system and don't accept that it's just how the D&D world works.

[Optimystik]

Mephit: Usually neutral.
Imp: Always evil.

Thank you for proving my point.

Anytime a monster manual entry > what the creature IS ACTUALLY DOING, you are falling into the Stupid Good trap.


Unless of course you are questioning the alignment system and don't accept that it's just how the D&D world works.

Uh, Rich is too, if SoD is any indication.

[Sarrel]

Because I'm thinking Lawful Neutral, or maybe True Neutral. (s)he's not going our of h is/er way to be evil, but c'mon, killing somebody without a fair trial JUST to help recover party members? lying to paladins? leaving your party to try to accomplish things on your own, despite knowing that they need you? These are not things that scream "Good".

No, they don't scream good. They scream chaotic. Those are the kind of things I would do, and I'm generally chaotic nuetral, sometimes chaotic good. Kubota was Lawful EVIL, and lets face it, he knew his trade. He probably would have gotten out of that with a slap on his wrist. That would have eventually led to more trouble, and been a pain all around. They need to get the party back together to beat the ultimate EVIL in the world. She was more or less hanging out in the hold researching and consuming supplies. Aside from the minute benefits they may have received when he deemed his assistance necessary, they got nothing out of her. Lying to paladins? How can you not? If you tell them the truth, you will never hear the end of it, and your chances of actually fixing the problem are likely to be diminished. It's kind of a "don't tell them unless you really can't fix it on your own" deal.

[GoC]

Thank you for proving my point.

Anytime a monster manual entry > what the creature IS ACTUALLY DOING, you are falling into the Stupid Good trap.
It's stupid in our world, not in theirs.

Also, you said creature type, not alignment. Creature type is irrelevant, it's alignment that's important.


Uh, Rich is too, if SoD is any indication.
Having not read SoD I can't say, but I'm not inclined to trust your interpretation of it.

[Optimystik]

It's stupid in our world, not in theirs.

Actually, it's stupid in theirs too. Miko is proof of that.


Also, you said creature type, not alignment. Creature type is irrelevant, it's alignment that's important.

Alignments are tied to creature types in D&D, remember? You're the one who said fiends are "always evil," and OotS proves that it follows these rules as well because the Paladins in SoD
Didn't fall after massacring Redcloak's village even though the goblins there did nothing evil.


Having not read SoD I can't say, but I'm not inclined to trust your interpretation of it.

The beauty of this forum is that you don't have to, but it also removes your basis for arguing with me if you can't refute my points.

[magic9mushroom]

GoC, remember that just because a creature is Evil does not make killing it Good. Look at Roy's discussion with the deva about Belkar in 489. Or look at the Blood War. Does the Evil nature of both sides make them Neutral for killing each other? Of course not.

Whether killing is Evil or not is determined by the circumstances, not by textbook alignments. Go read the Book of Vile Darkness.

In this case:

Vaarsuvius attempted to kill Qarr.
Qarr, while Evil, hadn't attempted to harm Vaarsuvius in any intentional way.
Vaarsuvius' motive for killing is that Qarr is a distraction.
Qarr refused to fight back despite having the capability.
Vaarsuvius trapped Qarr and continued trying to kill him after Qarr offered to leave.

Hence, trying to kill Qarr is an Evil act on the same level as Xykon's "Because I'm BORED!"

[Spoomeister]

Vaarsuvius' alignment is "neutral me".

[LurkerInPlayground]

A good wizard, a neutral wizard and an evil wizard all decide to disintegrate an imp during different and unrelated instances.

I can see a good wizard disintegrating Qarr, simply because it is a prudent thing to do. The imp is self-serving and he more than suspects that it doesn't really have his or anybody else's best interests in mind. This wizard may pull punches once he feels he has impressed upon Qarr that he has no interest in doing business, although I wouldn't count on it. This imp is a unrepentantly criminal creature based on its previous actions (backing a would-be tyrant and suggesting virgin's blood as a spell component).

Then you have V, trying to disintegrate the imp for roughly the same reasons. The added caveat is that V is also disintegrating the imp because she simply finds it to be that annoying and is quite willing to at least threaten others for merely interrupting her studies. V simply sees no reason to pull the punches after somebody has established themselves as a threat.

An evil character could still disintegrate the imp. Just because they're both evil doesn't mean that they're on the same team. Given the opportunity, one would harm the other in order to come out ahead, unless given sufficient incentive not to. The imp has really provided this incentive since the evil wizard really isn't interested in being thrall to demonic overlords, much less do favors for a sniveling backbiting weakling.

Keep in mind that V is ostensibly doing this because V feels she has failed in her proper duties to her chosen allies and is willing to destroy everyone who gets in the way of that perceived duty.

On this basis, I'd simply rate V as neutral. V protects friends and looks after her own self-interest. Beyond that, she feels very little obligation to anybody else (e.g. the dirt farmers, the Azure City citizens and its due process of law, etc.). I have little doubt that V would simply murder Belkar, if it weren't for the fact that Belkar is actually useful to her and is generally a "contained" threat.

[Optimystik]

Thank you magic9mushroom, that is precisely what I was getting at.

On to Lurker's comments.


A good wizard, a neutral wizard and an evil wizard all decide to disintegrate an imp during different and unrelated instances.

I can see a good wizard disintegrating Qarr, simply because it is a prudent thing to do. The imp is self-serving and he more than suspects that it doesn't really have his or anybody else's best interests in mind. This wizard may pull punches once he feels he has impressed upon Qarr that he has no interest in doing business, although I wouldn't count on it. This imp is a unrepentantly criminal creature based on its previous actions (backing a would-be tyrant and suggesting virgin's blood as a spell component).

For Good characters, killing is a last resort after other options have been exhausted. A Good wizard could easily (and would likely) Dismiss Qarr. In fact, had V been wiser and done this, all of his 6th and 7th level slots would be intact. In fact, all he would have had to do was let Qarr's teleport succeed!


Then you have V, trying to disintegrate the imp for roughly the same reasons. The added caveat is that V is also disintegrating the imp because she simply finds it to be that annoying and is quite willing to at least threaten others for merely interrupting her studies. V simply sees no reason to pull the punches after somebody has established themselves as a threat.

But after they cease to be a threat, he has every reason to pull his punches. "Quit it! Look, I'm sorry I said anything! Stop shooting me and I'll just fly away, okay?" Had any character but a Fiend been saying this, even an evil human, we'd be writing V off as Evil right this second. When the only mitigating factor is the creature type of his target, there's just no way his bloodthirstiness can be Good.

[magic9mushroom]

Well, I've always had a way with words...

And another unrelated proof that V isn't Good - Suggesting Soul Binding Nale. This act is actually specifically noted as Evil in the Book of Vile Darkness.

I quote:

"While harming one’s enemies physically is not inherently villainous, harming their souls is always evil. Only the foulest of villains could actually want to cause pain to another creature’s eternal aspect. Creatures without corrupt hearts simply dispatch their foes quickly, believing that sending a villain off to the justice of the afterlife is punishment enough. But evil beings like to capture foes and torture them to death, and some even prefer to torture the souls of their foes, never granting them the release of death. Worse still, some evil beings use their foul magic to destroy an opponent’s soul, ending his or her existence altogether."

V isn't Good and hasn't been since pre-timeskip, but doesn't seem Evil yet. She probably is Chaotic Neutral.

[LurkerInPlayground]

Well, I've always had a way with words...

And another unrelated proof that V isn't Good - Suggesting Soul Binding Nale. This act is actually specifically noted as Evil in the Book of Vile Darkness.

I quote:

"While harming one’s enemies physically is not inherently villainous, harming their souls is always evil. Only the foulest of villains could actually want to cause pain to another creature’s eternal aspect. Creatures without corrupt hearts simply dispatch their foes quickly, believing that sending a villain off to the justice of the afterlife is punishment enough. But evil beings like to capture foes and torture them to death, and some even prefer to torture the souls of their foes, never granting them the release of death. Worse still, some evil beings use their foul magic to destroy an opponent’s soul, ending his or her existence altogether."

V isn't Good and hasn't been since pre-timeskip, but doesn't seem Evil yet. She probably is Chaotic Neutral.
I most emphatically do not agree with this. I don't much care what Core says about the Soul Binding spell either.

V isn't interested in torturing souls, merely imprisoning the soul of a villain to prevent him from harassing the party again.

Soul Binding is only a little worse than life imprisonment, which is where Nale should be anyway. If nothing else, it is an excellent way to buy time while you figure out what to do with him.

Considering that his afterlife either consists of him being promoted to some infernal creature of some kind, torture and/or forced servitude -- I don't think it all that unreasonable to keep his soul in abeyance in the mortal plane.

[magic9mushroom]

I most emphatically do not agree with this. I don't much care what Core says about the Soul Binding spell either.

V isn't interested in torturing souls, merely imprisoning the soul of a villain to prevent him from harassing the party again.

Soul Binding is only a little worse than life imprisonment, which is where Nale should be anyway. If nothing else, is an excellent way to buy time while you figure out what to do with him.

Considering that his afterlife either consists of him being promoted to some infernal creature of some kind or torture or painful servitude -- I don't think it all that unreasonable to keep his soul in abeyance in the mortal plane.

If you don't care about the rules, then there isn't much I can do to convince you beyond saying... you SHOULD care about the rules.

Also, sensory deprivation can be classed as torture, you know. Torture is bad, mmkay?

[Optimystik]

I most emphatically do not agree with this. I don't much care what Core says about the Soul Binding spell either.

V isn't interested in torturing souls, merely imprisoning the soul of a villain to prevent him from harassing the party again.

I'm as fond of arguing with BoVD as the next guy, but on this it makes perfect sense. Messing with someone's soul can only be an evil act, unless the subject is irredeemably evil, which is not a judgment Vaarsuvius is qualified to make.


Even then, this might be arguably to preferable to an afterlife in eternal flames and torture (barring any sort of "promotion"). And even then Soul Binding is only a little worse than life imprisonment, which is where Nale should be anyway. If nothing else, is an excellent way to buy time while you figure out what to do with him.

Trapping a soul is hardly the same as locking someone in a cell. Firstly, there's the tiny detail of having to murder Nale without due process. Second, you have no idea how much worse Soul Binding is than anything. I'm inclined to believe it's absolute torture for a freed soul to be barred from leaving the Material Plane - even discounting BoVD's description, souls that are forced to linger here past their time rarely enjoy it. It might even be every bit as bad as Hell.

And even if you want to toss all that out the window, V himself said that killing them all and binding them would represent "the halfling's viewpoint." Clearly V knew it was evil and didn't care. Haley also defined it as evil.

[David Argall]

Can we have a page # where BVD or other book discusses Soul Bind?

[Optimystik]

I don't have BoVD myself, but Googling portions of m9m's quote led me to sites that posted excerpts from it. Seems authentic, if of questionable legality. :smalltongue:

[LurkerInPlayground]

I'm as fond of arguing with BoVD as the next guy, but on this it makes perfect sense. Messing with someone's soul can only be an evil act, unless the subject is irredeemably evil, which is not a judgment Vaarsuvius is qualified to make.
This is really just an unqualified assumption. Why shouldn't V be able to judge this? Many members of the Order of the Stick most certainly would have killed Nale without "due process."

By why right does one individual have any right to judge the outcome or course of another individual's life in any of their myriad lives? And what difference does it make a person's powers can extend their influence into a person's potential future lives instead of merely influencing their immediate future?

As far as I can tell none.

Lacking any better evidence, I can't see why V isn't qualified. Nale already repeatedly demonstrated that he is simply an unrepentant card-carrying villain. He is also an established long-term threat.


Trapping a soul is hardly the same as locking someone in a cell. Firstly, there's the tiny detail of having to murder Nale without due process. Second, you have no idea how much worse Soul Binding is than anything. I'm inclined to believe it's absolute torture for a freed soul to be barred from leaving the Material Plane - even discounting BoVD's description, souls that are forced to linger here past their time rarely enjoy it. It might even be every bit as bad as Hell.
Again, that's an unqualified assertion. Maybe it's not so bad. Maybe it's horrible. The spell description certainly makes no mention of what happens and neither does OotS.

Imprisonment, soul or otherwise, isn't something I'd consider inherently evil. Mundane imprisonment can be pretty horrible, particularly if the warden is particularly negligent or sadistic, but that alone doesn't make imprisonment an evil institution or practice.

So as far as I'm concerned, they're roughly equivalent. They're both devices intended to rob the prisoner of their freedom. Either I deprive you of precious time in your mortal life or I deprive you of a small piece of your eternity. If the Soul Binding just so happens to be less painful, good for you. Any further claims that one method is eviler than the other is going to take some backing-up.

Whether Nale's soul is remitted to an unpleasant magical gemstone limbo or a hellish afterlife makes little difference to me and apparently makes little difference to V. Nale knew the consequences of making enemies like V and probably knew more than a little bit of theology concerning his future afterlife.

In my eyes, this is a "live by the sword, die by the sword" situation. Except that the swords in question are powerful supernatural forces. Nale deserves no special dispensation because he has decided to risk both fates. The gloves come off once Nale decides it's alright to cause that much pain and anguish to others.

The BoVD entry above only makes reference to willfully and unnecessarily torturing a person, which I would most certainly qualify as "evil." However, this simply isn't the case here, since V is not suggesting Soul Binding for its own sake.


And even if you want to toss all that out the window, V himself said that killing them all and binding them would represent "the halfling's viewpoint." Clearly V knew it was evil and didn't care. Haley also defined it as evil.
I agree with you in that V is obviously covering his ass. But that's not the same thing as an admission of moral fault or guilt. All it tells is that V doesn't think it's particularly wrong. The other members do. Whether it's actually evil or not is a separate issue.

We both know Belkar would more likely slaughter and/or torture Nale if he had his way. So it's fairly misleading say that it's evil because Belkar would suggest it.

[Optimystik]

This is really just an unqualified assumption. Why shouldn't V be able to judge this? Many members of the Order of the Stick most certainly would have killed Nale without "due process."

While he's tied up and helpless? I can only think of one member of the Order who would kill Nale in that situation, and V was even on the fence enough to consider that person's viewpoint valid.


By why right does one individual have any right to judge the outcome or course of another individual's life in any of their myriad lives? And what difference does it make if my powers can extend my influence into their potential future lives instead of merely influencing their immediate future?

Individuals DON'T have that right, which was precisely my point. Only a society-based institution (i.e. a court) could properly decide whether Nale was worth the trouble of trying to rehabilitate; that or a deity.


As far as I can tell none. Lacking any better evidence, I can't see why V isn't qualified. Nale already repeatedly demonstrated that he is simply an unrepentant villain, to the point of being a card-carrying villain. He is also an established long-term threat.

A threat that had been neutralized. We're right back to the Was-It-Okay-To-Vaporize-Kubota argument again. You don't just get to kill people because they may inconvenience you in the future - that's not self-defense, that's preemptive murder.


Again, that's an unqualified assertion. Maybe it's not so bad. Maybe it's horrible. The spell description certainly makes no mention of what happens and neither does OotS.

True, we don't know. But I provided reasoning as to why it would be horrible which you have yet to refute - souls trapped on our plane by other means are never enjoying it, so there's no reason to think SB would be any less painful for them.


Whether Nale's soul is remitted to an unpleasant magical gemstone limbo or a hellish afterlife makes little difference to me and apparently makes little difference to V. Nale knew the consequences of making enemies like V and probably knew more than a little bit of theology concerning his future afterlife.

In my eyes, this is a "live by the sword, die by the sword" situation. Except that the swords in question are powerful supernatural forces. Nale deserves no special dispensation because he has decided to risk both fates. The gloves come off once Nale decides it's alright to cause that much pain and anguish to others.

Please understand that if it were up to me I'd have probably slit all their throats and called it a day. All I'm saying is that dispensing of them in that fashion wouldn't be a good act. Binding their souls on top of it is not only unnecessary, it's clearly evil. That passage from BoVD is not only irrefutable, it makes sense.


I agree with you in that V is obviously covering his ass. But that's not the same thing as an admission of moral fault or guilt. It's simply his way of avoiding controversy by passing the blame.

We both know Belkar would more likely slaughter and/or torture Nale if he had his way. So it's not a very convincing excuse.

He wasn't merely using Belkar's POV as a shield - he actively agreed with the way their psychotic teammate would have handled this situation.

In fact, his later method of dealing with Kubota seems to have stemmed directly from his consideration of the "halfling's viewpoint," at least to my eyes.

[LurkerInPlayground]

While he's tied up and helpless? I can only think of one member of the Order who would kill Nale in that situation, and V was even on the fence enough to consider that person's viewpoint valid.
Fair enough. I forget certain plot points like him being tied-up, although I remember the issue being Nale is quite good at escaping his due punishments.


Individuals DON'T have that right, which was precisely my point. Only a society-based institution (i.e. a court) could properly decide whether Nale was worth the trouble of trying to rehabilitate; that or a deity.
The deity part just sounds like an appeal to authority. The deity in question is probably some sort of infernal lord that would preside over Nale's soul. So you'd have a hard time convincing me that this particular patron has any more right than V would. The difference being that the latter doesn't particularly care for earning Nale's soul as a vassal.

If the Order of the Stick were the only available authority, then the responsibility kind of falls to Roy et. al. Seeing as how V more or less ceded to their wishes, the point is moot. He discharged his responsibility to an immediate authority.

Which shows the way V thinks. He's perfectly fine letting other authorities solve problems for him, until those authorities have been proven incapable or incompetent.


A threat that had been neutralized. We're right back to the Was-It-Okay-To-Vaporize-Kubota argument again. You don't just get to kill people because they may inconvenience you in the future - that's not self-defense, that's preemptive murder.
I have exactly zero problems calling it murder. But Kubota is utterly tangential to the point I'm trying to make about Soul Binding.


True, we don't know. But I provided reasoning as to why it would be horrible which you have yet to refute - souls trapped on our plane by other means are never enjoying it, so there's no reason to think SB would be any less painful for them.
But I just established that it isn't inherently evil. Imprisonment in a mundane "meat-space" cell could be more painful for a prospective prisoner. But this can be considered legitimate and good. It can also be considered evil when mismanaged.

It seems to me the burden is on you to prove that there is enough of a difference to warrant condemnation of it as an inherent evil.


Please understand that if it were up to me I'd have probably slit all their throats and called it a day. All I'm saying is that dispensing of them in that fashion wouldn't be a good act. Binding their souls on top of it is not only unnecessary, it's clearly evil. That passage from BoVD is not only irrefutable, it makes sense.
Yes, except my point is that merely imprisoning somebody, their soul or body, isn't the same thing as willfully torturing somebody. So the passage is tangental at best.

You raise a fair point about the murder -- traumatizing as it is. But it seems like that makes the murder-of-prisoners part is evil, not necessarily the Soul Binding part.

Haley is indulging the question all the same, but seems to object more to the Soul Binding than to the actual execution.

I would personally see little harm in imprisoning the soul if taking a particularly malicious enemy prisoner was not an option and I had reason to suspect that they could cheat death using resurrection/raise dead. D&D adventurer's run into this kind of situation a lot.

Seems to me they were planning what they might hypothetically do given that eventuality. Not unlikely given who Nale is.


He wasn't merely using Belkar's POV as a shield - he actively agreed with the way their psychotic teammate would have handled this situation.

In fact, his later method of dealing with Kubota seems to have stemmed directly from his consideration of the "halfling's viewpoint," at least to my eyes.
V is referring to the idea that Belkar would suggest a summary execution. V suggests the Soul Binding only after Haley points out a particular flaw in this plan and doesn't really suggest that Belkar would bring it up.

However, I don't find it particularly pertinent to the discussion.

[Optimystik]

The deity part just sounds like an appeal to authority. The deity in question is probably some sort of infernal lord that would preside over Nale's soul. So you'd have a hard time convincing me that this particular patron has any more right than V would. The difference being that the latter doesn't particularly care for earning Nale's soul as a vassal.

In a world with such clearly visible deities and afterlife, judgment by those entities is valid. Otherwise, what gave the deva the right to evaluate Roy?

But even if you deny the legitimacy of a deity's decision on Nale's redeemability, that still leaves the judgment of a court, which point I noticed you didn't refute.


I have exactly zero problems calling it murder. Since I really consider sanctioned killing as only a little better than murder anyway. Maybe it's desirable to sanction killing using courts etcetera to maintain a certain harmony and continuity of affairs.

Which, putting it bluntly, didn't really exist as far as the Azurites were concerned. One could argue that it was no longer a legitimate court. At which point, things kind of get tossed into the air.

I don't particularly contest the fact that he took things into his own hands. Although I do have a problem with him not knowing the exacting details of the situation, which seems uncharacteristic for somebody who prides himself on solving problems intelligently.

It would have been a lawful trial by his peers using the applicable strictures of Azure City and its Sapphire Guard. The fact that Kubota's fate would have been decided on a boat instead of in a marble building is purely cosmetic.

My point remains that V had as little authority to override that due process as he did Nale's. The difference is that in Nale's case he limited his objections to speech and did not act upon them.


Yes, but I just established that it isn't inherently evil. Imprisonment in a mundane "meat-space" cell could be more painful for a prospective prisoner. But this can be considered legitimate and good. It can also be considered evil when mismanaged.

It seems to me the burden is on you to prove that there is enough of a difference to warrant condemnation of it as an inherent evil.

Actually, all I have to prove is that trapping a soul constitutes torture. The passage from BoVD automatically makes it evil at that point. I have provided evidence that it does based on the only analogues we have; undead spirits. Now the onus is on you to prove that my analogy is flawed.


Yes, except my point is that merely imprisoning somebody, their soul or body, isn't the same thing as willfully torturing somebody. So the passage is tangental at best.

Yet all that is necessary to make an undead spirit feel torment is to prevent its soul from passing on against its will - this is present in countless literary examples, including D&D novels. No other willful harm is necessary after that to constitute torture, and the passage applies.


You raise a fair point about the murder -- traumatizing as it is. But it seems like that makes the murder part evil, not the Soul Binding part.

I would personally see little harm in imprisoning the soul if taking a particularly malicious enemy prisoner was not an option. D&D adventurer's run into this kind of situation a lot.

I agree, if there is no other option then a Soul Bind becomes the responsible thing to do. (One wonders how V was going to obtain a 9th level spell, however.) However, just as with killing Nale in the first place, other avenues must be exhausted first for the act to remain non-evil.


Kind of half-baked if you ask me and certainly nothing I'd go out on a limb to make conclusions on.

Belkar might agree to it simply to cause pain with the actual utility being the cherry on top. V mostly is broaching it for the sake of utility. He's simply misrepresenting his reasons for mentioning it in the first place, but his intentions would be significantly different from Belkar's.

So again, I don't find it particularly pertinent to the discussion.

Fair enough, but in that case his motives in presenting it as someone else's viewpoint are largely irrelevant if it is truly the stance V himself would have taken. That means the moral ramifications are V's to deal with, both for the murder and the binding, however much utility is garnered thereby.

EDIT: Haley suffered a touch of Plot Stupidity at that point (how would Nale find a 17th-level cleric to raise him while being dead? Never mind one that would resurrect his Outsider girlfriend and hench-orc also) but her attitude concerning the Binding is still valid. She reacted to the idea of binding someone's soul as anyone reasonable would - with revulsion.

[LurkerInPlayground]

Scroll up. See some of my revisions.

Kubota is kind of a tangent you threw into the point I was trying to make and I'll concede the whole murder thing. I was more interested in abstractions involved in the morality of chaining a "soul."


Actually, all I have to prove is that trapping a soul constitutes torture. The passage from BoVD automatically makes it evil at that point. I have provided evidence that it does based on the only analogues we have; undead spirits. Now the onus is on you to prove that my analogy is flawed.
No it isn't. You're the one making the claim that it constitutes or involves pain. I'm merely stating that, lacking any better evidence, I'm not calling it evil.

D&D morality simply sucks and what some splatbook suggests according to some sort of made-up theology and with a pseudo-philosophical framework really has no bearing on a setting that Rich Burlew pretty much made-up.

If his world *did* exist, how would we judge this action. I simply say that I don't know. You say that it's unequivocally wrong according to some special suprenatural knowledge that you don't actually have.


Yet all that is necessary to make an undead spirit feel torment is to prevent its soul from passing on against its will - this is present in countless literary examples, including D&D novels. No other willful harm is necessary after that to constitute torture, and the passage applies.
And then you'd have to establish why this was even applicable to the prior situation in the first place. We're not making undead. We're performing imprisonment. Maybe they're related, but since neither of us are fictional wizards in Rich Burlew's setting, neither of us can prove it. I'm merely in this for the thought experiment.

You however, are willing to make moral proclamations based on unsubstantiated claims. So no, the onus is on you.

[Optimystik]

Scroll up. See some of my revisions.

Kubota is kind of a tangent you threw into the point I was trying to make and I'll concede the whole murder thing. I was more interested in abstractions involved in the morality of chaining a "soul."

I'll reiterate - I have provided a useful analogue to a Bound Soul in the form of restless undead spirits. These souls are clearly prevented from passing on from our plane, and experience considerable torment as a result of being trapped. I deduce therefore that trapping a dead person's soul on this plane is an excruciating experience and thus satisfies the "torture the soul" clause in the BoVD.

To reinforce my point, I'll requote part of the paragraph that magic9mushroom posted earlier:


But evil beings like to capture foes and torture them to death, and some even prefer to torture the souls of their foes, never granting them the release of death.

The passage implies that preventing a soul from finding the release of death is part of the "torture." Since that is exactly what Soul Bind does, it must therefore be torture.

Your rebuttal?

[LurkerInPlayground]

I'll reiterate - I have provided a useful analogue to a Bound Soul in the form of restless undead spirits. These souls are clearly prevented from passing on from our plane, and experience considerable torment as a result of being trapped. I deduce therefore that trapping a dead person's soul on this plane is an excruciating experience and thus satisfies the "torture the soul" clause in the BoVD.
And this is significantly different from depriving them of their more mundane mortal freedoms how? Again, you need qualify why this particular trauma is worse. That is, why is it cruel and unusual?


To reinforce my point, I'll requote part of the paragraph that magic9mushroom posted earlier:



The passage implies that preventing a soul from finding the release of death is part of the "torture." Since that is exactly what Soul Bind does, it must therefore be torture.

Your rebuttal?
So your only point is the splatbook says so?

If I put a prisoner in his cell and he suffers because he was cut off from a potential future he might have had in normal society, the reason I put him in there was exclusively to torture him? You have to admit that's a pretty weak argument.

Think it through a little bit. If I were a wizard, you're assuming that I'd want to imprison a soul indefinitely. And secondly, you're assuming that I'd be around long enough for it to matter or that I would make no long-term arrangements.

Even a very long time in a gemstone is still a finite time. I fail to see how that's significantly worse as a punishment than an afterlife of practically forever.

I would very much be interested in finding out if their natural lifespans lapse in the time that they're "imprisoned." If so, I can very conveniently wait for their time in the mortal plane to lapse or wait until they are too old to be really connected with their former allies or be of any personal real threat, assuming that the situation warranted it.

I'm not interested in infinite punishments for finite crimes. And really, the kinds of enemies I'd imprison with such powerful and difficult tools really aren't ones I'd be interested in "teaching a lesson." They'd practically have to be the adventurer's equivalent of war criminals.

[magic9mushroom]

Soul Binding is sensory deprivation, which for long periods is considered torture by most RL governments. It is in RL used as an interrogation technique. Vaarsuvius' suggested course of action implied giving Nale an eternity of that. Eternity, not a finite time, because it has to be destroyed for him to get out again. Souls don't age, and True Rez restores the body at time-of-death. And who is going to break the gem, seriously?

BTW, you can't really argue that something outright stated to be torture in canon isn't torture, which is what you're apparently attempting to do.

Beyond that, Soul Binding's considered Evil in its own right because you're messing with the natural order of things.

Soul Binding Nale is most definitely an evil act. It doesn't make a character automatically Evil, though, just like anything else.

I'll concur that were it my decision, I'd Soul Bind him, and then use his soul to make a magical item, erasing him from existence forever, but I'm not Good.

[Forealms]

Qarr is practically begging him for mercy, has made no attempts to defend himself by attacking or fending off V, and even offers to leave. Yet V not only continues his assault, he continues to use lethal force.

The sole mitigating factor in our wizard's defense is that Qarr is a fiend. But if OotS (and SoD in particular) has taught us anything, it's that needless violence based solely on a monster manual entry does not a Good act make.

I think Qarr is not attacking for the same reasons I would not, which is a couple of reasons:

1. V is WAY stronger than him. If he attacked V, he would have no chance of dealing with V in the future (and would probably be dead as a result).
2. If he is rejected now, he can at least wait until V has a change of heart, or needs some extra firepower (as is the case at the moment). Again, if he attacked, V would never trust him.

Apart from that, this seems mostly correct.

[Optimystik]

And this is significantly different from depriving them of their more mundane mortal freedoms how? Again, you need qualify why this particular trauma is worse. That is, why is it cruel and unusual?

Because it is a direct interference with their immortal soul. No matter how much physical pain a mortal has endured throughout his life, none is likely to have any experience with pain of the soul. There is no way to desensitize oneself to that kind of attack - even the most hardened warrior would have no way to prepare.

Again I point to shackled and bound spirits as an example. They long to leave; they beg for release; and within a given time frame, they invariably go mad and begin lashing out at every living creature that happens upon them. Ghosts, Spectres, Wraiths - all products of powerful necromancy, just like Soul Bind itself.


So your only point is the splatbook says so?

If it didn't make sense, I wouldn't be quoting it. I just can't see how cutting off a dead person's soul from the afterlife can be anything but harmful and evil, no matter what is waiting for it. It's almost certainly an egregious violation of the natural order.


If I put a prisoner in his cell and he suffers because he was cut off from a potential future he might have had in normal society, the reason I put him in there was exclusively to torture him? You have to admit that's a pretty weak argument.

The reason you put him in there is irrelevant if you lack the authority to do so, which V does. Inflicting suffering is torture, and torture is evil.


Think it through a little bit. If I were a wizard, you're assuming that I'd want to imprison a soul indefinitely. And secondly, you're assuming that I'd be around long enough for it to matter or that I would make no long-term arrangements.

Even a very long time in a gemstone is still a finite time. I fail to see how that's significantly worse as a punishment than an afterlife of practically forever.

Strawman. Whether soul bind is "significantly worse" than hell or not is irrelevant. If I lock someone in a box, even if that is less painful to that person that putting thumbscrews on them, both still qualify as torture.


I would very much be interested in finding out if their natural lifespans lapse in the time that they're "imprisoned." If so, I can very conveniently wait for their time in the mortal plane to lapse or wait until they are too old to be really connected with their former allies or be of any personal real threat, assuming that the situation warranted it.

Time spent dead doesn't count against your lifespan, and you have to be dead before your soul can be bound. Only the condition of Nale's remains would be a factor.


I'm not interested in infinite punishments for finite crimes. And really, the kinds of enemies I'd imprison with such powerful and difficult tools really aren't ones I'd be interested in "teaching a lesson." They'd practically have to be the adventurer's equivalent of war criminals.

Unfortunately for you, there is no Geneva Convention in BoVD. Besides, what exactly would give you, or V, the right to pass that kind of sentence on anyone?

[hamishspence]

SoD showed that beings inside a gem for Soul Bind aren't in "stasis" they can still think.

on Geneva: BoED seems heavily inspired by it- granting surrenders if asked, no poison, disease, etc, no torture.

on putting serious baddies out of action without killing or resorting to evil spell: the City of Union in Epic Handbook prescribes Temporal stasis as penalty. Like Soul bind, but without the messing with souls, or perception of time passing. very handy.

[Optimystik]

SoD showed that beings inside a gem for Soul Bind aren't in "stasis" they can still think.

So they are aware of time passing, if nothing else. Thanks hamish.

Insanity is the inevitable, if gradual, result. Torture, evil.


on putting serious baddies out of action without killing or resorting to evil spell: the City of Union in Epic Handbook prescribes Temporal stasis as penalty. Like Soul bind, but without the messing with souls, or perception of time passing. very handy.

See, if V had suggested something like that - or the non-epic equivalent, turning Nale to stone - I wouldn't have minded.

[hamishspence]

that may be why the spell has the Evil subtype.

the spell itself isn't epic but still a bit out of V's reach at the time: 8th level. Maybe Shojo's wizard could have cast it once he'd been resurrected.

[Optimystik]

that may be why the spell has the Evil subtype.

the spell itself isn't epic but still a bit out of V's reach at the time: 8th level. Maybe Shojo's wizard could have cast it once he'd been resurrected.

Eh? Which spell are you referring to? I was talking about Soul Bind (9th level) and Flesh to Stone (6th level).

By the way David, the page number in question for BoVD is 8.

[LurkerInPlayground]

Because it is a direct interference with their immortal soul. No matter how much physical pain a mortal has endured throughout his life, none is likely to have any experience with pain of the soul. There is no way to desensitize oneself to that kind of attack - even the most hardened warrior would have no way to prepare.
Pretty much everything here is an unverified claim, since you can't define what *exactly* a soul is to me or what relationship that has to do with their physical conditioning, much less tell me that "sensitization" is impossible.


Again I point to shackled and bound spirits as an example. They long to leave; they beg for release; and within a given time frame, they invariably go mad and begin lashing out at every living creature that happens upon them. Ghosts, Spectres, Wraiths - all products of powerful necromancy, just like Soul Bind itself.
And again, I point out that I don’t find this to be particularly admissible. I know what you are trying to say, so re-asserting this isn’t going to change my mind. You’re not going to convince me this method is particularly evil simply because of its association to things that are reputedly bad-horrible.

At the risk of repeating myself, of course the prisoners want to leave. The thing is that this prisoner isn’t harmful to others in their current state and frankly because I don’t acknowledge the prisoner to have any right to a choice in the matter.

I wouldn’t derive pleasure from doing this, merely because the idea of Soul Binding a “high-level” character with potentially powerful allies (mortal or otherwise) sounds like a major hassle. But if it needs doing, I’d do it.

On an utter tangent, there are plenty course of literary tropes about undead that want to stay in the mortal realm as opposed to leaving. So you have yet to define or relate “undead” to this particular example. In my mind, it’s not something you could ever prove to me.


If it didn't make sense, I wouldn't be quoting it. I just can't see how cutting off a dead person's soul from the afterlife can be anything but harmful and evil, no matter what is waiting for it. It's almost certainly an egregious violation of the natural order.
I can understand what you value, but I certainly don’t agree with you. I think you are letting your accultured biases get in the way of making a judgment based on rational criteria.

My personal bias is that I make no distinction between possessing the intent to kill someone or the intent to destroy their soul. They are one in the same to me. Imprisoning a body or a soul likewise bears a similar status. And the distinction is somewhat nonsensical to me. Chaining a person’s body achieves relatively the same effect as shackling their spirit.

Frankly, D&D cosmologies don’t have afterlives that I consider to be any more legitimate and moral than mortal agencies in the here-and-now. It grants infinite reward or punishment based of finite deeds. And it’s no even always that: sometimes it’s just mere exploitation or just stuff that happens to you with no apparent agency involved.

Even then, souls are sometimes far from “immortal” since, depending on your setting, you can have creatures that can ultimately destroy souls (e.g. The Chaos Hound, The Wall of the Faithless, “consumption” in the Blood War, Rich Burlew’s Snarl). But that’s a separate a whole different bag of nasty knick-knacks I don’t want get into detailing here.



The reason you put him in there is irrelevant if you lack the authority to do so, which V does. Inflicting suffering is torture, and torture is evil.
I guess you’re lawful then?

I don’t hold authority to be sacred on its own. It actually has to have merit or applicability, which isn't always the case.

The early roots of D&D actually make adventurers to be scoundrels out to make their fortune. They’re the fringe of society that can often be surrounded by authorities too distant or corrupt to be of any real meaning.

In other words, adventurer’s often fall under Wild West tropes. Even in the real world, authority only has as much meaning as people give it. That’s why national jurisdictions break down once you are distant enough from a country’s power center. (And even the idea of a nation-state that serves the idea of justice is a relatively new invention.)

Am I saying that might makes right? Yes. I’m not saying that’s how it ought to be.

I’m saying that if I were a sufficiently powerful wizard, then at this point, yes, I’m already the kind of person who takes it upon himself to do these things. There might not be anybody who has any right to claim jurisdiction of some cloistered villain that I happened to have slain well outside of any civilized provision. In which case, the adventuring part is effectively the highest jurisdiction there is for the moment.

I might systemize and popularize it as a legitimate punishment. I might do it on my own. I may do it maliciously. In my mind, managing power is really more a question of ethics.


Strawman. Whether soul bind is "significantly worse" than hell or not is irrelevant. If I lock someone in a box, even if that is less painful to that person that putting thumbscrews on them, both still qualify as torture.
Yet we imprison people and deprive significant of significant portions of their life. This causes pain.

I’m not talking about merely how bad the pain is. I’m talking about whether it is deemed unnecessary or excessive for a given a situation.

Again, to beat on the dead horse, I do not necessarily respect or value the afterlife’s jurisdiction. Just because they’re god-like figures and agencies doesn’t mean that I think they are worthy of my admiration or respect. Nevermind, whether I think they’re legitimate custodians or not.

Effectively, this means that I don’t really give a damn about whether some devil thinks he has authority or not. That devil can threaten and bully me, but I certainly don’t think he’s legitimate and I certainly don’t acknowledge his station.


Time spent dead doesn't count against your lifespan, and you have to be dead before your soul can be bound. Only the condition of Nale's remains would be a factor.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/soulBind.htm
I don’t see anything here that says anything to that effect.



Unfortunately for you, there is no Geneva Convention in BoVD. Besides, what exactly would give you, or V, the right to pass that kind of sentence on anyone?
What would give an adventurer the right to jam a sword into his throat? Or fry him with lightning? Both cause distress, trauma and physical harm. Both can potentially rob him of his immediate future and deprive him of his autonomy.

If you can think a situation where either example is justified, then your objection to Soul Bind is a case of special pleading. If it were legitimate to kill Nale under specific circumstances (i.e. not killing prisoners who have surrendered), then it could be legitimate to want to prevent his resurrection, even if only as a temporary measure.

But as I expressed earlier, if I felt said enemy were a substantial threat, I would imprison them for the course of their natural lives, if possible. As far as I’m concerned, they no longer have any say in the matter.

If some higher authority would like to take custodianship, they’re certainly welcome to negotiate for his release (although I question what kind of authority might even want to do so if a high-leveled wizard is taking the fall for them).

Or maybe I’ll just flip the bird and tell them to mind their own business.

[GoC]

Actually, all I have to prove is that trapping a soul constitutes torture. The passage from BoVD automatically makes it evil at that point. I have provided evidence that it does based on the only analogues we have; undead spirits. Now the onus is on you to prove that my analogy is flawed.
I call BoVD non-core and therefore non-canon in this setting until we're sure Rich uses it.


I agree, if there is no other option then a Soul Bind becomes the responsible thing to do. (One wonders how V was going to obtain a 9th level spell, however.) However, just as with killing Nale in the first place, other avenues must be exhausted first for the act to remain non-evil.
Doing that last time led to the deaths of hundreds. Nale is a known and unrepentant murderer. Any chaotic person can execute him based on his own concience.


EDIT: Haley suffered a touch of Plot Stupidity at that point (how would Nale find a 17th-level cleric to raise him while being dead? Never mind one that would resurrect his Outsider girlfriend and hench-orc also) but her attitude concerning the Binding is still valid. She reacted to the idea of binding someone's soul as anyone reasonable would - with revulsion.
The infernals can just plane-shift them back.

EDIT: Accursed data backups!

[Optimystik]

I call BoVD non-core and therefore non-canon in this setting until we're sure Rich uses it.

He did. (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0431.html)


Doing that last time led to the deaths of hundreds. Nale is a known and unrepentant murderer. Any chaotic person can execute him based on his own concience.

Executing him while he's tied up and helpless is not a Good act.


The infernals can just plane-shift them back.

Why would they? If they're willing to go to all that trouble we could just as well say they'd send someone to destone them, break the crystal their souls are bound in, etc.

[Optimystik]

Pretty much everything here is an unverified claim, since you can't define what *exactly* a soul is to me or what relationship that has to do with their physical conditioning, much less tell me that "sensitization" is impossible.

Nobody can define "exactly" what a soul is. That's what analogies are for.
You have yet to refute mine.


And again, I point out that I don’t find this to be particularly admissible. I know what you are trying to say, so re-asserting this isn’t going to change my mind. You’re not going to convince me this method is particularly evil simply because of its association to things that are reputedly bad-horrible.

Clearly I'm not, but your refusal to acknowledge BoVD really isn't my problem.


At the risk of repeating myself, of course the prisoners want to leave. The thing is that this prisoner isn’t harmful to others in their current state and frankly because I don’t acknowledge the prisoner to have any right to a choice in the matter.

What you consider to be the prisoner's rights or choices are irrelevant if you have no authority to make that determination.


I wouldn’t derive pleasure from doing this, merely because the idea of Soul Binding a “high-level” character with potentially powerful allies (mortal or otherwise) sounds like a major hassle. But if it needs doing, I’d do it.

As would I - if there were no other options. There were.


On an utter tangent, there are plenty course of literary tropes about undead that want to stay in the mortal realm as opposed to leaving. So you have yet to define or relate “undead” to this particular example. In my mind, it’s not something you could ever prove to me.

None of those were bound against their will by powerful necromancy. They accept being undead, either because they're twisted and what to harm the living, or because they have some kind of long-term duty that extends past their lifespan. (Baelnorns, Soon, etc.) But in all of those examples, being undead is a conscious choice, not the result of being bound anywhere.


I can understand what you value, but I certainly don’t agree with you. I think you are letting your accultured biases get in the way of making a judgment based on rational criteria.

This isn't just about my personal values. Both V and Haley consider Soul Bind to be evil as well, a point you have neither addressed nor refuted.


My personal bias is that I make no distinction between possessing the intent to kill someone or the intent to destroy their soul. They are one in the same to me. Imprisoning a body or a soul likewise bears a similar status. And the distinction is somewhat nonsensical to me. Chaining a person’s body achieves relatively the same effect as shackling their spirit.

With one important distinction: death is a release for the person whose *body* is chained. BoVD specifically mentions barring the release of death as being evil.

There's also the tiny point that only one of your examples requires 9th-level necromancy to effect.


Frankly, D&D cosmologies don’t have afterlives that I consider to be any more legitimate and moral than mortal agencies in the here-and-now. It grants infinite reward or punishment based of finite deeds. And it’s no even always that: sometimes it’s just mere exploitation or just stuff that happens to you with no apparent agency involved.

Sounds like your argument is with the entire morality system now. That's fine, but until they change it the rules are the rules. Since Rich himself accepts that system (Roy's Archon refers repeatedly to "eternal reward") you have to accept it as part of OotS even if you don't agree with it.


Even then, souls are sometimes far from “immortal” since, depending on your setting, you can have creatures that can ultimately destroy souls (e.g. The Chaos Hound, The Wall of the Faithless, “consumption” in the Blood War, Rich Burlew’s Snarl). But that’s a separate a whole different bag of nasty knick-knacks I don’t want get into detailing here.

"Immortal" does not mean "Invincible." Even gods can die in OotS-land - the Snarl proved that. This strengthens my argument, since anything that can die can also be made to suffer, and therefore can be the subject of both good and evil acts.


I guess you’re lawful then?

I don’t hold authority to be sacred on its own. It actually has to have merit or applicability, which isn't always the case.

The early roots of D&D actually make adventurers to be scoundrels out to make their fortune. They’re the fringe of society that can often be surrounded by authorities too distant or corrupt to be of any real meaning.

In other words, adventurer’s often fall under Wild West tropes. Even in the real world, authority only has as much meaning as people give it. That’s why national jurisdictions break down once you are distant enough from a country’s power center. (And even the idea of a nation-state that serves the idea of justice is a relatively new invention.)

Am I saying that might makes right? Yes. I’m not saying that’s how it ought to be.

I’m saying that if I were a sufficiently powerful wizard, then at this point, yes, I’m already the kind of person who takes it upon himself to do these things. There might not be anybody who has any right to claim jurisdiction of some cloistered villain that I happened to have slain well outside of any civilized provision. In which case, the adventuring part is effectively the highest jurisdiction there is for the moment.

I might systemize and popularize it as a legitimate punishment. I might do it on my own. I may do it maliciously. In my mind, managing power is really more a question of ethics.

Again, you're forgetting that for all their freedoms, adventurers still answer to ultimate authorities. The OotS had to plead their case before the Sapphire Guard; Roy's actions were reviewed by Celestials upon his death; Miko was struck down for being evil AND berated by the founder of her Order.

Obviously V has the power to cause major changes to the world. But that doesn't mean he has the power to escape the consequences of his actions. And keep in mind that even Elan, who can't even be Lawful, was still willing out of goodness to turn his prisoner over to the authorities after he surrendered.


Yet we imprison people and deprive significant of significant portions of their life. This causes pain.

We do that using the authority they've given us through government. By being in Azure City, Nale submitted to that authority and its consequences, and V has no right to supersede it.


I’m not talking about merely how bad the pain is. I’m talking about whether it is deemed unnecessary or excessive for a given a situation.

Again, to beat on the dead horse, I do not necessarily respect or value the afterlife’s jurisdiction. Just because they’re god-like figures and agencies doesn’t mean that I think they are worthy of my admiration or respect. Nevermind, whether I think they’re legitimate custodians or not.

Effectively, this means that I don’t really give a damn about whether some devil thinks he has authority or not. That devil can threaten and bully me, but I certainly don’t think he’s legitimate and I certainly don’t acknowledge his station.

And I reiterate that your personal beliefs are utterly irrelevant. In OotS-land, the heavens call the shots. Everyone, V included (he isn't an atheist, (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0081.html) remember?) has to deal with their inevitable judgment. If you don't like that aspect of the comic, take it up with Rich, not me.


http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/soulBind.htm
I don’t see anything here that says anything to that effect.

So you missed the part about the target having to be dead before the soul could be bound then? All the rules of being dead apply at that point.


What would give an adventurer the right to jam a sword into his throat? Or fry him with lightning? Both cause distress, trauma and physical harm. Both can potentially rob him of his immediate future and deprive him of his autonomy.

If you can think a situation where either example is justified, then your objection to Soul Bind is a case of special pleading. If it were legitimate to kill Nale under specific circumstances (i.e. not killing prisoners who have surrendered), then it could be legitimate to want to prevent his resurrection, even if only as a temporary measure.

There is one "special circumstance" where all of the above are perfectly allowed and not evil. It's called Self-Defense, which doesn't apply once the threat has been neutralized.

Now you could make a case for Nale being a danger to those around him if they didn't kill him, at which point I would mention the antimagic cells and a league of paladins to stand guard.


But as I expressed earlier, if I felt said enemy were a substantial threat, I would imprison them for the course of their natural lives, if possible. As far as I’m concerned, they no longer have any say in the matter.

If some higher authority would like to take custodianship, they’re certainly welcome to negotiate for his release (although I question what kind of authority might even want to do so if a high-leveled wizard is taking the fall for them).

Or maybe I’ll just flip the bird and tell them to mind their own business.

Denying the authorities the right of due process is fine, as long as you're willing to accept the consequences of that act. Clearly V is not, as his actions after killing Kubota can attest to.

[Kaytara]

Executing him while he's tied up and helpless is not a Good act.


If you'll pardon my intrusion...

1) Killing a helpless prisoner may not be a Good act, but allowing him to eventually escape and slaughter hundreds of innocents is even less Good. In a situation like this, one has to choose the lesser evil.
The alternative is, mind you, dooming many people by letting a killer escape because you can't bring yourself to break your principles. He deserves it, but you'd leave him alive solely because while you were fighting for your life against him, you happened to knock him out rather than kill him.

2) In that situation, Nale hadn't even surrendered. He just happened to get knocked out. But isn't that what you're trying to achieve in a fight? Pound on your enemy until you get enough of an opening to kill him?
If killing a villain who has attacked you after your counter-attack knocked him out is evil, then sneak attacking, magically slowing, incapacitating, paralyzing etc. someone is evil too - yet there are countless feats and abilities that rely specifically on that sort of thing without being condemned, and refusing to act on a tactical advantage is generally considered Lawful Stupid.

3) Killing a prisoner who has surrendered... Let's take Kubota as an example.
When a person surrenders, you accept their surrender on the assumption that the person is actually going to stop their hostilities against you. In that case, you really are honour-bound to accept - after all, there's no reason not to.
However, if the person explicitly states that he has submitted to you in name only and is already gloating about how they're going to take advantage of your honour in order to resume their hostilities as soon as they get the chance, playing along is nothing short of idiotic.

The whole 'no killing unarmed prisoners' thing presumably has the purpose of preventing unnecessary bloodshed. If its application will just end up postponing and enabling more of the bloodshed while simultaneously seriously screwing over the guy who is honourable enough to uphold it, you know you're not using it right.
This is where a reference to Malcolm Reynolds and Firefly fits in nicely. Honour, but not stupid honour.

[Optimystik]

To paraphrase Elan (#596):

"Wow Kaytara, you're absolutely right! It's totally cool for us to go around killing people. As long as it makes it more convenient for us, why worry?"

I'll note once more that he is Unlawful.

At this point I'd like to reiterate that I'd be fully in favor of ending Nale's evil permanently if there were no better way to do it. In fact, he'd almost certainly earned death by that point with all of the murders he committed. But killing him out of hand and permanently binding his soul to this plane is nothing short of excessive in a city with anti-magic cells.

Could they have expedited his trial? Absolutely. But he still deserves one, just like every other criminal.

[Zack Norglad]

S/He could be True good evil...
I think he's just going trough a phase (elf puberty?). S/He's probably good, maybe Chaotic Good or Neutral Good, but not evil, for sho.

[hamishspence]

If V were good, then there would be rather more concern for others- the commoners, Lien, etc. Neutral with mild evil leanings makes more sense to me (a scoundrelly hero can be pragmatic without being Evil, but pragmatism can only go so far.)

However, at the moment, I'm willing to give V a certain amount of benefit of the doubt, putting V on the borderline and seeing Neutral or Evil as both plausible at the moment.

[Kaytara]

To paraphrase Elan (#596):

"Wow Kaytara, you're absolutely right! It's totally cool for us to go around killing people. As long as it makes it more convenient for us, why worry?"

I'll note once more that he is Unlawful.

At this point I'd like to reiterate that I'd be fully in favor of ending Nale's evil permanently if there were no better way to do it. In fact, he'd almost certainly earned death by that point with all of the murders he committed. But killing him out of hand and permanently binding his soul to this plane is nothing short of excessive in a city with anti-magic cells.

Could they have expedited his trial? Absolutely. But he still deserves one, just like every other criminal.

The first part of my argument was about prisoners in general, not Nale in this particular situation. You are right in that an Anti-Magic cell is a perfectly applicable option here - after all, nobody could have seen it coming that the city would be lying in ruins in just a few days.

That is why my argument was more of a general nature. For one thing, an anti-magic cell AND a favour that allows you to place a prisoner in it with no questions asked isn't something that's always available. The Order let Nale live the first time and innocents paid for it. They let Nale live a second time and as the result, Nale is apparently off securing a Gate somewhere and could thus end up threatening the whole world.

Furthermore, I am curious why you think that every criminal deserves a trial in a universe where good and evil are objective forces. I assume that you don't just mean the possibility of error, ways to fool magical lie detection, etc., because in theory those are but minor obstacles. So, why? If we have unambiguous proof that Nale is an evil bastard who's killed innocents and deserves death, what exactly makes him worthy of a fair trial?

One more thing. You argued earlier that no single individual has the authority to decide another's fate; that only the courts and the deities do.
What I find odd about that specification is that the court is essentially just a group of individuals. What is so special about their multitude so as to give them that kind of authority? They are still fallible mortals and can make mistakes as a group as easily as they would've done separately. While there are some problems, bias and such, that can be prevented when working as a group, there are other problems that arise only when working as a group.
Deities, too, are individuals, just ones with superior abilities. Some are even ascended mortals. What gives them the right to judge something like this, as opposed to a mortal?

[hamishspence]

the courts are granted their authority by the individuals, who consent to have the system make these descisions on their behalf.

Since revenge is considered borderline evil in BoVD and actually evil in BOED, its best to make the justice as impartial as possible- may not be infallible, but its less likely to become corrupt.

Added to which- who knows a criminal is a criminal and not merely a suspect until they have been tried? Only witnesses to the crime. And could the witnesses be lying? thats why there are courts instead of vigilante punishment.

According to DMG2 and Races of The Wild, even chaotic groups like elves, have courts.

[Optimystik]

The first part of my argument was about prisoners in general, not Nale in this particular situation. You are right in that an Anti-Magic cell is a perfectly applicable option here - after all, nobody could have seen it coming that the city would be lying in ruins in just a few days.

That is why my argument was more of a general nature. For one thing, an anti-magic cell AND a favour that allows you to place a prisoner in it with no questions asked isn't something that's always available. The Order let Nale live the first time and innocents paid for it. They let Nale live a second time and as the result, Nale is apparently off securing a Gate somewhere and could thus end up threatening the whole world.

If it's not available, then they drag Nale to somewhere where it is and kill him if he tries to escape. To do anything else would be the Miko solution.


Furthermore, I am curious why you think that every criminal deserves a trial in a universe where good and evil are objective forces. I assume that you don't just mean the possibility of error, ways to fool magical lie detection, etc., because in theory those are but minor obstacles. So, why? If we have unambiguous proof that Nale is an evil bastard who's killed innocents and deserves death, what exactly makes him worthy of a fair trial?

For the same reason Belkar got a fair trial despite all of his horrible misdeeds; it's the Law. Now you can ignore or take issue with that law if you choose, and certainly a being with V's power could do exactly that, but there are consequences to doing so. The bottom line is that he is not the ruler of Azure City and so cannot pass judgment within its walls.


One more thing. You argued earlier that no single individual has the authority to decide another's fate; that only the courts and the deities do.
What I find odd about that specification is that the court is essentially just a group of individuals. What is so special about their multitude so as to give them that kind of authority? They are still fallible mortals and can make mistakes as a group as easily as they would've done separately. While there are some problems, bias and such, that can be prevented when working as a group, there are other problems that arise only when working as a group.

There is one very important aspect of a jury that an individual judge cannot provide; if only one of those fallible individuals feels reasonable doubt as to your guilt, you cannot be convicted. In other words, your guilt and the evidence thereof must be so persuasive that it utterly convinces

I don't know whether Azure City uses juries, but they do use Celestials to judge guilt, which brings me to your next question:


Deities, too, are individuals, just ones with superior abilities. Some are even ascended mortals. What gives them the right to judge something like this, as opposed to a mortal?

That's a very metaphysical question, but thankfully we're discussing a webcomic so the ultimate answer is that Rich gives them that right as the DM. Eugene could argue with and deny the authority of the archons until he's blue in the face, but in the end he has to hop when they say toad. That's the Law of OotS-land. Similarly, if V dies he very likely has to answer to his "elven god of knowledge."

[LurkerInPlayground]

Nobody can define "exactly" what a soul is. That's what analogies are for.
You have yet to refute mine.
Why am I required to? The burden of evidence is on you, not me. You're the ones making very exacting and extraordinary claims.

I am asserting that it's fallacious to label a tool evil based on incomplete information and I am stating an opinion on the morality of said tool based on what facts are commonly accepted.


Clearly I'm not, but your refusal to acknowledge BoVD really isn't my problem.
Well, I'm glad that's clear. No, I don't acknowledge BoVD. Even if I did, a large part of the passage you cited is completely irrelevant since torture is not necessarily the explicit intention of using Soul Bind.


What you consider to be the prisoner's rights or choices are irrelevant if you have no authority to make that determination.
And if I did have authority, and made my decision according to more or less the rationale outlined above, what then?

I've also exhaustively explained that perhaps it really doesn't matter whether you think I have the authority or not. If I act according to my own power, then, I probably think I'm ethically in the right.


As would I - if there were no other options. There were.
Then I think we are more or less in agreement here.


None of those were bound against their will by powerful necromancy. They accept being undead, either because they're twisted and what to harm the living, or because they have some kind of long-term duty that extends past their lifespan. (Baelnorns, Soon, etc.) But in all of those examples, being undead is a conscious choice, not the result of being bound anywhere.
Fair enough. I still don't see the relevance as I've laid out above.


This isn't just about my personal values. Both V and Haley consider Soul Bind to be evil as well, a point you have neither addressed nor refuted.
Because I honestly don't care what *they* think of it. My interpretation of V's deadpan reaction is that he honestly doesn't consider it to be evil or ethically objectionable. Or in D&D terms, considers it to be a justifiable "lesser evil."


With one important distinction: death is a release for the person whose *body* is chained. BoVD specifically mentions barring the release of death as being evil.
And you're citing BoVD again, even though we've established I don't particularly care about it?

Laying aside what is canon in D&D or OoTS aside for the moment, I think that chaining a body is exactly the same as chaining their spirit. This goes double if it's a known fact that your afterlife doesn't necessarily involve any sort of justice or agency. So it's entirely possible that nobody wants to claim jurisdiction. The legitimacy of those claims is also a seperate issue as well.


There's also the tiny point that only one of your examples requires 9th-level necromancy to effect.
And?


Sounds like your argument is with the entire morality system now. That's fine, but until they change it the rules are the rules. Since Rich himself accepts that system (Roy's Archon refers repeatedly to "eternal reward") you have to accept it as part of OotS even if you don't agree with it.
Considering that Rich Burlew parodies D&D and will take wild liberties with the rules in order to tell a better story, I think you can take all that with a grain of salt.


"Immortal" does not mean "Invincible." Even gods can die in OotS-land - the Snarl proved that. This strengthens my argument, since anything that can die can also be made to suffer, and therefore can be the subject of both good and evil acts.
Huh? Just because you're indestructible means you can't suffer? Suffering is inherently good or evil? Does not compute.


Again, you're forgetting that for all their freedoms, adventurers still answer to ultimate authorities. The OotS had to plead their case before the Sapphire Guard; Roy's actions were reviewed by Celestials upon his death; Miko was struck down for being evil AND berated by the founder of her Order.
You should make the distinction between being forced to acknowledge an authority as opposed to recognizing it out of respect. You'll remember that they were, with the exception of Durkon,forced to recognize Azurite law.

So unless you're trying to assert that might ought to make right, drop it.


Obviously V has the power to cause major changes to the world. But that doesn't mean he has the power to escape the consequences of his actions. And keep in mind that even Elan, who can't even be Lawful, was still willing out of goodness to turn his prisoner over to the authorities after he surrendered.
I have no particular objection to the assertion that you are responsible for the the power you use. And again, kinda tangential to the Soul Binding question.


We do that using the authority they've given us through government. By being in Azure City, Nale submitted to that authority and its consequences, and V has no right to supersede it.
Nale submitted with the intention of escaping later. So what?

You're claiming V ought not to have superseded their authority. I'm saying it's fair play if V does. Because authority isn't always correct or legitimate. V isn't a citizen of Azure City and likely considers himself above their law when it has proven incompetent or corrupt.

V certainly could have been more attentive and less flippant in some matters of judgment, I agree. But again, tangential to the Soul Binding point.


And I reiterate that your personal beliefs are utterly irrelevant. In OotS-land, the heavens call the shots. Everyone, V included (he isn't an atheist, (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0081.html) remember?) has to deal with their inevitable judgment. If you don't like that aspect of the comic, take it up with Rich, not me.
The heavens call the shots because they have the power to. This doesn't necessarily mean that they have a right to do so. And a lot of characters tend to pick and choose their allegiances, if they acknowledge them at all.


So you missed the part about the target having to be dead before the soul could be bound then? All the rules of being dead apply at that point.

I honestly find it a good possibility that adventurers manage to kill things, legitimately or otherwise.

So I find the question moot. I also already acknowledged that killing for personal vengeance or satisfaction is murder.



There is one "special circumstance" where all of the above are perfectly allowed and not evil. It's called Self-Defense, which doesn't apply once the threat has been neutralized.

You already admitted that you would Soul Bind a person if you had no other recourse to contain a threat.

So claiming that the spell is inherently "evil" raises some problems doesn't it? It's a case of special pleading to say that some tools are always wrong to use and then claim that the other tools that potentially have negative consequences for the health, autonomy and welfare of other individuals also have legitimate uses.

If one tool requires special category or qualification that the others don't, you have to establish why.


Now you could make a case for Nale being a danger to those around him if they didn't kill him, at which point I would mention the antimagic cells and a league of paladins to stand guard.

Yes, I acknowledge this.

As I implied, why would I want the hassle of containing Nale myself if he might have demonic overlords or powerful friends who may come looking for his soul? Let the Azurites handle the responsibility then.

V more or less backed-down since there were better alternatives available.


Denying the authorities the right of due process is fine, as long as you're willing to accept the consequences of that act. Clearly V is not, as his actions after killing Kubota can attest to.
I'm not sure what you mean. If by a lack of responsibility, you mean that he probably should have been more diligent to the actual facts, then I don't disagree.

V's intentions were clearly did a "kill all bad guys without much thought" response. Elan's response to the disintegration was a regretful, "it might have been for the better." He only got pissed right after he felt that V wasn't exercising enough due diligence.

[Mr. Pin]

Well, we all know how broken the alignment system is, and this makes pegging a complicated character like Vaarsuvius hard. However, I would have to say that s(he) is lawful good; S(he) has campaigned against evil for a long time and the "increasing her magical capacity" explanation doesn't seem to cover the effort and risk that V has gone through in order to, say, rid the world of Xykon. This does not, however, mean that V is not a complete Jerk, because the whole invisiblingoutofthere thing, the whole disintigratingKubota thing, and the way s(he)'s acted to hir party members are really not "good". in conclusion, Vaarsuvius= Cantankerous Jerk, but overall still technically within the realm of Lawful good.

[Iranon]

Apologies if this seems a little disjointed... I hope the points aren't linked only in my head.

***

In the SRD, Soul Bind does not have the 'Evil' descriptor - in contrast to some other unwholesome magic like Unholy Blight. It also doesn't really state anything about the awareness of a bound soul - I assume there is none. As such, it seems to be a 'time out' effect of indefinite length, similar to being petrefied.

I have no problem at all with rulings that messing with a sentient being's soul is enough of a personal violation that it's always evil. Certain higher powers might also disapprove because, the subject being dead, someone or something else has a claim on it (would this also make it inherently chaotic for interfering with due process?).
Still, this is in no way comparable to magic that would allow one to do as one pleases with a bound soul... which would be more helpless than anyone being held physically captive. I could understand a classification of Evil Most Foul for such.

V treats it as an acceptable Evil. I'm sure many Neutral and some Good(ish) people would under the circumstances.

***

If the objections aren't for tampering with souls but simply the pragmatic quality of putting someone on ice possibly forever... huge can of worms. Saying that this is somehow different from petrifying someone would be akin to saying 'locking someone up is unambiguously evil if the door is stronger than 6 inches of oak' which sounds a little strange.
What constitutes 'due force' is very arbitrary in D&D... high-level adventurers could have the ability to resolve most conflicts without bodily harm or death. Pretty much every typical battle involves wilfully denying the opponents the opportunity to surrender.

***

I generally think 'always Evil' is rated as a lot more significant than it is. That just removes ambiguity and means ignorance is no excuse for those who want (or need) a spotless record.
A pawnbroker who takes an unhealthy pleasure in the misery of her clients is as unambiguously Evil as a demon the minute a paladin bothers to check. It doesn't mean anything has to be done about it.

Some things in official works make little sense... if allowing a fiend to live is Evil, shouldn't allowing a celestial to live be Good?
I'd rule that only those strongly devoted to the cause of either Good or Evil would be obliged to act.

[Optimystik]

Why am I required to? The burden of evidence is on you, not me. You're the ones making very exacting and extraordinary claims.

Evidence I provided by analogy. If you have an issue with my analogy, say why.


I am asserting that it's fallacious to label a tool evil based on incomplete information and I am stating an opinion on the morality of said tool based on what facts are commonly accepted.

Clearly it is commonly accepted in OotS-land that binding a soul is evil. Both Haley and V made that apparent. Therefore the onus is on you to show why their perceptions might be incorrect.

You have both a sourcebook and the comic's author himself contradicting you; in this case, therefore, you are simply wrong, since your personal beliefs have absolutely no bearing on OotS.


Well, I'm glad that's clear. No, I don't acknowledge BoVD. Even if I did, a large part of the passage you cited is completely irrelevant since torture is not necessarily the explicit intention of using Soul Bind.

The passage states that barring the soul from the release of death constitutes part of that torture. Soul Bind does exactly that.


And if I did have authority, and made my decision according to more or less the rationale outlined above, what then?

If V had the authority to execute him, he'd have the authority to soul bind him, turn him to stone or whatever other punishment his actions merited. But he doesn't.


I've also exhaustively explained that perhaps it really doesn't matter whether you think I have the authority or not. If I act according to my own power, then, I probably think I'm ethically in the right.

It's not that I *think* V doesn't have the authority to pass sentence on Nale; I KNOW he doesn't have that authority. He isn't even a citizen of Azure City, never mind a law enforcement official.


Fair enough. I still don't see the relevance as I've laid out above.

Slitting Nale's throat and Binding his soul would very obviously be against his will. Therefore the point of "there are undead who like it that way" would not apply to him.


Because I honestly don't care what *they* think of it. My interpretation of V's deadpan reaction is that he honestly doesn't consider it to be evil or ethically objectionable. Or in D&D terms, considers it to be a justifiable "lesser evil."

A lesser evil is still evil. A necessary evil is still evil.

You may have a very good reason for what you do, but if you're so convinced that you're in the right you should defend your actions and accept the consequences, just as Roy said in #204. Vaarsuvius did neither.


And you're citing BoVD again, even though we've established I don't particularly care about it?

Rich draws on it and its his comic. Don't complain to me if you disagree with its use.


Laying aside what is canon in D&D or OoTS aside for the moment, I think that chaining a body is exactly the same as chaining their spirit. This goes double if it's a known fact that your afterlife doesn't necessarily involve any sort of justice or agency. So it's entirely possible that nobody wants to claim jurisdiction. The legitimacy of those claims is also a seperate issue as well.

It very clearly cannot be the same. Destroying or even merely restraining a soul requires a MUCH greater effort than doing the same to a body for a reason. It doesn't take 9th level necromancy and extremely expensive gemstones to shackle a body. Even Roy's Archon refers to his body as a "glorified sausage," and in the grand scheme of things that's really all our corporeal selves are.

The soul is what is important. Thus, doing anything to harm or restrain it logically carries much more serious consequences.


Considering that Rich Burlew parodies D&D and will take wild liberties with the rules in order to tell a better story, I think you can take all that with a grain of salt.

So the fact that Rich makes rules jokes means that the entire D&D morality system no longer applies? Are you listening to yourself?


Huh? Just because you're indestructible means you can't suffer? Suffering is inherently good or evil? Does not compute.

CAUSING suffering IS inherently Evil. Even if you have an extremely good reason for it, that brings it up to Neutral at best. As long as there are other options available, no reason is good enough.


You should make the distinction between being forced to acknowledge an authority as opposed to recognizing it out of respect. You'll remember that they were, with the exception of Durkon,forced to recognize Azurite law.

So unless you're trying to assert that might ought to make right, drop it.

Uh, you're the one making that assertion buddy, not me. You said V's arcane power should give him the right to pass judgment on Nale and Kubota.

And none of them was forced to aid the Azurites in their quest to check on the Gates, or even stay in Azure City for that matter. That was a conscious choice for all of them, even Roy, blood oath or not. But they made that decision, they were in Azure City when Nale attacked, and they were under its jurisdiction.


I have no particular objection to the assertion that you are responsible for the the power you use. And again, kinda tangential to the Soul Binding question.

It's only tangential if you're being narrow-minded. V is responsible for the power he uses, he wants to use the Order's political influence or even his own abilities to kill Nale and get his soul bound, therefore he would be fully responsible if that occurrence came to pass.


Nale submitted with the intention of escaping later. So what?

You're claiming V ought not to have superseded their authority. I'm saying it's fair play if V does. Because authority isn't always correct or legitimate. V isn't a citizen of Azure City and likely considers himself above their law when it has proven incompetent or corrupt.

V certainly could have been more attentive and less flippant in some matters of judgment, I agree. But again, tangential to the Soul Binding point.

Nale's submission was implicit with his desire to stay in the city. It had nothing to do with his defeat. He intended fully to break the law and murder the Order (starting with Haley) while there.



The heavens call the shots because they have the power to. This doesn't necessarily mean that they have a right to do so. And a lot of characters tend to pick and choose their allegiances, if they acknowledge them at all.

It doesn't mean they DON'T have that right either. Again you are confusing your own values with the ones the author has chosen to implement in his creative work.

Besides, they are in a much better position to judge people than any elven wizard. Roy's deva knew every detail of his life; her judgment is much more likely to take in every possible circumstance than the snap judgment of a murderous adventurer.


You already admitted that you would Soul Bind a person if you had no other recourse to contain a threat.

So claiming that the spell is inherently "evil" raises some problems doesn't it? It's a case of special pleading to say that some tools are always wrong to use and then claim that the other tools that potentially have negative consequences for the health, autonomy and welfare of other individuals also have legitimate uses.

If one tool requires special category or qualification that the others don't, you have to establish why.

What problems? I acknowledge it's evil, and that I might be forced to do it anyway if there was no better way. It's exactly the same as killing him would be - evil unless all other options had been exhausted.

The difference between myself and Vaarsuvius (and you, it seems) is that having decided to commit this evil act for the greater good, I would submit to the authorities and explain the circumstances, knowing that if I was truly right that they would see things my way, and that even if they considered me a criminal that the afterlife would not. I would NOT simply fly away and avoid having to deal with it. 'La la la, I'm a wizard, I don't have to explain my actions.'


Yes, I acknowledge this.

As I implied, why would I want the hassle of containing Nale myself if he might have demonic overlords or powerful friends who may come looking for his soul? Let the Azurites handle the responsibility then.

V more or less backed-down since there were better alternatives available.

The fact that there are better alternatives than binding his soul implies that Soul Bind is a last resort, which in turn is a strong indication of its inherent evil. That's even after you discount BoVD, Haley and Vaarsuvius' beliefs.


I'm not sure what you mean. If by a lack of responsibility, you mean that he probably should have been more diligent to the actual facts, then I don't disagree.

V's intentions were clearly did a "kill all bad guys without much thought" response. Elan's response to the disintegration was a regretful, "it might have been for the better." He only got pissed right after he felt that V wasn't exercising enough due diligence.

No, what I was referring to was his desire to both lie to the paladin and flee the ship. If he really believed that he was doing the right thing by killing Kubota, he would have defended his actions.

[Optimystik]

In the SRD, Soul Bind does not have the 'Evil' descriptor - in contrast to some other unwholesome magic like Unholy Blight. It also doesn't really state anything about the awareness of a bound soul - I assume there is none. As such, it seems to be a 'time out' effect of indefinite length, similar to being petrefied.

Two things:

Firstly, BoVD condemns other spells that have no evil descriptor. For instance, it says that causing despair is an evil act, so Crushing Despair would be evil if used against any but the most evil creatures themselves. (As further proof, observe CD's counterspell - Good Hope.) For spells without an evil descriptor, using them when there is no other alternative can be neutral. For spells WITH an evil descriptor, they are always evil because they either increase the level of entropy, suffering or negative energy in the world, e.g. animate dead.

Secondly, Rich seems to believe that Soul Bind maintains the subject's awareness, because in SoD the souls captured in Xykon's gem are not in stasis and can think.


I have no problem at all with rulings that messing with a sentient being's soul is enough of a personal violation that it's always evil. Certain higher powers might also disapprove because, the subject being dead, someone or something else has a claim on it (would this also make it inherently chaotic for interfering with due process?).
Still, this is in no way comparable to magic that would allow one to do as one pleases with a bound soul... which would be more helpless than anyone being held physically captive. I could understand a classification of Evil Most Foul for such.

V treats it as an acceptable Evil. I'm sure many Neutral and some Good(ish) people would under the circumstances.

Acceptable or not, evil is evil. A truly Good character would be willing, even anxious to explain himself so that others would think he hasn't gone off the deep end. V simply doesn't care.


If the objections aren't for tampering with souls but simply the pragmatic quality of putting someone on ice possibly forever... huge can of worms. Saying that this is somehow different from petrifying someone would be akin to saying 'locking someone up is unambiguously evil if the door is stronger than 6 inches of oak' which sounds a little strange.
What constitutes 'due force' is very arbitrary in D&D... high-level adventurers could have the ability to resolve most conflicts without bodily harm or death. Pretty much every typical battle involves wilfully denying the opponents the opportunity to surrender.

As I said earlier, Soul Bind is very different from F2S, at least in OotS-land, in that stoned victims lose awareness while SB victims retain it. Since we're discussing the comparative evil of these acts in OotS terms, those are the rules we have to rely on.

Another major difference is that being stoned doesn't require you to be killed first.


I generally think 'always Evil' is rated as a lot more significant than it is. That just removes ambiguity and means ignorance is no excuse for those who want (or need) a spotless record.
A pawnbroker who takes an unhealthy pleasure in the misery of her clients is as unambiguously Evil as a demon the minute a paladin bothers to check. It doesn't mean anything has to be done about it.

Firstly, there are degrees of evil and Detect Evil can gauge the strength of those. A shopkeeper would have to be cruel indeed to register on the same scale as a Fiend. Read the Detect Evil entry for more information.

Secondly, I agree that creatures shouldn't be given the "always evil" label. Some actions on the other hand (like spells) should. Morality is based on actions, not attributes, and that goes for both simple actions like murder and complex actions like necromancy.


Some things in official works make little sense... if allowing a fiend to live is Evil, shouldn't allowing a celestial to live be Good?
I'd rule that only those strongly devoted to the cause of either Good or Evil would be obliged to act.

Given that an evil cleric allowing a celestial to live would be rebuked by his faith, I'd say it's a Good act.

[magic9mushroom]

@ all those who refuse to accept BoVD's word that Soul Binding is Evil: Soul Binding doesn't exist in RL. Therefore, trying to say that it's non-evil by analogy with prison is a completely worthless argument, because you simply don't have the understanding required. BoVD says it's evil, and evidence to the contrary is literally impossible. Hence, it's evil, except in extreme mitigating circumstances. In this case, there were less evil alternatives available, so Soul Binding Nale is therefore an evil act. The end.

I can see a case where Soul Binding wouldn't be evil, namely, if the person you were trying to confine had god-like powers and was hence impossible to contain any other way. This wasn't the case with Nale. Even without the certificate, the Cliffport authorities could easily be persuaded to transfer him to the Azure City jail, and the LG government of Azure City wouldn't object.

[Optimystik]

Further evidence that not only is Soul Bind evil, but does not result in stasis for the trapped souls: BoED has a "good" version of Soul Bind called Sanctify the Wicked (Sanctified 9, Necromancy [Good].) It functions like Soul Bind but can only be used on evil creatures, and requires the caster to sacrifice a level to imprison their wicked soul in a flawless, crystal clear diamond. The target need not be killed first.

While in the gem, the spell states that the evil character reflects on its past misdeeds and within one year is able to eventually find a spark of good within itself. At the spell's end, the evil creature takes on the alignment of the caster (CG, NG or LG). If the gem is broken prematurely, the creature emerges with its originally evil alignment and murderous rage toward the caster.

Most importantly, in both instances (full duration and early release) the creature retains full memory of its time within the gem. It is NOT a timeskip or stasis. Equally important, StW has a limited duration (1 year) while Soul Bind persists indefinitely. Clearly the point of the limited duration is to prevent the soul from being tortured and pervert the caster's good intent. This is the closest analogue we have to Soul Bind yet.

One final point: several creatures in BoVD can cast Soul Bind, either as a spell or SLA; NONE of the ones in BoED can do so.

[Iranon]

Regarding the RAW fanaticism: D&D writers throw around so many absolute statements that it's hard to take them entirely seriously and different books end up contradicting each other all over the place.

Regarding Soul Bind: I never argued it wasn't Evil - messing with souls sounds serious business. Merely that a good number Neutral and some Good characters won't really get what the fuss is all about and deem it an acceptable gray.

Regarding Sanctify the Wicked: Charming, so the Good version explicitly has psychological torture and brainwashing built into it. This sounds far worse than the original.

[magic9mushroom]

Regarding the RAW fanaticism: D&D writers throw around so many absolute statements that it's hard to take them entirely seriously and different books end up contradicting each other all over the place.

Regarding Soul Bind: I never argued it wasn't Evil - messing with souls sounds serious business. Merely that a good number Neutral and some Good characters won't really get what the fuss is all about and deem it an acceptable gray.

Regarding Sanctify the Wicked: Charming, so the Good version explicitly has psychological torture and brainwashing built into it. This sounds far worse than the original.

Noone said that non-Evil characters don't Soul Bind occasionally. The point of contention is that Soul Binding is Evil. Which it is.

[Optimystik]

Regarding the RAW fanaticism: D&D writers throw around so many absolute statements that it's hard to take them entirely seriously and different books end up contradicting each other all over the place.

Perhaps, but that doesn't mean the books should be disregarded entirely. If there's a passage or even a theme that makes sense, especially if multiple sourcebooks agree on it, then it should be given great weight.


Regarding Soul Bind: I never argued it wasn't Evil - messing with souls sounds serious business. Merely that a good number Neutral and some Good characters won't really get what the fuss is all about and deem it an acceptable gray.

Again, having deemed it a necessary yet serious violation, those characters would stick around to explain themselves, just as a neutral or good character would when vaporizing a prisoner or otherwise killing in cold blood.


Regarding Sanctify the Wicked: Charming, so the Good version explicitly has psychological torture and brainwashing built into it. This sounds far worse than the original.

Personally I think StW should make them roll to keep their alignment or not. Reformation shouldn't be guaranteed. Then again, there are plenty of other magical effects that can change alignment, so why not this one? Most importantly, it allows both a will save and spell resistance. SB also allows a will save, but since the target is dead, even if he succeeds the spell can just be recast until the 1 round per caster level window closes.

[King of Nowhere]

You don't have to sould bind someone forever. If I were to decide what to do with Nale, I'd Soul Bind him, and put a magic something that triggers to destroy the gem in about 200 years. Long enough to prevent resurrections once the soul is unleashed, but short enough to make a proportionate punishment. Not even Nale deserves an eternity of soul trapping, but a couple centuries ae very little compared to what he deserves. By the way, I'd put the gem in a container with the most powerful anti-magic detections I can conjure, cover that container in concrete and disguise it as a rock, and throw it in, say, the 10th deepest abyss in the ocean (not the deepest: everyone will start looking there).
I'd even trap Sabine inside the same gem (SoD show that it is possible to trap two souls in a single gem; I'm not sure in this case because Sabine is an outsider). I think the two will start disliking each other after a few decades, but they probably won't go insane, and that's enough for me. Not that if Nale would go insane I'd cry for him. I find that there is a level of evilness at which a person lose every right, including the right to exist, the right to a human treatment, the right to not be summarily executed on the spot, and Nale reached it. Seriously, murdering 200+ people in cold blood only to form some arrows on a map? How can you still care for the fate of someone who did this?


Besides, what exactly would give you, or V, the right to pass that kind of sentence on anyone?
Assume that if you don't soul bind him, he'll come back, and that you don't have a sure mean to lock him. That means letting him go, free to kill other innocents (and he will surely do it). What gives you the right to pass that kind of sentence?


Further evidence that not only is Soul Bind evil, but does not result in stasis for the trapped souls: BoED has a "good" version of Soul Bind called Sanctify the Wicked (Sanctified 9, Necromancy [Good].) It functions like Soul Bind but can only be used on evil creatures, and requires the caster to sacrifice a level to imprison their wicked soul in a flawless, crystal clear diamond. The target need not be killed first.

While in the gem, the spell states that the evil character reflects on its past misdeeds and within one year is able to eventually find a spark of good within itself. At the spell's end, the evil creature takes on the alignment of the caster (CG, NG or LG). If the gem is broken prematurely, the creature emerges with its originally evil alignment and murderous rage toward the caster.
So, trapping a soul is bad, but permanently twisting someone's mind with magic to completely change his personality in a brain washing style is ok? Not that I have anything against it, but I don't see one of the two to be less despicable that the other. I personally see the manipulation of the mind as much worst than the manipulation of souls.
Anyway, I'd never allow something like this to work in my campaign. The idea that you make a spell on someone and he become good, I find it stupid and pointless. What's the point in being good or evil, if a single spell can change it, forever, no dispelling, no saving throws or chance of failure?
In the best case I'd allow that to work only if the villain already has some redeeming trait. For example, I'd make it work for Redcloack or for Thog, but never for Xykon or Nale.

[hamishspence]

I've just checked, its Imprison Soul (9th level clerical spell) that has the Evil descriptor, in Heroes of Horror (updated version of the BoVD spell)

on Spells with Evil descriptor, Deathwatch I think should have lost it- primarily because its on the list of one class thats required to be good (healer) and one prestige class that loses all its power for any evil act (Slayer of domiel). I think that the writers of those books simply retconned it back to No Descriptor, like it was in 3.0.

at least one Spell to temporarily turn someone evil exists (morality undone) so why be surprised that a spell to turn someone Good exists?

[derfenrirwolv]

When a person surrenders, you accept their surrender on the assumption that the person is actually going to stop their hostilities against you. In that case, you really are honour-bound to accept - after all, there's no reason not to.
However, if the person explicitly states that he has submitted to you in name only and is already gloating about how they're going to take advantage of your honour in order to resume their hostilities as soon as they get the chance, playing along is nothing short of idiotic.

And thats exactly what Kubota was doing. As much as nale was going to break out of prison with spells, escape artist checks, and murder, kubota was going to break out of his just rewards using bluff checks and his status in society. From a good/evil perspective, theres just as much reason to kill one as the other.

IMHO V is a Lawfull neutral elf (the last part will come up)

Lets start with the easier part...Neutral. V does want power, but V's not willing to do anything evil to get it. V respects their friends and the coworkers that EARN that respect, and would LIKE to help the poor and down trodden, but isn't willing to go TOO far out of her way to do it. (see the dirt farmers). He also stops at the use of virgins blood, human sacrifice, and making deals with devils.

A Unholy blight spell WILL affect neutral characters, just not evil ones.


Only good and neutral (not evil) creatures are harmed by the spell


Now as to the lawfull aspects.

V itemizes bills

systematically investigates belkars protobrain

got off against roys commands to avoid blowing up party members by the
technicality of casting explosive runes "on a series of inanimate objects"

gets upset when the laws of probability are upstaged by the whims of that copper peice whore: drama.

Explains the rules of random encounters in a logical and predictable pattern.

V likes things to be orderly and follow the rules.

Now, why disintigrate lord kabuto? In short it needed to be done. As an elf, V is NOT a member of AC or subject to its jurisdiction outside of its borders, and whereever the ships have wound up is certainly no longer within the city limits. In short, he doesn't recognize any law he has a legal obligation to follow where he happens to be.

Also remember that there are many different forms of law. A mobster can be lawfull evil while still breaking the law... as long as he strongly adheres to the rules of the mob and does eveything by THEIR book he's still lawfull. He respects authority... its just his Don rather than the government. V's boss is the rules of the universe... the orderly, systematic, arcane rules that govern magic.

[Optimystik]

You don't have to sould bind someone forever. If I were to decide what to do with Nale, I'd Soul Bind him, and put a magic something that triggers to destroy the gem in about 200 years. Long enough to prevent resurrections once the soul is unleashed, but short enough to make a proportionate punishment. Not even Nale deserves an eternity of soul trapping, but a couple centuries ae very little compared to what he deserves. By the way, I'd put the gem in a container with the most powerful anti-magic detections I can conjure, cover that container in concrete and disguise it as a rock, and throw it in, say, the 10th deepest abyss in the ocean (not the deepest: everyone will start looking there).
I'd even trap Sabine inside the same gem (SoD show that it is possible to trap two souls in a single gem; I'm not sure in this case because Sabine is an outsider). I think the two will start disliking each other after a few decades, but they probably won't go insane, and that's enough for me. Not that if Nale would go insane I'd cry for him. I find that there is a level of evilness at which a person lose every right, including the right to exist, the right to a human treatment, the right to not be summarily executed on the spot, and Nale reached it. Seriously, murdering 200+ people in cold blood only to form some arrows on a map? How can you still care for the fate of someone who did this?

First off, I don't care for his fate. If he wasn't tied up and subdued, I'd probably be the first one to run him through. What I care for is the quality of my own soul. Killing a prisoner without due process is still murder, no matter how much he deserves it AND no matter how much I rationalize it with hypothetical innocents he may or may not threaten in a supposed future but is very clearly NOT threatening at that moment in time. (Whew.)

Secondly, 200 years forcibly stuffed in a gem is hardly likely to improve his outlook on life, even (perhaps, especially) with an evil outsider tossed in there to keep him company.


Assume that if you don't soul bind him, he'll come back, and that you don't have a sure mean to lock him. That means letting him go, free to kill other innocents (and he will surely do it). What gives you the right to pass that kind of sentence?

That's a false assumption with anti-magic cells around and a league of paladins to guard them. If those things were not available AND the Order wasn't able to guard him until they reached such enclosures, then and only then would I mandate execution. Even then I'd be against binding his soul, since if he can get 17+ level clerics to aid his resurrection then he'd likely also have a contingency in place to get his soul out of a gem.


So, trapping a soul is bad, but permanently twisting someone's mind with magic to completely change his personality in a brain washing style is ok? Not that I have anything against it, but I don't see one of the two to be less despicable that the other. I personally see the manipulation of the mind as much worst than the manipulation of souls.

StW is inherently better for a couple of reasons. First, it only works on evil creatures, whereas SB works on anyone. Secondly, the target doesn't need to be killed first. Thirdly, if the gem is shattered, BoED states that "the creature's state is just as it was before the spell was cast" (i.e. its body reforms and its alignment is unchanged) whereas shattering a bound soul just sends it to the afterlife. Fourth and final, the caster, not the target, loses a level for StW. That's a significant sacrifice, and meaningful sacrifices both have great power and are inherently benevolent.

To conclude, Soul Bind is much, much worse than Sanctify.


Anyway, I'd never allow something like this to work in my campaign. The idea that you make a spell on someone and he become good, I find it stupid and pointless. What's the point in being good or evil, if a single spell can change it, forever, no dispelling, no saving throws or chance of failure?

Firstly you're wrong, StW has both a will save and spell resistance, only works on evil creatures, and requires the caster to sacrifice an entire level to make it work, and requires a flawless diamond of at least 10,000GP. This is not the kind of spell you spam - deciding to redeem a villain requires a lot of forethought on the caster's part and is by no means a minor decision. Secondly, tons of magical effects forcibly change alignment even in the SRD, such as Helm of Opposite Alignment, Betrayal from an Incantation, Deck of Many Things, etc. Like StW, these are all magical effects and can be reversed by an evil cleric's Atonement spell with no XP cost.

[Ramidel]

D&D Alignment does not necessarily have anything to do with human ethics, remember. It was set by gods who often don't have anything to do with things on the ground.

Example being the fact that for a mortal to torment a soul is an Evil act, but for the Gods it's perfectly acceptable to put the Faithless into a wall of eternal pain for the crime of disbelieving, or hand those who were false to their beliefs over to devils for punishment (Faerun). That's how the rules work.

In OOTS, killing goblin villages for fun and XP is not evil. Those goblins have less rights than animals. Indeed, that's the whole point of Redcloak's Rage Against The Heavens. But Redcloak is Evil for fighting against humanity and the gods and trying to destroy the world to force the gods to accept his race's right to live.
---
On V, I'm not convinced that killing Kubota counts as evil. It may, it may not. I consider it an illegal homicide, and chaotic, but not necessarily evil; Vaarsuvius was assuming the right of judge, jury and executioner. He* knew Kubota was a villain who would get off after a lengthy trial scene, he was right, and he eliminated the problem. That's pretty textbook Chaotic Good.

Overall, I presume he's True Neutral overall. On the Good/Evil axis, his neutrality is canonically stated. On the Law-Chaos axis, he's a mixed bag. He doesn't have any use for paladins and their version of Law, but he has equally little use for Belkar's version of Chaos. It's not that he's actively against law like Belkar and Haley are, though; they spit on the rules as a matter of course (see: Haley v. Celia). He just has no use for other people's Law when it gets in his way, or for ethical matters in general beyond his personal loyalty to Roy and Haley.

Definitely more Chaotic than Lawful, but Chaotic Neutral doesn't conjure up the right images. (For one thing, Chaotic individuals are rarely this stuck-up unless they're children.)

*I am not playing the he-she game this post. Thank you all and sundry.

[magic9mushroom]

V isn't Lawful. To be Lawful, you have to have some kind of respect for authority. V has none, even when it's legitimate.

[David Argall]

@ all those who refuse to accept BoVD's word that Soul Binding is Evil:
But BoVD does not say that.
"...some even prefer to torture the souls of their foes, never granting them the release of death...
This merely says that death is normally an end to torture, but that some evil types find ways to continue the torture. Soul binding can be deemed a necessary part of that, but that merely makes it the same as a locked door, acceptable when there is valid reason to keep somebody in or out.
It does not say the binding itself is torture [tho we presume the soul does not like the idea.] It merely says that souls can be tortured, and death does not stop that as it normally would.


Soul Binding doesn't exist in RL. Therefore, trying to say that it's non-evil by analogy with prison is a completely worthless argument, because you simply don't have the understanding required.
Flying dragons, magic, etc, etc also don't exit in RL. That we do not have a perfect understanding of them does not stop us from having to try.

The analogy with prison seems highly likely to be accurate and so we
rather automatically use it as a measure, and find the act is good/evil depending on other circumstances. There is no good reason to deem it automatically evil.



Nale. Even without the certificate, the Cliffport authorities could easily be persuaded to transfer him to the Azure City jail, and the LG government of Azure City wouldn't object.
That's the jail Belkar, Haley, Miko, etc all escaped from, right? The party did deem this superior to looking into soul binding, but it's automatic superiority is rather obviously suspect.



If he wasn't tied up and subdued, I'd probably be the first one to run him through.
But that means you would run him thru other times too. Quite possibly wisely, but there are a lot of cases which are not really different from tied up and subdued.


Killing a prisoner without due process is still murder, no matter how much he deserves it AND no matter how much I rationalize it with hypothetical innocents he may or may not threaten in a supposed future but is very clearly NOT threatening at that moment in time.
But this of course rejects the death penalty, which is accepted in the D&D world.

Killing a prisoner without due process is unlawful, not [necessarily] non-good. When somebody threatens future crime, we normally have additional ways to prevent that, but if there is no other effective way to prevent the crime, we are still under the laws of self defense. We can shoot him now for the crime threatened next year.



That's a false assumption with anti-magic cells around and a league of paladins to guard them.
As has been noted, we have a lot of people who seem able to walk out almost at will.



If those things were not available AND the Order wasn't able to guard him until they reached such enclosures, then and only then would I mandate execution. Even then I'd be against binding his soul, since if he can get 17+ level clerics to aid his resurrection then he'd likely also have a contingency in place to get his soul out of a gem.
But note here you are talking pragmatics. Binding his soul is merely a lesser choice, not an unacceptable choice.



StW is inherently better for a couple of reasons.
Better is an insufficient standard here. The forms are good-better. So saying it is better is saying soul bind is good. And that we even have to argue which spell is better challenges Soul Bind being classed as evil.

[Optimystik]

But BoVD does not say that.
"...some even prefer to torture the souls of their foes, never granting them the release of death...
This merely says that death is normally an end to torture, but that some evil types find ways to continue the torture. Soul binding can be deemed a necessary part of that, but that merely makes it the same as a locked door, acceptable when there is valid reason to keep somebody in or out.
It does not say the binding itself is torture [tho we presume the soul does not like the idea.] It merely says that souls can be tortured, and death does not stop that as it normally would.

You forgot the preceding part of that cite: "Creatures without corrupt hearts simply dispatch their foes quickly, believing that sending a villain off to the justice of the afterlife is punishment enough." In other words, if you must kill them, do it quickly and get it over with - anything else implies a corrupt heart.

In addition, from your own quote: "never granting them the release of death" implies that being stuck on this plane is part of the torture. Sorry, but binding someone's very soul is far, far different from "a locked door."


That's the jail Belkar, Haley, Miko, etc all escaped from, right? The party did deem this superior to looking into soul binding, but it's automatic superiority is rather obviously suspect.

Nobody in the LG has Haley's lockpick skills (even the cell in the first town the Order went to was able to hold Nale). As for Miko and the LG escaping from AC, clearly those were exceptional circumstances.


But that means you would run him thru other times too. Quite possibly wisely, but there are a lot of cases which are not really different from tied up and subdued.

No, being helpless is a very unique situation in which killing him without due process would be wrong. No case can approximate that - you're either helpless and subdued or you aren't.


But this of course rejects the death penalty, which is accepted in the D&D world.

The death penalty is, by definition, the result of due process. In what way did I reject it?


Killing a prisoner without due process is unlawful, not [necessarily] non-good. When somebody threatens future crime, we normally have additional ways to prevent that, but if there is no other effective way to prevent the crime, we are still under the laws of self defense. We can shoot him now for the crime threatened next year.

It's unambiguously good only if Nale is actively threatening someone else, and you are acting to protect that person immediately. Killing him while subdued and tied may not be evil, but it can't be good either.

BoED: Prisoners and dominated characters are both helpless, and killing them is an evil act. (Page 10)

As for there being "no other effective way" I agree with that statement completely. But the burden of proof was on V and he didn't demonstrate a lack of options.


As has been noted, we have a lot of people who seem able to walk out almost at will.

As has been noted, the circumstances of those escapes were very unique.


But note here you are talking pragmatics. Binding his soul is merely a lesser choice, not an unacceptable choice.

Again, I would bind his soul if necessary. That merely makes it a necessary evil, not a non-evil act.


Better is an insufficient standard here. The forms are good-better. So saying it is better is saying soul bind is good. And that we even have to argue which spell is better challenges Soul Bind being classed as evil.

Spare me the semantics, by better I meant "morally preferable." Eating ice cream is better than getting shot, that doesn't make getting shot good. Flawed logic is flawed.

[B. Dandelion]

@ all those who refuse to accept BoVD's word that Soul Binding is Evil: Soul Binding doesn't exist in RL. Therefore, trying to say that it's non-evil by analogy with prison is a completely worthless argument, because you simply don't have the understanding required. BoVD says it's evil, and evidence to the contrary is literally impossible. Hence, it's evil, except in extreme mitigating circumstances. In this case, there were less evil alternatives available, so Soul Binding Nale is therefore an evil act. The end.
I agree with your conclusion but I can't say as much for the logic used to get there. It's hypothetical, and because it can't exist in real life no one could have the understanding required to say that it isn't evil? Why, then, do they have the understanding required to say that it is? Or what mitigating circumstances would make it not evil and which ones wouldn't? This is a total cop-out in league with "God works in mysterious ways" since God is possessed of the omnisicent morality license. (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/OmniscientMoralityLicense) Which also is only hypothetical in real life. I mean, except for God, but I don't recall anything about d20s in the Bible...


Regarding Sanctify the Wicked: Charming, so the Good version explicitly has psychological torture and brainwashing built into it. This sounds far worse than the original.
That was my reaction too.


StW is inherently better for a couple of reasons. First, it only works on evil creatures, whereas SB works on anyone.
A weapon that only hurts evil people certainly creates a more desirable outcome than something that's indiscriminate, but it seems like it is on somewhat shaky ground to say that because it is "better" morally it should not still be considered evil.


Secondly, the target doesn't need to be killed first.
I don't think that was cited as one of the reasons people were still uncomfortable with it. The problem is the inherent idea of brainwashing.


Thirdly, if the gem is shattered, BoED states that "the creature's state is just as it was before the spell was cast" (i.e. its body reforms and its alignment is unchanged) whereas shattering a bound soul just sends it to the afterlife.
Yeah, again, so? Actually, are you saying this means if you kill an evil person, use this spell, and then they get released somehow, they come back to life all on their own? Doesn't that make it riskier to use instead of a simple execution?


Fourth and final, the caster, not the target, loses a level for StW.
Still beside the point.


That's a significant sacrifice, and meaningful sacrifices both have great power and are inherently benevolent.
On WHOSE behalf is it a sacrifice? Oh, theirs, you say, but its effect on an unwilling person is a mental rape accompanied by a magically coerced change in attitude. Why is it that your belief in it being a beneficial act makes it so for the person who regards it as rape?


To conclude, Soul Bind is much, much worse than Sanctify.
Well if that line about "meaningful sacrifices being inherently benevolent" is actually in any of those rule books I'd have to concede it is the law of the land, but even so in real life I find it repugnant.

[The Neoclassic]

Because I'm thinking Lawful Neutral, or maybe True Neutral.

I'm thinking true neutral. Yeah, I was lazy and didn't read all four pages up to this. I'm sure I'll jump in as soon as someone starts nitpicking my view. :smallamused: He is single-minded in his pursuit of contacting Haley, and cares not for law nor chaos along the way. His motivation is slightly good-leaning (helping a friend, though a lot of it is more self-centered, since she was his only close friend we saw in the comic, so I imagine that attachment has something to do with it). He's not done many notably evil acts (unless I'm forgetting a lot), though he hasn't done much that's compassionate or helpful to others along the way either.

[magic9mushroom]

@Dandelion:

My point is this. Some people in this thread have been claiming Soul Bind as not-necessarily-evil by equating it to a prison sentence. I'm pointing out that they can't prove it's in any way equivalent to a prison sentence because it doesn't exist in RL, and all the evidence points the other way, since otherwise all those books wouldn't call it Evil while not calling prison evil.

[Kaytara]

Lets start with the easier part...Neutral. V does want power, but V's not willing to do anything evil to get it. V respects their friends and the coworkers that EARN that respect, and would LIKE to help the poor and down trodden, but isn't willing to go TOO far out of her way to do it. (see the dirt farmers). He also stops at the use of virgins blood, human sacrifice, and making deals with devils.

This. I do not think Vaarsuvius is Chaotic, he simply has very high standards about who to obey and whose opinion to respect. He even explicitly says so when Miko tries to order him about: "...nor do I take orders from those intellectually inferior to myself."
He obeys Roy's orders most of the time because Roy has proven to be both intelligent and a rather good leader. The times when he doesn't, he has a reason. For example, when he tried to blow up Miko, it was after Roy had consistently proven himself both unable and somewhat unwilling to rein in her asocial tendencies. Similarly, when he disobeyed Roy at the beginning of the Azure City battle, it was a legitimate decision: Roy's reasoning was that it was "too dangerous" for V to handle three elementals by himself but had no understanding of the scrolls that would allow V to easily do that.


Also remember that there are many different forms of law. A mobster can be lawfull evil while still breaking the law... as long as he strongly adheres to the rules of the mob and does eveything by THEIR book he's still lawfull. He respects authority... its just his Don rather than the government. V's boss is the rules of the universe... the orderly, systematic, arcane rules that govern magic.

Not even necessarily the rules of the universe or of magic... V is very dedicated, which is a Lawful quality. His seemingly Chaotic actions can easily be explained as staying true to that quality. He blew up Miko because he was upset with how she was disrupting the natural order of the party. He killed Kubota because the noble got in the way of V's overarching goal, finding Haley.

This is why I consider arguments about DnD alignment completely pointless, at least if they draw on rulebook entries on what's Good, Evil, Lawful and Chaotic as proof. There are countless perspectives to almost any action if we're talking about a sufficiently complex character, which is clearly the case here.

[King of Nowhere]

That's a false assumption with anti-magic cells around and a league of paladins to guard them. If those things were not available AND the Order wasn't able to guard him until they reached such enclosures, then and only then would I mandate execution. Even then I'd be against binding his soul, since if he can get 17+ level clerics to aid his resurrection then he'd likely also have a contingency in place to get his soul out of a gem.


I was speaking theoretically in case they hadn't a safe way to guard Nale. Note that at the moment V proposed Soul Bind, the oots still didn't realized they could take Nale in Sojo's prison. Once they realized it, they did, and I support that decision. Also V supported that decision. I'm just saying that in case that option wasn't available, I find soul bind acceptable.



Secondly, 200 years forcibly stuffed in a gem is hardly likely to improve his outlook on life, even (perhaps, especially) with an evil outsider tossed in there to keep him company.

I don't think there's anything that can change Nale toward good, that's why I won't even try it and i content myself in taking all the precautions to stopping him from harming anyone. If I tought Nale's morality could be improved, I'd be against soul bind too.

[Vaarsuvius4181]

I believe i have the answer. the card on his token in DoD is "aroogant neutral" Therefor it implies nuetral. I belive that V is stricken with some sort of guilt that he cant find haley, or roy, or maybe (just a wee bit) belkar. He is being distracted. And so far, Qarr has tried to murder his friends, wipe out the fleet, kill alot of paladins, and when he comes over to V probably just wanting someone to manipulate, you think thats evil?No. vaarsuvius is either true neutral, or Chatoic Neutral. MAYBE if he helps qarr and goes back for his friends, it would be caotic good.

[Wanton Soup]

No, I consider killing defenseless monsters to be neutral at best, not good.

Define defenseless.

A multiple murderer is defenseless against the might of a SWAT team.

So should we just send one PC in with a big stick?

[jidasfire]

Let's break the question of V's alignment down to how s/he acts in relation to the rest of the team. While it's true that alignment does not equate to personality, there are certainly traits people of the same alignment must, at least at a base level, share.

On the moral axis, Roy, Durkon, Haley, and Elan are all, as stated by the comic, Good. They help others in need and try to show compassion as often as possible, going out of their way to do so. Belkar, on the other hand, is Evil. He has little to no respect for the lives, rights, and dignity of other beings and happily kills them if it suits his purposes. Does V fit either axis? Perhaps not. V is compassionate to those s/he cares about, but will ignore the suffering of others if it is tangential to his/her ultimate goals of saving the world and unlocking greater magics. S/he is neither cruel nor whimsically violent, nor does s/he kill for sheer convenience, but s/he is clearly willing to be ruthless if the situation calls for it. The execution of Kubota, while heartless and perhaps even hasty, probably did the people of Azure City a lot of good. Here was a man who trafficked with devils, murdered his own sympathetic underling, and contributed to the fall of Azure City by refusing to help the fight against Xykon and actively trying to slay the general of said city's forces. Perhaps the ends can't always justify the means, but if you ask me, couldn't have happened to a nicer guy. As for the attack on "defenseless" Qarr, he's a devil, so he's never defenseless and always up to no good. Moreover, destroying a devil's body does not end its existence. It simply goes back to Hell, or whatever plane they use (I'm a 2nd Edition guy so I don't know how it works now). Hence, on the moral axis, I propose that V is Neutral.

As for ethics, Roy and Durkon are Lawful. They generally try to follow set rules, play fair with others, and respect just authority. Haley, Elan, and Belkar are Chaotic. They follow their own consciences or whims and break rules as desired. Does V fit on either of these axes? Perhaps not. V is loyal to people s/he cares about, but when it suits his/her ends, s/he has no compunctions about telling them, or anyone else, to buzz off. An example from the early strips of V being more reliable than the Chaotics was when Durkon was missing. While it was a joke to be sure, Haley pointed out that only Roy and V could be blamed, because she, Elan, and Belkar were so consistently irresponsible (read: Chaotic). As for being less reliable than the Lawfuls, while Roy and Durkon were both willing to go along with Miko to Azure City originally (for their own reasons perhaps, but still playing by the rules), V was a general voice of dissent, siding with the Chaotic characters to beat Miko up and leave. S/he moves between Lawful and Chaotic behavior as it is logically pragmatic, which sounds pretty Neutral to me.

V being True Neutral gives something of a center to the party's alignment axis. Everyone else on the team has an extreme alignment (i.e. no part of their alignments are Neutral), so having a teammate who is completely Neutral allows at least one of them whose morals are more situational and less absolute. While none of the characters on the team (not even Belkar anymore, go figure!) are stock characters who make obvious decisions, V is, and should be, I think, the one who stays in the middle and keeps us guessing.

[hamishspence]

an armed multiple murderer is not defenceless- even if guaranteed to lose, could still injure someone in process.

an unarmed one, is.

in either case, the team would have authority to kill in self-defence/defence of others only- killing the murderer when he's dropped his weapon and stuck arms in air, would be murder.

Same principle applies- without the authority to kill, the only justified killing is defensive, and the onus is on the killer to prove they were defending life.

[Optimystik]

Define defenseless.

A multiple murderer is defenseless against the might of a SWAT team.

So should we just send one PC in with a big stick?

Defenseless is perfectly defined in the rules (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/combatModifiers.htm) (helpless.) While tied up (like Nale was) you can be coup de graced just as if you were caught paralyzed or sleeping.


I agree with your conclusion but I can't say as much for the logic used to get there. It's hypothetical, and because it can't exist in real life no one could have the understanding required to say that it isn't evil? Why, then, do they have the understanding required to say that it is? Or what mitigating circumstances would make it not evil and which ones wouldn't?

There are none. Sometimes evil acts are necessary, but that doesn't make committing them any more Good. Sometimes, it doesn't even make them Neutral. I firmly believe murdering someone and sealing their soul in a gem to be one of those acts.

Again, I would do it if I had to, and readily accept the consequences if I believed myself to be in the right, but believing there would be no consequences is naive at best and dangerous at worst.


That was my reaction too.

Not to get too much into religion, but Jesus didn't exactly ask everyone's permission before making his sacrifice either. That's the line of thought this spell is emulating.

Besides, alignment-changing spells and effects existed long before BoED. I listed some earlier but apparently they bear repeating - Helm of Opposite Alignment, Deck of Many Things, misfired incantations, even the Atonement spell.


A weapon that only hurts evil people certainly creates a more desirable outcome than something that's indiscriminate, but it seems like it is on somewhat shaky ground to say that because it is "better" morally it should not still be considered evil.

You're begging the question: In what way is it "hurting" them?You need to provide reasons why Sanctify would cause pain just as I did for Soul Bind.


I don't think that was cited as one of the reasons people were still uncomfortable with it. The problem is the inherent idea of brainwashing.

Whether it was cited as a reason or not, that's still a key difference between Sanctify and Soul Bind and must be considered when evaluating the two spells.


Yeah, again, so? Actually, are you saying this means if you kill an evil person, use this spell, and then they get released somehow, they come back to life all on their own? Doesn't that make it riskier to use instead of a simple execution?

You're not listening. Unlike Soul Bind, with Sanctify you do not kill the target first. No, they don't "come back to life" because they never died to begin with.


Still beside the point.

Self-sacrifice has always been Good's most potent weapon. For a classic non-D&D example, I point you to the entire Harry Potter series.


On WHOSE behalf is it a sacrifice? Oh, theirs, you say, but its effect on an unwilling person is a mental rape accompanied by a magically coerced change in attitude. Why is it that your belief in it being a beneficial act makes it so for the person who regards it as rape?

The spell duplicates what the evil soul would have experienced in the afterlife anyway: a recounting of its misdeeds during life. The only difference is that the result is redemption instead of damnation. Unless you consider every soul's judgment to be "mental rape," you can't consider this spell to be that way either.


Well if that line about "meaningful sacrifices being inherently benevolent" is actually in any of those rule books I'd have to concede it is the law of the land, but even so in real life I find it repugnant.

Why? As I said before, self-sacrifice is Good's most powerful tool and has always been. What's repugnant about that?

As for the rule quotes, here's a few:

"Good characters make sacrifices to help others." (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/description.htm) - SRD
"No caster can draw on Sanctified Magic without being changed for the better as a result." -Page 7
"[Many] Good spells (meaning spells with the [Good] descriptor) involve a personal sacrifice to help another." -page 83
"With Sanctified Magic, casters exchange a personal sacrifice for powerful results." - page 83.

[LurkerInPlayground]

@Dandelion:

My point is this. Some people in this thread have been claiming Soul Bind as not-necessarily-evil by equating it to a prison sentence. I'm pointing out that they can't prove it's in any way equivalent to a prison sentence because it doesn't exist in RL, and all the evidence points the other way, since otherwise all those books wouldn't call it Evil while not calling prison evil.
It's called a thought experiment. Given the premises we accept as fact with in a continuity, we can make judgments.

Souls are nominally accepted to be the personality/mind that persists independent of a mortal body. How this exactly happens is irrelevant. But they're demonstrably real to the characters in the ficition, as are different alignment-related afterlives in the context of the comic. They're arguably not even supernatural, since they're so well known.

I disagree with the idea that Soul Bind is evil merely because I automatically assume that destroying souls is a bad thing. Nor do I make statements that are unproven within a given context.

If we accept, "fact A" and "fact B" we can make conclusion "C."

Soul Bind is canonically "evil" and I take the time to point out that, no such a thing isn't inherently or at least necessarily evil.

[LurkerInPlayground]

There are none. Sometimes evil acts are necessary, but that doesn't make committing them any more Good. Sometimes, it doesn't even make them Neutral. I firmly believe murdering someone and sealing their soul in a gem to be one of those acts.
If it's possible to perform "necessary" or "lesser" evils and still remain nominally "good" or "neutral" with respect to D&D's cosmology, are you then admitting the possibility that V actually was or is neutral?


Not to get too much into religion, but Jesus didn't exactly ask everyone's permission before making his sacrifice either. That's the line of thought this spell is emulating.
Then don't bring up religion. This example isn't helping you at all. Secondly, not all of us unconditionally admire Jesus or accept the claims people make about Jesus.


Besides, alignment-changing spells and effects existed long before BoED. I listed some earlier but apparently they bear repeating - Helm of Opposite Alignment, Deck of Many Things, misfired incantations, even the Atonement spell.
So? You're talking about the morality of forcibely changing somebody's capacity for self-determination.

Pointing to the fact that the game had tools that made this possible doesn't address anything.


You're begging the question: In what way is it "hurting" them?You need to provide reasons why Sanctify would cause pain just as I did for Soul Bind.
Except that you didn't do this for Soul Bind. If you existed in the OoTS world, you'd still be making a bunch of unverified supernatural claims. You just sort of puttered out after that and cited splatbooks.

I don't care what those books say. I want to test your logic as you test mine, not see how well you can appeal to authority.

Also, if you did establish that your alternative is "good" it doesn't automatically make Soul Bind "evil." And you still need to qualify why that "reflection time" gets the special distinction of not being the morally the same thing as "time passing" for Soul Bind.


Whether it was cited as a reason or not, that's still a key difference between Sanctify and Soul Bind and must be considered when evaluating the two spells.
Again, as I said above, you are making two seperate claims. They are to be treated as such.

Also, keep in mind, depending on the variables of a setting, the alternative may simply not exist at all.


You're not listening. Unlike Soul Bind, with Sanctify you do not kill the target first. No, they don't "come back to life" because they never died to begin with.
Yes he is listening. He's claiming that a potential source of harm can re-enter the world and that this could be potentially bad.

Ignore for the moment that the spell automatically forces you to be good with a 100% certainty.


Self-sacrifice has always been Good's most potent weapon. For a classic non-D&D example, I point you to the entire Harry Potter series.
Self-denial is a sign of self-control and the capacity for self-mediation. It does not necessarily mean you are an altruistic person. You have to establish why a particular sacrifice is good.

Or putting it simply: Why is interfering with somebody else's ability to make their own decisions a good thing? An easy question for you to answer snce you can just say: "They have time to reflect."

Of course, they have presumably exactly the same thing in the Soul Bind spell. The only difference is that it isn't a foregone conclusion and they're still being subjected to imprisonment. But then you don't qualify forced "reflection time" as a kind of torture. That's inconsistent.

Again, disproving one assertion doesn't automatically prove an alternative assertion that you favor.

That the "good" alternative makes redemption 100% certain with all cases seems to be kind of weird. It's definately something of a narrative gap. Why aren't there intelligent evil characters that decide they're still evil?



The spell duplicates what the evil soul would have experienced in the afterlife anyway: a recounting of its misdeeds during life. The only difference is that the result is redemption instead of damnation. Unless you consider every soul's judgment to be "mental rape," you can't consider this spell to be that way either.
What gives you that right?

Oh right, exactly the same right I had when I rationally choose to utilize potent tools and take responsibility for them.

Aside from which, I imagine some evil characters don't recount their past lives as "torture." D&D has a particularly rich tradition of evil characters becoming vassals to demons or devils in their afterlives. (example: The Blood War) Othertimes, they manage to get up the pecking order to earn themselves some power and vassals of their own.

Nale is joining team evil because he sees potential benefit.


Why? As I said before, self-sacrifice is Good's most powerful tool and has always been. What's repugnant about that?
Again, being capable of making sacrifices means you're capable of self-denial. It doesn't mean you're good.

"Paying a cost" doesn't necessarily make one course of action morally superior. It means you're capable of predicting future outcomes and picking between desirable and undesirable ones whether those outcomes are "good" or "evil."

You still have to establish why that sacrifice is good.

[Kish]

Soul Bind is canonically "evil" and I take the time to point out that, no such a thing isn't inherently or at least necessarily evil.
It's certainly not equivalent to a prison sentence. It seems, from what I can tell, more equivalent to a sentence of an eternity in featureless solitary confinement. Sanctify the Wicked hardly sounds better, but it's easy for me to see why Soul Bind is evil. I'm not really an expert on the law, but I'm enough of one to know that sticking someone in a windowless, featureless cell, alone, with nothing to read or do, for all eternity would qualify as "cruel and unusual punishment" in a big way.

[LurkerInPlayground]

It's certainly not equivalent to a prison sentence. It seems, from what I can tell, more equivalent to a sentence of an eternity in featureless solitary confinement. Sanctify the Wicked hardly sounds better, but it's easy for me to see why Soul Bind is evil. I'm not really an expert on the law, but I'm enough of one to know that sticking someone in a windowless, featureless cell, alone, with nothing to read or do, for all eternity would qualify as "cruel and unusual punishment" in a big way.
Yes, yes, as opposed to letting them go to an afterlife where they slave for their demonic overlords.

Secondly, it's not like they need to eat or sleep or anything or shack up with prison rapists. Mental pain is complicated and inter-related to physical pain, I'm sure. Do you actually need light stimuli if you don't actually have an organ that regulates your circadian rythyms, or for that matter, eyes? Such a debate is moot anyway.

Bringing us to the third point: Soul Bind is supposed to prevent an enemy from being revived from the dead. It isolates them from the world and polite society.

Which can be a good thing if that person is very dangerous. Whether it is pleasant for the prisoner is irrelevant. If I had a better method, I would definately consider it, but until then, sucks for him.

EDIT: There's also an interesting tangent here. Does driving a soul irreversibly insane the same as killing it? I mean, if the mind and personality are incoherent, then it can hardly be said to be either.

Which leads to another interesting point: If the soul in question "merges" with some otherworldly plane in the afterlife, is used as magical fuel or takes on an entirely new incarnation (demon, spirit animal or whatever) can it even be said to the same soul?

If a hellish afterlife was going to destroy the soul, for the gain of Evil (capital E and all) what difference does it make to killing the soul beforehand for reals make?

[Optimystik]

If it's possible to perform "necessary" or "lesser" evils and still remain nominally "good" or "neutral" with respect to D&D's cosmology, are you then admitting the possibility that V actually was or is neutral?

He IS neutral. He may be sliding (very rapidly, in my opinion) toward evil, but he hasn't done anything truly overt yet that I saw.


Then don't bring up religion. This example isn't helping you at all. Secondly, not all of us unconditionally admire Jesus or accept the claims people make about Jesus.

Calm down. I didn't bring it up, the poster I quoted mentioned the Bible. That reply wasn't directed at you.


So? You're talking about the morality of forcibely changing somebody's capacity for self-determination.

Pointing to the fact that the game had tools that made this possible doesn't address anything.

Somebody evil's capacity for self-determination is already in need of expansion. Evil people either (a) don't know or (b) don't care about the consequences of their actions, therefore by definition they have need of such reflection.


Except that you didn't do this for Soul Bind. If you existed in the OoTS world, you'd still be making a bunch of unverified supernatural claims. You just sort of puttered out after that and cited splatbooks.

My supernatural claims aren't unverified; they're common knowledge. Give me one spirit in any fantasy world forcibly chained to this plane that wasn't (a) miserable, (b) insane or (c) exercising some kind of duty.

The fact that you refuse to accept a common literary device doesn't invalidate my examples, it only makes you look obdurate.


I don't care what those books say. I want to test your logic as you test mine, not see how well you can appeal to authority.

Uh, you don't have to care what they say; it's not your comic, it's the Giant's.


Also, if you did establish that your alternative is "good" doesn't automatically make Soul Bind "evil."

Of course not, but it's a strong indication. For example, pretend you know nothing about Superman. If D.C. Comics then printed a comic whose cover read "Superman Meets His Evil Twin!" you would have compelling evidence to believe the current Superman is Good, despite knowing nothing else about him.

Printing a spell, then a "good version" of that same spell means that at the very least the previous one has no Good application, and strongly implies that it is the moral opposite of the new one.


Again, as I said above, you are making two seperate claims. They are to be treated as such.

That Sanctify is Good, and that Soul Bind is evil, correct? I'm aware of that.


Also, keep in mind, depending on the variables of a setting, the alternative may simply not exist at all.

I never said Sanctify was part of OotS-verse; even if it was, I doubt anyone in the Order (except maybe Elan) would be willing to give up a level to reform his brother, and he can't cast it. But the fact that it's not usable doesn't make Soul Bind okay.


Yes he is listening. He's claiming that a potential source of harm can re-enter the world and that this could be potentially bad. He's pointing out the limitations of one tool as compared to another.

Precisely. Potential. Not IMMINENT harm, POTENTIAL. Should we go around slaughtering and binding every potential source of harm because we're unsure of our ability to keep them in check any other way?

By the way, even though you don't care about it, I'll cite the relevant portion of BoED for the benefit of those who do care about the rules.


In a world full of enemies who show no respect for life whatsoever, it can be extremely tempting to treat foes as they have treated others, to exact revenge for slain comrades and innocents, to offer no quarter and become merciless. A good character must not succumb to that trap. Good characters must offer mercy and accept surrender no matter how many times villains might betray that kindness or escape from captivity to continue their evil deeds.

Again the rules contradict you, but thankfully you don't get to decide which rules to ignore; Rich does.


Self-denial is a sign of self-control and the capacity for self-mediation. It does not necessarily mean you are an altruistic person. You have to establish why a particular sacrifice is good.

Simplicity itself. That sacrifice must benefit another to be Good, like every other Good act.

Giving up food just to say "hey, I can go X days without eating! I'm so awesome" isn't a good act. Giving the food you would have eaten to the hungry instead, is.


Or putting it simply: Why is interfering with somebody else's ability to make their own decisions a good thing? An easy question for you to answer snce you can just say: "They have time to reflect."

Of course, they have presumably exactly the same thing in the Soul Bind spell. The only difference is that it isn't a foregone conclusion and they're still being subjected to imprisonment.

You forgot that they don't have to be murdered first, that the spell has a limited duration that the target is aware of, and that in Soul Bind they are not shown anything - not their misdeeds, not their life choices, nothing at all. They are aware of time passing (at least in OotS-land) and that's it. And if you the caster forget, change your mind, get killed, lose the gem etc. then they are trapped forever. They are not the same spell, no matter how much you try to assert otherwise.


Again, disproving one assertion doesn't automatically prove an alternative assertion that you favor.

That the "good" alternative makes redemption 100% certain with all cases seems to be kind of weird. It's definately something of a weird narrative gap. Why aren't there intelligent evil characters that decide they're still evil?

That's where the will save comes in. The whole definition of a will save is having a strong enough sense of self to resist an attempt at coercion. If your conviction is too low for that, then you're clearly susceptible to having your mind changed. For example, an evil cleric would be much more convinced of the rightness of his chosen path than an evil fighter, and be harder to affect with this spell.


What gives you that right?

Just because you consider it to be desirable end doesn't mean that everybody else does. An evil character might have zero regret at all, even given sufficient time to "reflect."

Oh right, exactly the same right I had when I rationally choose to utilize potent tools and take responsibility for them.

Aside from which, I imagine some evil characters don't recount their past lives as "torture." D&D has a particularly rich tradition of evil characters becoming vassals to demons or devils in their afterlives. (example: The Blood War) Othertimes, they manage to get up the pecking order to earn themselves some power and vassals of their own.

Right, and as soon as their usefulness runs out they are extinguished. No rational person would choose that existence if they were fully aware of the consequences. The spell shows them the inevitable result of their misdeeds and makes it felt on a cellular level; it presents those sins in whatever way is necessary to make them as horrified by those acts as a Good character would be, yet there is no fabrication. Evil is an inherently unnatural state, and the spell serves to make them realize that.


Again, being capable of making sacrifices means you're capable of self-denial. It doesn't mean you're good.

"Paying a cost" doesn't necessarily make one course of action morally superior. It means you're capable of predicting future outcomes and picking between desirable and undesirable ones whether those outcomes are "good" or "evil."

You still have to establish why that sacrifice is good.

Every Good act has at least one of the following attributes (including sacrifices):

Benefit someone besides the actor;
Inspire hope, joy, or other positive emotions;
Alleviate suffering;
Improve or call upon Celestials or other good creatures;
Follow the wishes of Good deities;
Redeem villains. <---- Highest possible Good act, by BoED, and it makes perfect sense.

[Kish]

Whether it is pleasant for the prisoner is irrelevant.
Irrelevant to the morality of the action? That's an--odd--concept of morality.

[LurkerInPlayground]

Irrelevant to the morality of the action? That's an--odd--concept of morality.
Would you consider what the mass murder wants as being relevant when he gets tossed into a high-security jail cell? It probably causes him distress or pain, but again, what he wants isn't relevant.

The fact that he must be isolated or contained is what is relevant. His comfort is secondary as long. Torture isn't the intent. Imprisonment is. I'm not inflicting anymore pain than is strictly necessary to get the job done.

[Optimystik]

Yes, yes, as opposed to letting them go to an afterlife where they slave for their demonic overlords.

I find it odd that you consider that outcome to be bad (as any rational person would, even an evil one), yet don't consider saving them from that fate to be better than killing them and tossing them in a gem indefinitely. Which, by the way, is going to be a much more harrowing experience, since they know that if you drop that gem they're going to end up in their crappy afterlives anyway.


Secondly, it's not like they need to eat or sleep or anything or shack up with prison rapists. Mental pain is complicated and inter-related to physical pain, I'm sure. Do you actually need light stimuli if you don't actually have an organ that regulates your circadian rythyms, or for that matter, eyes? Such a debate is moot anyway.

Wrong, wrong, wrong. Mental pain is very possible even without a corporeal body; ghostly undead prove this all the time. They have no eyes or brain, yet they go insane and even feel sorrow (at least while their humanity is intact) just as we do.


Bringing us to the third point: Soul Bind is supposed to prevent an enemy from being revived from the dead. It isolates them from the world and polite society.

Which can be a good thing if that person is very dangerous. Whether it is pleasant for the prisoner is irrelevant. If I had a better method, I would definately consider it, but until then, sucks for him.

You very often have a better method, and so did V. I'm not saying that I would never, ever, under any circumstances use Soul Bind, but if I did I would be aware that I was committing an evil act.


EDIT: There's also an interesting tangent here. Does driving a soul irreversibly insane the same as killing it? I mean, if the mind and personality are incoherent, then it can hardly be said to be either.

Tormenting a foe is more evil than killing him quickly. Always.
Even if you don't want to believe BoVD, at least look at it logically; there's a whole word devoted to this very concept (euthanasia.)


Which leads to another interesting point: If the soul in question "merges" with some otherworldly plane in the afterlife, is used as magical fuel or takes on an entirely new incarnation (demon, spirit animal or whatever) can it even be said to the same soul?

If a hellish afterlife was going to destroy the soul, for the gain of Evil (capital E and all) what difference does it make to killing the soul beforehand for reals make?

Their punishment in the afterlife is a gain for Good, not Evil. It demonstrates to others that Evil gets its just desserts, and rightfully so. Withholding a soul from that punishment is only good if you intend to try and redeem it; An indefinite Soul Bind is just pointless delaying of the inevitable and torture to boot.

[Kish]

Would you consider what the mass murder wants as being relevant when he gets tossed into a high-security jail cell?
Yes. But much more importantly to this discussion, the law generally does as well. When a country's laws provide for someone who has broken the law to forfeit all rights and consideration, we call that country a banana republic or a dictatorship, and its ruler a monster. I didn't pull the phrase "cruel and unusual punishment" out of the air, you know. So you don't care what it's like for a murderer to be confined alone in a windowless cell for all eternity? Then we are done here.

[LurkerInPlayground]

My supernatural claims aren't unverified; they're common knowledge. Give me one spirit in any fantasy world forcibly chained to this plane that wasn't (a) miserable, (b) insane or (c) exercising some kind of duty.
The facts given relate to undead and according to you, not even all of those are evil. So that fact isn't pertinent. You assume that the pain is worse in a Soul Bind gem, but you have no other "precedent" for that.

So exactly why does it make a difference if you're miserable inside of soul can instead of a meat can? What makes imprisonment in one mode so different from the other.

Why are you so stuck on the undead argument? What does it change if I turned the prisoner into an undead that had to "do time" or "civil service" before passing on? Or barring that, simply kept him here until I destroyed him?

So you all you managed to say is that people hate having their freedoms restricted. Good for you. The thing is, that is actually justifiable under certain circumstances.

It wasn't the least bit relevant at all and hasn't become moreso since you last repeated it.


The fact that you refuse to accept a common literary device doesn't invalidate my examples, it only makes you look obdurate.
I'm well aware of the literary tropess. I want your reasoning. What is the rationale you would use under conditions x, y and z.


Uh, you don't have to care what they say; it's not your comic, it's the Giant's.
Yet you keep citing them like they're a substitute for actually giving me an answer that you've come to under your own power.

Whether I'm obdurate or not isn't really your problem. I'll thank you not to take shots into my psychological dark or presume that I'm angry at you, thank you very much.


Of course not, but it's a strong indication. For example, pretend you know nothing about Superman. If D.C. Comics then printed a comic whose cover read "Superman Meets His Evil Twin!" you would have compelling evidence to believe the current Superman is Good, despite knowing nothing else about him.
In short, you make your decisions on superficial appearances. The commonly accepted symbols that people use to represent good or evil.


Printing a spell, then a "good version" of that same spell means that at the very least the previous one has no Good application, and strongly implies that it is the moral opposite of the new one.
Come on, not everything is a dichotomy you know.


That Sanctify is Good, and that Soul Bind is evil, correct? I'm aware of that.
No you don't. Otherwise, you would know that proving one assertion wouldn't prove or disprove the other. I'm well aware you're talking about "dramatic sense" here. That's not what I'm talking about.



I never said Sanctify was part of OotS-verse; even if it was, I doubt anyone in the Order (except maybe Elan) would be willing to give up a level to reform his brother, and he can't cast it. But the fact that it's not usable doesn't make Soul Bind okay.
Great, we're finally on the same page here. Oh and thanks for contradicting yourself just now.


Precisely. Potential. Not IMMINENT harm, POTENTIAL. Should we go around slaughtering and binding every potential source of harm because we're unsure of our ability to keep them in check any other way?
No, just the justifiable ones.

And keep in mind that I'm clarifying what the poster you were replaying to was saying. So please don't say he wasn't listening to you. It's insulting.


By the way, even though you don't care about it, I'll cite the relevant portion of BoED for the benefit of those who do care about the rules.



Again the rules contradict you, but thankfully you don't get to decide which rules to ignore; Rich does.
Precisely my point. You don't get to make up facts that don't exist in the rules either.

Furthermore, I'm asking what your judgement is given the facts that you do have. Therefore, BoVD is inadmissible since it has never come up in the strip.

You can't defend the logic of your position by saying that you "care about the rules" and then pretend it's relevant after you say that the "Rich ignores rules."


Simplicity itself. That sacrifice must benefit another to be Good, like every other Good act.

Giving up food just to say "hey, I can go X days without eating! I'm so awesome" isn't a good act. Giving the food you would have eaten to the hungry instead, is.
Yes, and I wished you just say that instead of just throwing "good" and "self-sacrificing" in the same sentence.

If Sanctify did force people to reform (brainwashing) without their choice, I'd be hesitant to call it good. I call that "forcing your beliefs on others." I also find it somewhat incongruous that no evil creature decides that they still want to be evil.

I would personally want more details, but I find the spell pretty suspect.

You forgot that they don't have to be murdered first, that the spell has a limited duration that the target is aware of, and that in Soul Bind they are not shown anything - not their misdeeds, not their life choices, nothing at all. They are aware of time passing (at least in OotS-land) and that's it. And if you the caster forget, change your mind, get killed, lose the gem etc. then they are trapped forever. They are not the same spell, no matter how much you try to assert otherwise.
Unless you killed them in self-defense or legitimately executed them. A point I already made and am so tired of re-treading. But apparently you can't be bothered to acknowledge that I've said anything at all.

There is no moral obligation to redeem people if it's not possible and your only practical course of action is to contain a threat. If there were no option to redeem a person and the best I could do was to contain them, then it can hardly be said that I was evil because I didn't change that person's ways.

While it is admirable and "good" to redeem a person it can't be said that Soul Bind is evil exclusively based on the fact that the tool wasn't designed for it.

My glasses weren't built for redeeming people. They were made to help me see things. That doesn't make using my glasses evil.



That's where the will save comes in. The whole definition of a will save is having a strong enough sense of self to resist an attempt at coercion. If your conviction is too low for that, then you're clearly susceptible to having your mind changed. For example, an evil cleric would be much more convinced of the rightness of his chosen path than an evil fighter, and be harder to affect with this spell.
Dominate has a will save too. I dominate a good person to do an evil act. Therefore, that person wasn't really sure about his goodness. Clearly, failing a will save is a reflection of a person's moral priorities.


Right, and as soon as their usefulness runs out they are extinguished. No rational person would choose that existence if they were fully aware of the consequences. The spell shows them the inevitable result of their misdeeds and makes it felt on a cellular level; it presents those sins in whatever way is necessary to make them as horrified by those acts as a Good character would be, yet there is no fabrication. Evil is an inherently unnatural state, and the spell serves to make them realize that.
Again, you assume the spell shows them an afterlife. Unverified. Assertion.

And you still don't know that the afterlife doesn't present some acceptable risk when weighed against significant gain (e.g. becoming a demon lord). Maybe he thinks he has a good go a relatively prosperous position. So yes, a rational person could choose that. And that consideration doesn't include the possibilities of other evil afterlives.

[Optimystik]

Precisely my point. You don't get to make up facts that don't exist in the rules either.

Furthermore, I'm asking what your judgement is given the facts that you do have. Therefore, BoVD is inadmissible since it has never come up in the strip.

Wrong. (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0431.html)

With that taken care of, on to the rest of your argument.


The facts given relate to undead and according to you, not even all of those are evil. So that fact isn't pertinent. You assume that the pain is worse in a Soul Bind gem, but you have no other "precedent" for that.

So exactly why does it make a difference if you're miserable inside of soul can instead of a meat can? What makes imprisonment in one mode so different from the other.

Why are you so stuck on the undead argument? What does it change if I turned the prisoner into an undead that had to "do time" or "civil service" before passing on? Or barring that, simply kept him here until I destroyed him?

We're at an impasse here. You see shackling someone's soul as the same thing as shackling their physical body, though it clearly isn't. Kish, myself, magic9mushroom, have all been trying to make you see that, but you won't. If I tie someone up and they die, their soul isn't trapped in this world; if I kill and soul bind them, it is.

I pointed out the fact that in every fantasy world, not just D&D, that when a soul is bound to the material world against its will that it becomes miserable and goes insane, and that Soul Bind does exactly that, yet you have yet to find an example that refutes my claim.

As for the difference between the "meat can" and the "soul can," the prisoner locked up physically knows that at least when he dies his circumstances will change. The soulbound prisoner has absolutely no means of escape, can do nothing to affect or even ameliorate his position, and when it grows to be unbearable he can't even commit suicide because he's already dead. Yet you refuse to see how that can be torture.

Oh, and turning them into undead? Evil. BoVD: Every additional bit of the negative energy that powers undead leeches a little bit more of the positive feeling from the world by cancelling it out.


So you all you managed to say is that people hate having their freedoms restricted. Good for you. The thing is, that is actually justifiable under certain circumstances.

It wasn't the least bit relevant at all and hasn't become moreso since you last repeated it.

Sigh. Again, I never said that there was no situation where one couldn't justify the use of soul bind. But it would still be Evil, however necessary; a fact you refuse to accept.

I'm not saying you'd be chucked out of Celestia just for doing it, just as Roy wasn't chucked out for abandoning Elan because he made up for it later. But it would be a black mark, and enough of those would get you refused.


I'm well aware of the literary tropess. I want your reasoning. What is the rationale you would use under conditions x, y and z.

If you're aware of them, then why are you acting like they have no merit? How can condemning someone to madness and spiritual decay not be an evil act under ANY moral system?


Yet you keep citing them like they're a substitute for actually giving me an answer that you've come to under your own power.

Whether I'm obdurate or not isn't really your problem. I'll thank you not to take shots into my psychological dark or presume that I'm angry at you, thank you very much.

I think you should look up the meaning of obdurate before you accuse me of shooting anything. I never said you were angry.


In short, you make your decisions on superficial appearances. The commonly accepted symbols that people use to represent good or evil.

What? You're not making sense. What part of my example was superficial?


Come on, not everything is a dichotomy you know.

Not everything isn't either.


No you don't. Otherwise, you would know that proving one assertion wouldn't prove or disprove the other. I'm well aware you're talking about "dramatic sense" here. That's not what I'm talking about.

That assertion was just one bullet point on my list of evidence, actually. I wouldn't base my opinion of Soul Bind on just one thing.


Great, we're finally on the same page here. Oh and thanks for contradicting yourself just now.

Are you reading your posts anymore? I say Soul Bind isn't okay, which is what I've been saying all along, and I contradicted myself? How?


No, just the justifiable ones.

How would you justify that? You didn't even want to give Nale a trial. Even if you did, that authority extends only to his life and worldly possessions, not his soul.


And keep in mind that I'm clarifying what the poster you were replaying to was saying. So please don't say he wasn't listening to you. It's insulting.

I read your "clarification." Just about anything and anyone could be "potentially bad." That doesn't give us the right to pre-emptively murder them.


You can't defend the logic of your position by saying that you "care about the rules" and then pretend it's relevant after you say that the "Rich ignores rules."

I didn't say "Rich ignores rules," I said he decides which rules he wants to ignore. Don't put words in people's mouths, its insulting.


Yes, and I wished you just say that instead of just throwing "good" and "self-sacrificing" in the same sentence.

I didn't think I'd have to spell things out to that degree to you. Evidently I was wrong.


If Sanctify did force people to reform (brainwashing) without their choice, I'd be hesitant to call it good. I call that "forcing your beliefs on others." I also find it somewhat incongruous that no evil creature decides that they still want to be evil.

I would personally want more details, but I find the spell pretty suspect.

Obviously an evil person wouldn't look fondly upon the idea of being shown his moral bankruptcy in a gem for a year, but once he is truly exposed to the inevitable consequences of his current path, he'll change his mind without fail. You yourself said that any evil creature would hate the idea of "slaving for its demonic overlords," so why don't you accept that redemption?


Unless you killed them in self-defense or legitimately executed them. A point I already made and am so tired of re-treading. But apparently you can't be bothered to acknowledge that I've said anything at all.

If you killed them in self-defense, or even executed them, then their imminent threat is over and done with: binding them after that can't be defined as a continuation of that self-defense. Your example is flawed.


There is no moral obligation to redeem people if it's not possible and your only practical course of action is to contain a threat. If there were no option to redeem a person and the best I could do was to contain them, then it can hardly be said that I was evil because I didn't change that person's ways.

While it is admirable and "good" to redeem a person it can't be said that Soul Bind is evil exclusively based on the fact that the tool wasn't designed for it.

The only way you can think of to "contain" someone - especially a helpless prisoner - is to execute them and stuff their soul into a gem? And obviously you aren't required to redeem every villain you come across, don't be ludicrous.

If that one act was your only Evil one, I doubt anyone would say you as a person were Evil. But the binding would still be an evil act.


My glasses weren't built for redeeming people. They were made to help me see things. That doesn't make using my glasses evil.

Do your glasses require you to kill someone and shove their soul inside? Because that would make them evil.


Dominate has a will save too. I dominate a good person to do an evil act. Therefore, that person wasn't really sure about his goodness. Clearly, failing a will save is a reflection of a person's moral priorities.

Again with the straw men. I didn't say Will had anything to do with morality. Will represents someone's personal conviction and strength of mind. The more of it you have, the more you can resist mental influence. Monks, Psions, Clerics, all prove this.


Again, you assume the spell shows them an afterlife. Unverified. Assertion.

Words in my mouth yet again. Obviously it doesn't show them the actual afterlife - what do you think it does, open a window into the Nine Hells? I said it shows them their misdeeds and makes them feel the true horror of their evil.

And while we're on the subject of unverified claims, how many of those evil souls you mentioned become vassals, and how many become fodder? If the evildoer is dumb enough to think his chances of being one of the former are high, how can it not be a kindness to save him from his own folly?


And you still don't know that the afterlife doesn't present some acceptable risk when weighed against significant gain (e.g. becoming a demon lord). Maybe he thinks he has a good go a relatively prosperous position. So yes, a rational person could choose that. And that consideration doesn't include the possibilities of other evil afterlives.

If he thinks he has a good shot at rising in the echelons of Baator or the Abyss, then he can't possibly be rational. If evil characters really thought they'd have it so good in hell, why aren't they in any hurry to get there? The whole point of the evil afterlife is that it *sucks*, which is one of the reasons ALL evildoers do their best to stay here and postpone that trip as long as possible.

[B. Dandelion]

There are none. Sometimes evil acts are necessary, but that doesn't make committing them any more Good. Sometimes, it doesn't even make them Neutral. I firmly believe murdering someone and sealing their soul in a gem to be one of those acts.

Again, I would do it if I had to, and readily accept the consequences if I believed myself to be in the right, but believing there would be no consequences is naive at best and dangerous at worst.
You do realize that section wasn't directed at you? Magic mushroom did mention certain mitigating circumstances.


Not to get too much into religion, but Jesus didn't exactly ask everyone's permission before making his sacrifice either. That's the line of thought this spell is emulating.
No it completely is not -- this is hitting on the exact distinction I'm trying to make here. Note that I'm not religious. It is true enough Jesus didn't take a public opinion poll before allowing himself to be sacrificed. But the outcome was not a world where people were coerced into a different frame of mind. The idea is that his sacrifice opens up the opportunity of salvation. When was that opportunity not available to the person subject to the hypothetical D&D spell? They just chose not to take it. By contrast this spell serves to actually take away a person's choices.


Besides, alignment-changing spells and effects existed long before BoED. I listed some earlier but apparently they bear repeating - Helm of Opposite Alignment, Deck of Many Things, misfired incantations, even the Atonement spell.
Are they listed as automatically good if the outcome leads a person to goodness? I'd think they'd be neutral on the whole. And don't people have to ask for the Atonement spell to really work? Nothing wrong with that.


You're begging the question: In what way is it "hurting" them?You need to provide reasons why Sanctify would cause pain just as I did for Soul Bind.
Something has to cause physical pain to be a "hurt?" Also, is Sanctify somehow "more pleasant" in its execution? Like you have Muzak pumped in to your spiritual prison or something? (Wait, no, that sounds worse. Let's say Muzak for Soul Bind and you get control of the radio for the other.) I thought the key difference was the duration.

Aside from that I didn't actually make the claim it was hurting anyone. I was replying to the section in which you cited Sanctify's "evil-only" effects as an indication of its moral superiority. I question whether this is a valid argument for calling any kind of tool the "Good" version of one that does not discriminate. "Better" is not "Good."


Whether it was cited as a reason or not, that's still a key difference between Sanctify and Soul Bind and must be considered when evaluating the two spells.
It's a difference, but I question its relevance to an argument as to either spell's supposed inherent morality. You want to bring it up, fine, but I fail to see how it makes a difference.


You're not listening. Unlike Soul Bind, with Sanctify you do not kill the target first. No, they don't "come back to life" because they never died to begin with.
That wasn't really what I was getting at. Lurker was spot-on in clarifying it for me, but for the sake of being thorough: you cast a hugely expensive spell that may result in an evil character's change of heart. If it fails, he/she/it comes back into the world with the primary change of now harboring a personal vendetta. That makes it sound even less useful than before, I would think it would generally not be preferable to a simple execution. Though I suppose that has no bearing on the question of its morality. So never mind, I guess.


Self-sacrifice has always been Good's most potent weapon. For a classic non-D&D example, I point you to the entire Harry Potter series.
Does the fact that it is often used by good characters to good effect translate into saying that self-sacrifice is both always and inherently good?


The spell duplicates what the evil soul would have experienced in the afterlife anyway: a recounting of its misdeeds during life. The only difference is that the result is redemption instead of damnation. Unless you consider every soul's judgment to be "mental rape," you can't consider this spell to be that way either.
Where does anyone get off subjecting another person to that kind of final judgment? You are taking matters of good and evil into your own hands. Its incredible hubris.


Why? As I said before, self-sacrifice is Good's most powerful tool and has always been. What's repugnant about that?
I just have this thing where I find it rude to brainwash people.


As for the rule quotes, here's a few:

"No caster can draw on Sanctified Magic without being changed for the better as a result." -Page 7

I'd say this one is the closest to what I was looking for, but still doesn't make that argument. It does not make every act of sacrifice one of "Sanctified Magic" nor does it say that the eventual outcome will always be Good, saving for the positive effects it has on the caster.

[thalandus]

I think (s)he is neutral good, heading towards true neutral. I would say V is heading towards true neutral because of V's focus towards his scrying spells, ignoring the pleas of people who need his help. I don't think V is chaotic, because that would mean he is heading towards chaotic neutral IMO, which he definitely is not. I cannot imagine him as CN, he is too focused. Although you could characterize some of his earlier behaviour (random disintegrates) as chaotic. The idea of him being evil was thwarted by his disdain of evil beings, such as the offer Qarr made. His disgust was partly moral, and partly practical.

[Optimystik]

You do realize that section wasn't directed at you? Magic mushroom did mention certain mitigating circumstances.

I know it wasn't directed at me but answered it anyway, because m9m and I share the same view: Soul Bind is evil regardless of why its used. Now, you could make a convincing argument to your deva during Review Day that you had no choice, or you did X Good deeds afterward to make up for it (just like Roy attempted to explain his abandonment of Elan to the bandits), but ultimately it would still be a black mark, whether it was sufficient to bar you from Celestia or not.


No it completely is not -- this is hitting on the exact distinction I'm trying to make here. Note that I'm not religious. It is true enough Jesus didn't take a public opinion poll before allowing himself to be sacrificed. But the outcome was not a world where people were coerced into a different frame of mind. The idea is that his sacrifice opens up the opportunity of salvation. When was that opportunity not available to the person subject to the hypothetical D&D spell? They just chose not to take it. By contrast this spell serves to actually take away a person's choices.

Fair enough, I can understand that; given the opportunity to convince rather than coerce, I personally would be more inclined to convince someone to change their ways. But look at it this way; Because evil is an inherently unnatural state and destructive to the world, one could easily argue that any evil creature could be convinced to reform himself if given the proper perspective on his actions. No soul is beyond redemption. All this spell does, therefore, is find that perspective with 100% accuracy, and it does so using the targets own memories and deeply repressed feelings of guilt.


Are they listed as automatically good if the outcome leads a person to goodness? I'd think they'd be neutral on the whole. And don't people have to ask for the Atonement spell to really work? Nothing wrong with that.

Of course they're neutral (unaligned) as a whole, because they work both ways. They can turn good to evil as well as evil to good. Sanctify is purely Good because it's a one-way street. It also requires a significant self-sacrifice towards that Good end, far moreso than the other items or spells that change alignment.


Something has to cause physical pain to be a "hurt?" Also, is Sanctify somehow "more pleasant" in its execution? Like you have Muzak pumped in to your spiritual prison or something? (Wait, no, that sounds worse. Let's say Muzak for Soul Bind and you get control of the radio for the other.) I thought the key difference was the duration.

Aside from that I didn't actually make the claim it was hurting anyone. I was replying to the section in which you cited Sanctify's "evil-only" effects as an indication of its moral superiority. I question whether this is a valid argument for calling any kind of tool "better" than one that doesn't discriminate.

What? I didn't say anything about physical pain.

Yes, I believe the fact that Sanctify affects only evil creatures to be evidence of its moral superiority. You can't use it, for instance, to force neutral characters to become pious or self-sacrificing. But you can soul bind a neutral person with ease. (As much 'ease' as it takes to cast a 9th level spell, anyway.)


It's a difference, but I question its relevance to an argument as to either spell's supposed inherent morality. You want to bring it up, fine, but I fail to see how it makes a difference.

One spell requires murder as a prerequisite, one doesn't. Even if you say "It's fine if I kill them in self-defense", self-defense ends when they're dead on the floor in front of you; how can you rationalize binding at that point?


That wasn't really what I was getting at. Lurker was spot-on in clarifying it for me, but for the sake of being thorough: you cast a hugely expensive spell that may result in an evil character's change of heart. If it fails, he/she/it comes back into the world with the primary change of now harboring a personal vendetta. That makes it sound even less useful than before, I would think it would generally not be preferable to a simple execution. Though I suppose that has no bearing on the question of its morality. So never mind, I guess.

StW *will* result in a change of heart as long as it isn't disrupted. No soul is beyond redemption.

If it is, the spell states they reform exactly as they were at casting; the only difference is that they hate you for locking them away. But they'd probably hate you if they escaped a Soul Bind too, or if you killed them and they got resurrected, or if you Dominated them, or even if you just tossed them in an ordinary mundane cell. The shot at redemption that sets Sanctify apart from these other options makes it worth the risk, especially since the only person incurring additional risk is you. It doesn't make them more evil than they were before.


Does the fact that it is often used by good characters to good effect translate into saying that self-sacrifice is both always and inherently good?

I clarified this to Lurker earlier but I'll do it again; self-sacrifice must either (a) benefit someone else or (b) result in the sacrificer's greater spiritual awareness, to be inherently good.

Monk starts fasting: Neutral.
Monk starts fasting and gives the extra food to the poor: Good.
Monk starts fasting and experiences spiritual growth: Also Good.


Where does anyone get off subjecting another person to that kind of final judgment? You are taking matters of good and evil into your own hands. Its incredible hubris.

That's why I feel the sacrifice component is such an important part of this. Permanently weakening yourself to save this person's soul from damnation proves that you aren't doing it just to assert your dominance over his morality; instead, it shows that you care so much about his welfare that you're willing to give up some of your own soul's energy to save him. Where's the hubris in that?


I just have this thing where I find it rude to brainwash people.

I think it's just a tiny bit ruder to let them play footstool to a demon for eternity instead when you can do something about it.

Keep in mind also that this spell isn't meant for you to run around saving everyone you can; the Sacrifice component makes that impossible. Rather, you save it for that one individual (say, a demon or a dragon) that you know could do tremendous amounts of Good if only shown the error of its ways. Even then you have to be extremely certain, because not only can they both resist it (unlike Soul Bind) and save against it, you'll end up weaker and less able to defend yourself if things don't work out the way you plan.


I'd say this one is the closest to what I was looking for, but still doesn't make that argument. It does not make every act of sacrifice one of "Sanctified Magic" nor does it say that the eventual outcome will always be Good, saving for the positive effects it has on the caster.

Sacrifice for others is always Good. Always.

Giving up something for the hell of it is definitely not what I meant.

[B. Dandelion]

I know it wasn't directed at me but answered it anyway, because m9m and I share the same view: Soul Bind is evil regardless of why its used. Now, you could make a convincing argument to your deva during Review Day that you had no choice, or you did X Good deeds afterward to make up for it (just like Roy attempted to explain his abandonment of Elan to the bandits), but ultimately it would still be a black mark, whether it was sufficient to bar you from Celestia or not.
Well we're not actually disagreeing here...


Fair enough, I can understand that; given the opportunity to convince rather than coerce, I personally would be more inclined to convince someone to change their ways. But look at it this way; Because evil is an inherently unnatural state and destructive to the world, one could easily argue that any evil creature could be convinced to reform himself if given the proper perspective on his actions. No soul is beyond redemption. All this spell does, therefore, is find that perspective with 100% accuracy, and it does so using the targets own memories and deeply repressed feelings of guilt.
Clarify something for me: your statement that "evil is an inherently unnatural state." Is this considered D&D canon? Like I said earlier if that's the philosophical framework we're operating in it's much harder to argue against your point. I didn't quite get that impression in OOTS (especially considering Start of Darkness) though.


Of course they're neutral (unaligned) as a whole, because they work both ways. They can turn good to evil as well as evil to good. Sanctify is purely Good because it's a one-way street. It also requires a significant self-sacrifice towards that Good end, far moreso than the other items or spells that change alignment.
I don't exactly mean they'd balance out at neutral. Is putting enchanted items of alignment change on evil people considered a good act? Also is Sanctify the only spell that only goes evil-to-good?


What? I didn't say anything about physical pain.
Mea culpa. You asked in what way it would be hurting them. I had thought you were dismissing what I would have considered the most obvious hurt of denying a person their free will.


Yes, I believe the fact that Sanctify affects only evil creatures to be evidence of its moral superiority. You can't use it, for instance, to force neutral characters to become pious or self-sacrificing. But you can soul bind a neutral person with ease. (As much 'ease' as it takes to cast a 9th level spell, anyway.)
::sigh:: No, you're completely right here in your dispute of what I wrote. Which I had immediately realized was phrased poorly and went back to edit but you are way too damn fast. Yeah, Sanctify is "Better" than Soul Bind. What I meant to ask is whether that makes the use of it "Good."


One spell requires murder as a prerequisite, one doesn't. Even if you say "It's fine if I kill them in self-defense", self-defense ends when they're dead on the floor in front of you; how can you rationalize binding at that point?
You're already rationalizing it as being "for their own good." That's the entire reason you're using it instead of something else, since in most circumstances it's a lot more difficult than the majority of your other options.


StW *will* result in a change of heart as long as it isn't disrupted. No soul is beyond redemption.
Yeah? I'm not wild about this concept, even allowing for that second statement to be true. But that's irrelevant to this discussion. I stand corrected.


If it is, the spell states they reform exactly as they were at casting; the only difference is that they hate you for locking them away. But they'd probably hate you if they escaped a Soul Bind too, or if you killed them and they got resurrected, or if you Dominated them, or even if you just tossed them in an ordinary mundane cell. The shot at redemption that sets Sanctify apart from these other options makes it worth the risk, especially since the only person incurring additional risk is you. It doesn't make them more evil than they were before.
Well now wait a minute. You are not only putting yourself at risk. If you've defeated someone who poses a threat to every person they come in contact with, and you opt to use the one weapon in your arsenal that might result in a happy ending for everyone including the villain, and something goes haywire? You are not the only person who stands to suffer in that scenario. Of course it goes without saying that no solution is guaranteed, or that this one would always be more dangerous than the others -- but if something did go wrong where other options would have worked...


I clarified this to Lurker earlier but I'll do it again; self-sacrifice must either (a) benefit someone else or (b) result in the sacrificer's greater spiritual awareness, to be inherently good.

Monk starts fasting: Neutral.
Monk starts fasting and gives the extra food to the poor: Good.
Monk starts fasting and experiences spiritual growth: Also Good.
The problem is that not everyone would see eye-to-eye on what we could call "beneficial." It's quite possible to do something for someone else that you would consider a kindness but they wouldn't appreciate at all. This isn't a perfect example, but consider the practice of Chinese foot binding. Better yet, FGM. It's the mothers who do it to their daughters, with the intent of giving them a better life. The might not be able to get a husband at all, otherwise, so to NOT do it might be seen as the greater cruelty. But in the West we consider it barbaric. How COULD you do that to your child... etc. Probably we wound up with a lot of daughters who resented their mothers either for doing it or NOT doing it, even though whatever choice they made it was probably with their child's best interests at heart.

I can see where we'd get the assumption that turning a person "good" would automatically be considered doing them a favor. Especially since afterwords, they'd probably thank you for it. But I don't know that that's reliable logic. Think about what the outcome would be if you turned a person EVIL for their own benefit. They might STILL thank you (doesn't mean they might not kill you anyway) for "opening their eyes" and so on. How do you define "beneficial"? What if you turned a person good, when if they'd stayed evil, they would have had the talents and the desire to wind up running the show down in hell? And were SATISFIED with that. Is that not "real" satisfaction -- the only real satisfaction descends from Goodness? Maybe... but are WE the ones who get to make that call?


That's why I feel the sacrifice component is such an important part of this. Permanently weakening yourself to save this person's soul from damnation proves that you aren't doing it just to assert your dominance over his morality;
Weakening yourself in what way? If it's all about showing your moral superiority you haven't touched the aspect of yourself you are most preoccupied with.


instead, it shows that you care so much about his welfare that you're willing to give up some of your own soul's energy to save him. Where's the hubris in that?
You think that's the only motive that goes in to it?


I think it's just a tiny bit ruder to let them play footstool to a demon for eternity instead when you can do something about it.
Which is the greater sin: to deny a person their freedom (especially mental freedom, here), or their happiness? Is this a question with a definitive answer? Also I imagine there might be some change in interpretation if we're talking about a hell people are condemned to forever verses one that allows eventual redemption if it's wanted.


Keep in mind also that this spell isn't meant for you to run around saving everyone you can; the Sacrifice component makes that impossible. Rather, you save it for that one individual (say, a demon or a dragon) that you know could do tremendous amounts of Good if only shown the error of its ways. Even then you have to be extremely certain, because not only can they both resist it (unlike Soul Bind) and save against it, you'll end up weaker and less able to defend yourself if things don't work out the way you plan.
The rarity of it is still not winning me over.


Sacrifice for others is always Good. Always.

Giving up something for the hell of it is definitely not what I meant.
Wasn't what I meant, either. I'm having a certain problem here with the implicit assumption that YOUR definition of good or beneficial is the one we have to operate under when you make that sacrifice on my behalf.

[Optimystik]

Clarify something for me: your statement that "evil is an inherently unnatural state." Is this considered D&D canon? Like I said earlier if that's the philosophical framework we're operating in it's much harder to argue against your point. I didn't quite get that impression in OOTS (especially considering Start of Darkness) though.

I didn't see anything in OotS to counter that assumption. Belkar is repeatedly described as "twisted"; Xykon clearly is unnatural; Redcloak knows he is doing evil things (particularly his association with a psychotic lich) but considers it necessary for his race. In fact, BoED would consider certain events in SoD to be anathema:Such as when the Paladins sack Redcloak's village; BoED states that attacking a tribe of orcs that have done nothing wrong is unjust, even if they are evil.

But if it's a rulebook quote you wanted, look no further than the opening paragraph of BoVD: "Evil is vile, corrupt, and irredeemably dark. It is not naughty or ill-tempered or misunderstood. It is black-hearted, selfish, cruel, bloodthirsty, and malevolent." BoVD goes on to mention the effects that particularly evil acts (like being the site of a mass murder) or presences (a lich or archfiend), can have on a location in the material plane and the creatures that live there, including but not limited to: preventing plant life from growing there, turning neutral creatures like animals evil, making mundane objects gradually warp and grow cold, and causing nightmares and neuroses in intelligent beings living nearby.


I don't exactly mean they'd balance out at neutral. Is putting enchanted items of alignment change on evil people considered a good act? Also is Sanctify the only spell that only goes evil-to-good?

For the first question, it is not, because there is no sacrifice involved in that. BoED makes it clear that it is the sacrifice involved that makes Sanctify Good, not merely the result. Even spells that usually accomplish Good ends (such as healing spells) don't get the Good descriptor because their relative goodness depends heavily on circumstances. But because Sanctified Magic requires not only Good casters, but Good acts (i.e. the sacrifices) to work, they do.

For the second question, it's the only sanctified spell that changes the target's alignment, and I think the only spell that forces evil to good only.


::sigh:: No, you're completely right here in your dispute of what I wrote. Which I had immediately realized was phrased poorly and went back to edit but you are way too damn fast. Yeah, Sanctify is "Better" than Soul Bind. What I meant to ask is whether that makes the use of it "Good."

Both its means (invoking large amounts of positive energy, requiring meaningful sacrifice from the caster) and its ends (redemption of a villain, resulting in a 2-point swing for Team Holy) make it Good. How could it be anything else?


You're already rationalizing it as being "for their own good." That's the entire reason you're using it instead of something else, since in most circumstances it's a lot more difficult than the majority of your other options.

Binding isn't for their own good. It might be for yours, or the welfare of the villain's potential future victims, but he gets nothing spiritual out of the experience besides downtime, which is tedious at best and torment at worst. Worse, he has no hope of escape, even to his rightful judgment, which sets this treatment apart from prison.


Yeah? I'm not wild about this concept, even allowing for that second statement to be true. But that's irrelevant to this discussion. I stand corrected.

I can't see why you wouldn't like it. From a philosophical standpoint, it would save the villain's soul from damnation, no matter how dark his deeds were before Sanctification. From a game standpoint, it opens all kinds of interesting avenues, such as Good-aligned mind flayers, demons, vampires and chromatic dragons. (BoED includes a good mind flayer monk as an example of a Sanctified creature.) And in a very real sense, it's not against his will, because once he is redeemed the very thought of returning to his old ways is repugnant to him - as it should be.

I see it more akin to pulling a veil away from the villain's eyes than imposing some kind of 'conformity ray' on him.


Well now wait a minute. You are not only putting yourself at risk. If you've defeated someone who poses a threat to every person they come in contact with, and you opt to use the one weapon in your arsenal that might result in a happy ending for everyone including the villain, and something goes haywire? You are not the only person who stands to suffer in that scenario. Of course it goes without saying that no solution is guaranteed, or that this one would always be more dangerous than the others -- but if something did go wrong where other options would have worked...

You've touched on another powerful distinction between Sanctify and Soul Bind. If something goes wrong during the former, both you and the villain go back to square one (though you are likely out a rather expensive diamond), and you're free to try another strategy if need be. Soul Bind, on the other hand, is irrevocable; if redemption has failed (which it likely will, given that they are locked in a box), their soul passes on to eternal torment and you will have jeopardized your own for nothing at all.


The problem is that not everyone would see eye-to-eye on what we could call "beneficial." It's quite possible to do something for someone else that you would consider a kindness but they wouldn't appreciate at all. This isn't a perfect example, but consider the practice of Chinese foot binding. Better yet, FGM. It's the mothers who do it to their daughters, with the intent of giving them a better life. The might not be able to get a husband at all, otherwise, so to NOT do it might be seen as the greater cruelty. But in the West we consider it barbaric. How COULD you do that to your child... etc. Probably we wound up with a lot of daughters who resented their mothers either for doing it or NOT doing it, even though whatever choice they made it was probably with their child's best interests at heart.

The spell's provision that it only target evil creatures prevents it from being used for oppression. It targets only the soul, which has willfully been made dark and evil,


I can see where we'd get the assumption that turning a person "good" would automatically be considered doing them a favor. Especially since afterwords, they'd probably thank you for it. But I don't know that that's reliable logic. Think about what the outcome would be if you turned a person EVIL for their own benefit. They might STILL thank you (doesn't mean they might not kill you anyway) for "opening their eyes" and so on. How do you define "beneficial"? What if you turned a person good, when if they'd stayed evil, they would have had the talents and the desire to wind up running the show down in hell? And were SATISFIED with that. Is that not "real" satisfaction -- the only real satisfaction descends from Goodness? Maybe... but are WE the ones who get to make that call?

That's just it, turning them evil cannot be for their own benefit. Only the evil to good path can lead to that favorable outcome. It is not a call to be made lightly... but if the alternative for that soul is an eternity of damnation and I was convinced of the good they could do otherwise, I would take the gamble.

Keep in mind that the process is reversible; the target is free to become evil again, and indeed may be likely to do so if the reasons it became evil in the first place are both compelling and still present. This spell gives those characters who were evil for psychotic ("Cause it's fun!") or racial reasons a chance to maintain their redemption.

Furthermore, the sacrifice involved ensures that neither I nor any other caster would succumb to false pride and think we could change the world all on our own.


Weakening yourself in what way? If it's all about showing your moral superiority you haven't touched the aspect of yourself you are most preoccupied with.

Mechanically, the price is humongous. A 10,000 GP minimum diamond plus an entire level is steeper than Wish, Miracle and True Resurrection. But Sanctified Magic this powerful demands no less.


You think that's the only motive that goes in to it?

If you see another, by all means enlighten me.


Which is the greater sin: to deny a person their freedom (especially mental freedom, here), or their happiness? Is this a question with a definitive answer? Also I imagine there might be some change in interpretation if we're talking about a hell people are condemned to forever verses one that allows eventual redemption if it's wanted.

D&D hell is the one we're talking about here; if you're in it, it's too late for redemption (barring a rez giving the evildoer a second chance.)


The rarity of it is still not winning me over.

That rarity, stemming from the difficulty of casting, is in direct opposition to your concerns about hubris and abuse.


Wasn't what I meant, either. I'm having a certain problem here with the implicit assumption that YOUR definition of good or beneficial is the one we have to operate under when you make that sacrifice on my behalf.

It isn't my definition; whichever entity processes souls in D&D would decide where to send an evildoer. In a broad view of D&D, you either go to hell when you die or you don't. Soul Bind both delays the inevitable and torments souls in the process; Sanctify does neither.

[LurkerInPlayground]

Wrong. (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0431.html)

With that taken care of, on to the rest of your argument.



We're at an impasse here. You see shackling someone's soul as the same thing as shackling their physical body, though it clearly isn't. Kish, myself, magic9mushroom, have all been trying to make you see that, but you won't. If I tie someone up and they die, their soul isn't trapped in this world; if I kill and soul bind them, it is.
No, you're wrong. The "example" you cited shows nothing about them being insane or miserable. In fact, they're quite gleeful about being adequately-alive, with the exception of the Eye of the Flame and Fear. And he might be described as being nervous from coercion of a different source.

Xykon positively loves being undead.

And it's still irrelevant.

And don't misrepresent mushroom, since her entire point is that we're both wrong for presuming anything. Secondly, Kish is not up to date on the argument and hasn't been given the finer points of my argument.


I pointed out the fact that in every fantasy world, not just D&D, that when a soul is bound to the material world against its will that it becomes miserable and goes insane, and that Soul Bind does exactly that, yet you have yet to find an example that refutes my claim.
Unverified. Assertion. Also, directly refuted above. And you just said that things like Baelnorns are a clear example of the opposite.


As for the difference between the "meat can" and the "soul can," the prisoner locked up physically knows that at least when he dies his circumstances will change. The soulbound prisoner has absolutely no means of escape, can do nothing to affect or even ameliorate his position, and when it grows to be unbearable he can't even commit suicide because he's already dead. Yet you refuse to see how that can be torture.
Thereby prison is torture. Everything you just described applies 90% of the time to prisons. (Yes, that is a completely made-up statistic that I just pulled.)

Do you have any idea how miserable mundane prison is? Or do you just pitiably assert that it's not that bad? You're literally robbing a person of large spans of their natural life. Soul Bind only robs them of a small fraction of eternity. Less than either if I release a soul directly after they've ceased being a threat. (Imprisoned, destroyed or neutralized his allies and resources.)

Read up on the Standford Prison Experiment. Merely the social context of the student volunteers as prisoners was unbearable to the point that the experiment had to be ended early.

And that's just from the "guards" bullying prisoners.

You also hear stories of kids cracking after a one-nighter merely being in the county jail.

There is no such external pressure inside of a one-man cell of hyper-abstraction.


Oh, and turning them into undead? Evil. BoVD: Every additional bit of the negative energy that powers undead leeches a little bit more of the positive feeling from the world by cancelling it out.
Baelnorns. Benign guardian spirits.

Argument invalidated.

You view the cancellation of vaguely-defined positive and negative energy as inherently bad. I don't see what would lead to this conclusion. It's abstract and it's not what causes suffering or misery, although it is occasionally the mechanic by which damage is inflicted.

So is swinging a hammer on a nail.


Sigh. Again, I never said that there was no situation where one couldn't justify the use of soul bind. But it would still be Evil, however necessary; a fact you refuse to accept.
Or you're the one being obdurate.

You're nitpicking the word you're calling it, even though it's morally neutral. Even though you yourself would justify its use. Good or evil comes exclusively from the use you put it to. You can still be said to serve the general cause of altruism, even if it's at the expense of a single individual other than yourself.


If you're aware of them, then why are you acting like they have no merit? How can condemning someone to madness and spiritual decay not be an evil act under ANY moral system?
Irrelevant. I was asking that you present logic, not cite external authorities (e.g. BoVD) on the assumption that they are correct. No appeals to emotion or ethos are necessary on this point.


I think you should look up the meaning of obdurate before you accuse me of shooting anything. I never said you were angry.
You told me to calm down. So yes, it was implied.


What? You're not making sense. What part of my example was superficial?
If I see a printed bit of material telling me that Superman is good, even if I know nothing else about Superman, and accept its word unconditionally then I'm using superficial judgments.

And just because it says Superman is fighting somebody for that issue, it doesn't automatically follow that his enemy is necessarily evil either.


Not everything isn't either.
Gee, then that leaves the burden of evidence on you, doesn't it?


That assertion was just one bullet point on my list of evidence, actually. I wouldn't base my opinion of Soul Bind on just one thing.
You don't have evidence. You have conclusions drawn based on supernatural claims that have no precedent.


Are you reading your posts anymore? I say Soul Bind isn't okay, which is what I've been saying all along, and I contradicted myself? How?
You're saying that if Sanctify doesn't exist, it doesn't make Soul Bind automatically okay.

Correspondingly, claiming that Sanctify is "good" doesn't automatically make Soul Bind bad.

Yet you argue that the indication that Sanctify is nominally "good" implies that Soul Bind is "evil." You get wishy-washy and only say it's a strong hint. Then you segue into your Superman example.

So yes, you were contradicting yourself. You can't both have your cake and eat it.


How would you justify that? You didn't even want to give Nale a trial. Even if you did, that authority extends only to his life and worldly possessions, not his soul.
Okay, now I have to tell you to listen. I'm getting tired of you expecting me to refute your clumsy metaphors -- but you can't be bothered to keep track of my arguments or address them.

I do not necessarily acknowledge gods as a pertinent legal authority. Just because they're stronger doesn't mean they're right. And I established that if I bear my own responsibility, then it is not impossible to make my own judgment while sticking to some basic universal code of ethics.

This is particularly true because not everybody is equipped or able to handle the problems that adventurers deal with. They have greater responsibilities and can even kill sentient beings without it coming up in a court of law. That law is assumed to be distant. That's part of what makes D&D work.

Whether they are being moral or not in exercising their powers is irrelevant when we're talking about legal jurisdiction.

Likewise, just because it's not legal doesn't mean that it isn't "good" or "right." Whether I give a trial or not is completely irrelevant to whether or not Soul Bind is evil.


I read your "clarification." Just about anything and anyone could be "potentially bad." That doesn't give us the right to pre-emptively murder them.
See below.


I didn't say "Rich ignores rules," I said he decides which rules he wants to ignore. Don't put words in people's mouths, its insulting.
It is the basic thrust of your argument. Apologies if you took offense.

You're trying to say that BoVD is somehow relevant and keep stubbornly citing it then contradict yourself by saying that Rich will pick his own rules to ignore or obey. Contradiction.


I didn't think I'd have to spell things out to that degree to you. Evidently I was wrong.
I'm not even going to bother here. Since I really don't want to have to scroll back up just for this.


Obviously an evil person wouldn't look fondly upon the idea of being shown his moral bankruptcy in a gem for a year, but once he is truly exposed to the inevitable consequences of his current path, he'll change his mind without fail. You yourself said that any evil creature would hate the idea of "slaving for its demonic overlords," so why don't you accept that redemption?

If you killed them in self-defense, or even executed them, then their imminent threat is over and done with: binding them after that can't be defined as a continuation of that self-defense. Your example is flawed.
No it isn't. He can be raised. If I legitimate reason to suspect that he is a persistent repeat offender capable of being rezzed repeatedly, then it is not unreasonable to take extra steps.

I wish you'd stop being so incoherent and realize that when you claim that you would use Soul Bind under sufficient justification you're doing so under the idea that it is a continuation of self-defense.

Either that or you're just conveniently forgetting your own position in the classical style of apologetics.


The only way you can think of to "contain" someone - especially a helpless prisoner - is to execute them and stuff their soul into a gem? And obviously you aren't required to redeem every villain you come across, don't be ludicrous.
*sigh* Don't throw rhetoric at me that I already know how to answer and that I know you can answer for youself: No it is not the only way.

I have been saying this in one form or another, or have implied it in the arguments I've used, over-and-over-and-over. This is the second time in this post *alone.* If I think one alternative isn't necessarily eviller than the other, than I think there is more than one means to accomplish a "good" end. Pay attention.

I'm not obligated. That's above-and-beyond because sometimes it's simply impossible.

My glasses are designed for seeing. Just because it wasn't designed for redeeming doesn't make it an evil tool. Forget the soul-stuffing part for a second and think that through a bit, then read on.

Remember that thing I said about how you should treat assertions for both spells separately? Yeah. Saying that Sanctify is a spell with expanded capabilities just says it's a more powerful tool than Soul Bind. Sanctify being a better tool doesn't make Soul Bind evil. (And no, I don't grant that Sanctify is better.)


If that one act was your only Evil one, I doubt anyone would say you as a person were Evil. But the binding would still be an evil act.
Semantics. Addressed earlier.


Again with the straw men. I didn't say Will had anything to do with morality. Will represents someone's personal conviction and strength of mind. The more of it you have, the more you can resist mental influence. Monks, Psions, Clerics, all prove this.
Apparently you don't know what a strawman is. If your argument seems simple when I summarize it for you, it's because it is that simple and easy to knock over. Your argument was that simple to begin with.

Your example is that an evil character failing a will save did so because he was having doubts about his adopted philosophical position.

So in essence, that is what you are claiming -- that failing Will saves represent shaky rationale for an adopted philosophical position.

That does not universally apply when I can just Dominate you. Just because you had a moment of "moral weakness" doesn't necessarily make your beliefs any less legitimate or solidly thought-through.



And while we're on the subject of unverified claims, how many of those evil souls you mentioned become vassals, and how many become fodder? If the evildoer is dumb enough to think his chances of being one of the former are high, how can it not be a kindness to save him from his own folly?

If he thinks he has a good shot at rising in the echelons of Baator or the Abyss, then he can't possibly be rational. If evil characters really thought they'd have it so good in hell, why aren't they in any hurry to get there? The whole point of the evil afterlife is that it *sucks*, which is one of the reasons ALL evildoers do their best to stay here and postpone that trip as long as possible.
It isn't an unverified claim, because it's not even a claim to begin with. It is not a statement of fact. Merely a statement of possibility.

A person could perfectly well think this given an assessment of their abilities.

And it is hard to call it insane when there have been past examples in D&D where it might be possible to cut a deal beforehand for a "fast track promotion."

It may be possible that Nale has just such an arrangement.

You also need to get rid of this ridiculous notion that evil is not rational or natural. It can be precisely both. Hitler exterminated the Jews rationally and nobody induced him to it artificially. He did it within in full possession of his senses and with deliberation.

Even assuming that they didn't know the full consequences of their actions doesn't mean they didn't do so with intent.

And it is natural because it is observable in humans. Quod erod demonstrandum. It is merely extreme self-interest at the expense of the other. And people will screw over other people for transient or long-term gains rationally.

It doesn't even have to a long-shot bet like I outlined above, it could be a sure-thing. You get something with a 100% certainty if you would just screw over that one guy. You won't get caught and you will profit. It's still an evil action, and a fully rational one at that.

To beat a dead horse: You would justify the use of Soul Bind and call it an acceptable evil. You weren't being irrational. You decided that it served a higher good and you did so by weighing alternatives and potential outcomes.

[Wanton Soup]

First off, I don't care for his fate. If he wasn't tied up and subdued, I'd probably be the first one to run him through. What I care for is the quality of my own soul. Killing a prisoner without due process is still murder,

Only in a LAWFUL society.

What about one where Trial By Combat is the rule? What about Ankh-Morpork (crime and punishment must bee seen to be done. If the one being punished is the one who did the crime, that is a bonus, but not necessary).

You are thinking LAWFUL GOOD, not NG or CG.

***Lawful*** has the idea of "due process". Chaos doesn't. It has the opposite. "due process" for a CG character is just a way to ensure those that are powerful get away with murder (maybe literally). NG don't care. They would be 100% behind Vetinari: whatever *works* works. And criminal punishment is about deterrent. If it deters 100 death crimes then the crime of hanging one innocent man is not wrong. Unfortunate, but not wrong.

[Wanton Soup]

Soul Bind is evil since it is 100% coercive and stops the correct process from continuing. A Good Soul cannot go to its reward. An Evil one to its punishment.

[MickJay]

arguments

If you are rejecting all superficial judgements, including those made by authors that refer to the worlds they create, then there's nothing left on which you can base your arguments about whether something is good or bad in those fantasies, either. Sure, the Stanford example is a good and valid point in real life, but the fantasy tends to work in a different way from real world. If an author says this is my world and things in it work like this, then you can either accept or reject it, but you can't really argue that the author is wrong about his world, since he is making all of the rules.

If the author says Superman is good, then in his world he is good, even though someone may see him as bad; if the author says that some of the deities are good, then in his world they objectively are good, and so on.

If you take something like Soul Bind and decide that in your campaigns it's not evil, then it won't be evil, since you then become author of the story with full right to overrule any and every point (and their implications) made by D&D authors. Still, even if the fluff is not fully consistent, it is pretty clear that in D&D world some things are inherently evil, even if they are merely tools, because that is how this world works; you can argue it makes no sense, but at the end of the day you can either take it or leave it (or join WotC and then, with full rights of an author, rewrite the rules).

[hamishspence]

Even from a Chaotic perspective, killing without some form of trial is not Good. Thats why DMG2 mentions Chaotic justice systems.

if the only evidence you have that a killing was just is "I give you my word that I witnessed the crime" you'd be a bit suspicious of the person claiming this.

[Optimystik]

No, you're wrong. The "example" you cited shows nothing about them being insane or miserable. In fact, they're quite gleeful about being adequately-alive, with the exception of the Eye of the Flame and Fear. And he might be described as being nervous from coercion of a different source.

Amazing. You completely missed the point of why I linked that strip, don't you?

You said: "BoVD is inadmissible since it has never come up in the strip." Yet there it is, at Redcloak's feet, in strip #431. I suggest you read again.

Clearly, The Giant has not only read it, he decided to incorporate elements into his own work. Now, as I have said repeatedly, your desire to ignore it is irrelevant.


And don't misrepresent mushroom, since her entire point is that we're both wrong for presuming anything. Secondly, Kish is not up to date on the argument and hasn't been given the finer points of my argument.

Wrong yet again. Mushroom and I said the exact same thing (that Soul Bind IS EVIL) and we even cited the same source, BoVD. And you're the one "misrepresenting" if you're assuming what people are and aren't up to date on without them explicitly telling you.


Unverified. Assertion. Also, directly refuted above. And you just said that things like Baelnorns are a clear example of the opposite.

Baelnorns choose to remain behind, they are not bound against their will. Sorry, try again.


Thereby prison is torture. Everything you just described applies 90% of the time to prisons. (Yes, that is a completely made-up statistic that I just pulled.)

If you die in prison, your soul is free to pass on. Sorry, try again.


Do you have any idea how miserable mundane prison is? Or do you just pitiably assert that it's not that bad? You're literally robbing a person of large spans of their natural life. Soul Bind only robs them of a small fraction of eternity. Less than either if I release a soul directly after they've ceased being a threat. (Imprisoned, destroyed or neutralized his allies and resources.)

Even the worst of prisons isn't small enough to fit in someone's pocket. They also doesn't come complete with the knowledge that you're already dead and completely at someone else's mercy. Bound souls are aware that at any time you could decide to trade them away to a fiend for a magic item or rare spell component - that is, unless they're completely ignorant of the fact that souls are currency in hell, and very few people in D&D don't know that.


Read up on the Standford Prison Experiment. Merely the social context of the student volunteers as prisoners was unbearable to the point that the experiment had to be ended early.

And that's just from the "guards" bullying prisoners.

You also hear stories of kids cracking after a one-nighter merely being in the county jail.

There is no such external pressure inside of a one-man cell of hyper-abstraction.


None of their souls were bound, were they? So how can you be convinced there is "less pressure?"

And you weren't proposing binding Nale's soul for just one night, either, so your "study" is completely irrelevant.


Baelnorns. Benign guardian spirits.

Argument invalidated.

Willing benign guardian spirits.

Rebuttal invalidated.


You view the cancellation of vaguely-defined positive and negative energy as inherently bad. I don't see what would lead to this conclusion. It's abstract and it's not what causes suffering or misery, although it is occasionally the mechanic by which damage is inflicted.

So is swinging a hammer on a nail.

Did you know that hammers and nails have other purposes besides being capable of hurting people?

Negative energy exists only to weaken and sicken life, power curses and disease, induce misery and nightmares, and animate evil undead creatures. Putting more of it into the world cannot be a good thing, no matter how benign your motives are. Evil is unnatural and doesn't belong here.


Or you're the one being obdurate.

No, see, I'm the one actually paying attention to the rules. Sorry, try again.


You're nitpicking the word you're calling it, even though it's morally neutral. Even though you yourself would justify its use. Good or evil comes exclusively from the use you put it to. You can still be said to serve the general cause of altruism, even if it's at the expense of a single individual other than yourself.

Justified Evil IS STILL EVIL in D&D. If a paladin burns down a plague-ridden village to save the countryside, he will still Fall for ending the innocent lives of the villagers, no matter how many other villages he saves by doing so. The ends do NOT justify the means.

If you don't like it, make your own game world where paladins can do crap like that and get away with it.


Irrelevant. I was asking that you present logic, not cite external authorities (e.g. BoVD) on the assumption that they are correct. No appeals to emotion or ethos are necessary on this point.

Again, BoVD is not irrelevant, despite how determined you are to shove your head in the sand.

You're disregarding my logic too. I've pointed out the evils of negative energy


You told me to calm down. So yes, it was implied.

Not because you were angry at me, but because you were heated about the religious response that I wasn't even directing at you.


If I see a printed bit of material telling me that Superman is good, even if I know nothing else about Superman, and accept its word unconditionally then I'm using superficial judgments.

And just because it says Superman is fighting somebody for that issue, it doesn't automatically follow that his enemy is necessarily evil either.


Wrong again Lurk. If the CREATOR of Superman (D.C. Comics in my example) tells you he is Good, then that can't possibly be superficial because he is an authority on Superman. For this same reason, Rich can tell us "Belkar is Chaotic Evil" and we have to agree because he made the character and he knows what he's talking about.

Unless you think the Creator is lying to you, in which case you'd need a basis for that assumption.


Gee, then that leaves the burden of evidence on you, doesn't it?

Gee, you'd think a rulebook would count as evidence in a game that relies on them, wouldn't it?


You don't have evidence. You have conclusions drawn based on supernatural claims that have no precedent.

Except they do.


You're saying that if Sanctify doesn't exist, it doesn't make Soul Bind automatically okay.

Correspondingly, claiming that Sanctify is "good" doesn't automatically make Soul Bind bad.

Yet you argue that the indication that Sanctify is nominally "good" implies that Soul Bind is "evil." You get wishy-washy and only say it's a strong hint. Then you segue into your Superman example.

So yes, you were contradicting yourself. You can't both have your cake and eat it.

That is not a contradiction. As I have said repeatedly, Sanctify's existence is just one indication. Now see, A rational person is supposed to take that indication, combine it with BoVD and BoED's thoughts on the subject of a person's soul, throw in the methods Soul Bind requires you to employ (such as, oh I don't know, murdering the target), add that in to the evidence we have of other forcibly bound souls feeling misery and pain, sprinkle with common sense, and serve. Feeds a family!

A preponderance of the evidence makes it extremely likely that a thing is what we think it is. If it looks like a duck, has feathers like a duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's probably a duck.


Okay, now I have to tell you to listen. I'm getting tired of you expecting me to refute your clumsy metaphors -- but you can't be bothered to keep track of my arguments or address them.

I do not necessarily acknowledge gods as a pertinent legal authority. Just because they're stronger doesn't mean they're right. And I established that if I bear my own responsibility, then it is not impossible to make my own judgment while sticking to some basic universal code of ethics.

This is particularly true because not everybody is equipped or able to handle the problems that adventurers deal with. They have greater responsibilities and can even kill sentient beings without it coming up in a court of law. That law is assumed to be distant. That's part of what makes D&D work.

The authority that YOU acknowledge gods to have is IRRELEVANT. The Giant clearly intends them to have the final say on the deeds in a person's life; Roy and Eugene are proof of that. If you want a world where gods judge adventurers differently from everyone else, make your own! The last time I checked, Roy and all the nameless NPCs went to the same cloud; they were separated by place of origin, NOT occupation.


Whether they are being moral or not in exercising their powers is irrelevant when we're talking about legal jurisdiction.

Again you're contradicting the author.
Shojo: "The gods are not limited in their jurisdiction."


Likewise, just because it's not legal doesn't mean that it isn't "good" or "right." Whether I give a trial or not is completely irrelevant to whether or not Soul Bind is evil.

Murder without due process is murder. As hamish mentioned, even Chaotic Good societies (like elves) have courts.


See below.

It is the basic thrust of your argument. Apologies if you took offense.

You're trying to say that BoVD is somehow relevant and keep stubbornly citing it then contradict yourself by saying that Rich will pick his own rules to ignore or obey. Contradiction.

It's not a contradiction, because plainly one of the rules sources he has picked for his world is BoVD. You're the one refusing to acknowledge it.


No it isn't. He can be raised. If I legitimate reason to suspect that he is a persistent repeat offender capable of being rezzed repeatedly, then it is not unreasonable to take extra steps.

I wish you'd stop being so incoherent and realize that when you claim that you would use Soul Bind under sufficient justification you're doing so under the idea that it is a continuation of self-defense.

Either that or you're just conveniently forgetting your own position in the classical style of apologetics.

You're the one forgetting his own position. We were talking about Nale, remember? Who would have "repeatedly" resurrected him? Only if they knew someone who would be likely to do this would the Order be justified in binding his soul. And it would still be evil.

Even if they did know of someone who would have no problems popping a True Resurrection for Nale's sake, guess what? Leaving him alive and locked up in an Antimagic cell has a funny way of preventing that too. So Soul Bind is still excessive.


*sigh* Don't throw rhetoric at me that I already know how to answer and that I know you can answer for youself: No it is not the only way.

I have been saying this in one form or another, or have implied it in the arguments I've used, over-and-over-and-over. This is the second time in this post *alone.* If I think one alternative isn't necessarily eviller than the other, than I think there is more than one means to accomplish a "good" end. Pay attention.

The ends do NOT justify the means in D&D. I've said this repeatedly. Pay attention.


I'm not obligated. That's above-and-beyond because sometimes it's simply impossible.

My glasses are designed for seeing. Just because it wasn't designed for redeeming doesn't make it an evil tool. Forget the soul-stuffing part for a second and think that through a bit, then read on.

Remember that thing I said about how you should treat assertions for both spells separately? Yeah. Saying that Sanctify is a spell with expanded capabilities just says it's a more powerful tool than Soul Bind. Sanctify being a better tool doesn't make Soul Bind evil. (And no, I don't grant that Sanctify is better.)

Your glasses are not opposite in moral spectrum to Sanctify. It's a foolish example and you should drop it. You're trying to say that Soul Bind is just a tool and therefore unaligned, and you'd be right IF it didn't trap someone's soul indefinitely (subjecting them to all the misery that entails) and require them to be killed first. If it was like Temporal Stasis and just kept them from being killed or revived that would be different, but it's not.


Semantics. Addressed earlier.

The comic proves that a person can commit a certain number of evil acts and still get into Celestia, especially if he is justified. You seem to think I'd be saying you'd be damned just for using Soul Bind no matter how dangerous the criminal in question is; I'm not. But that doesn't make it evil, and more than it was evil for Roy to abandon Elan, yet he got into heaven because he showed that he had a change of heart.

Note too, that one incident was almost enough to get his file "chucked into the True Neutral bin." So if you'd want to risk that via a Soul Bind, be my guest.


Apparently you don't know what a strawman is. If your argument seems simple when I summarize it for you, it's because it is that simple and easy to knock over. Your argument was that simple to begin with.

Oversimplifying is not the same as summarizing. No really, look it up. Now observe:


Your example is that an evil character failing a will save did so because he was having doubts about his adopted philosophical position.

So in essence, that is what you are claiming -- that failing Will saves represent shaky rationale for an adopted philosophical position.

That does not universally apply when I can just Dominate you. Just because you had a moment of "moral weakness" doesn't necessarily make your beliefs any less legitimate or solidly thought-through.

Wrong again; I did not claim that failing will saves is proof of "moral weakness". I said that character classes with STRONG will saves invariably have strong senses of self. If you have such a strong sense of self, chances are you have a will save to match and the attempt to show you your misdeeds will fail. If you are open to convincing, you're open to both this spell and a charm spell also.


It isn't an unverified claim, because it's not even a claim to begin with. It is not a statement of fact. Merely a statement of possibility.

A person could perfectly well think this given an assessment of their abilities.

And it is hard to call it insane when there have been past examples in D&D where it might be possible to cut a deal beforehand for a "fast track promotion."

It may be possible that Nale has just such an arrangement.


A statement of possibility? Like "it's POSSIBLE Nale might get resurrected if we kill him, so we need to bind his soul?"

How far do you stretch that possibility? It's possible this baby will grow up to be a serial killer, we need to execute him now? It's possible this criminal will go back to his life of crime, we should keep him in jail past his sentence?


You also need to get rid of this ridiculous notion that evil is not rational or natural. It can be precisely both. Hitler exterminated the Jews rationally and nobody induced him to it artificially. He did it within in full possession of his senses and with deliberation.

Ah, so Hitler was acting perfectly naturally, and had a proper place in the world. I never thought of it that way.

Congrats on Godwinning the thread too.


Even assuming that they didn't know the full consequences of their actions doesn't mean they didn't do so with intent.

And it is natural because it is observable in humans. Quod erod demonstrandum. It is merely extreme self-interest at the expense of the other. And people will screw over other people for transient or long-term gains rationally.

Emphasis mine. Pedophilia and disease are also "observable in humans." Does that make them natural?

If they have thought it out and still chose to be evil - not once or twice, but as an entire spiritual alignment - then they are not being rational. BoVD makes this clear in a D&D setting:

"Evil people might not always call themselves evil. They would be wrong or simply lying to do so, but they might still deny their evil nature. Even the most deranged mass murderer might be able to justify his actions to himself in the name of his beliefs, his deity, or some skewed vision of what is best for the world."

Note that I'm not quoting that for your benefit (since you don't care about the rules), instead I'm quoting it for the benefit of anyone who is reading our discussion.


It doesn't even have to a long-shot bet like I outlined above, it could be a sure-thing. You get something with a 100% certainty if you would just screw over that one guy. You won't get caught and you will profit. It's still an evil action, and a fully rational one at that.

To beat a dead horse: You would justify the use of Soul Bind and call it an acceptable evil. You weren't being irrational. You decided that it served a higher good and you did so by weighing alternatives and potential outcomes.

Committing one evil act, or two, or three over the course of one's life isn't going to damn my alignment if I balance it with sufficient Good and am truly repentant. Roy proved that.

What is irrational is choosing to pursue a life of evil, thereby willingly changing your alignment to "XXX Evil" and ensuring your own soul's eternal torment. Coincidentally, those irrational people are the only ones Sanctify will work on. I already told you that binding someone and explaining the mitigating circumstances at your review might prevent your file from being tossed from Celestia, but thinking that binding a soul wouldn't come up at your review at all is ridiculous.

[hamishspence]

you could say that roy atoned (not via the spell, but still atoned, for the evil act of "betraying a comrade for personal gain" (leaving Elan) by:

A: going back to rescue him, and

B: taking a probably temporary personal sacrifice (of the Trouser Titan) to save Elan when he's in danger again.

As BOED and Fiendish Codex 2 pointed out, Atonement can be done by acts instead of the spell, if what you're atoning for is not too serious.

on "two or three evil acts, plus repentance over a lifetime of Good- you're still Good" True, up to a point.

The point where its not enough- if the evil acts are serious and the repentance didn't come with actual atonement- is the Hellbred Transformation- for those whose acts would send them to Nine Hells but are genuinely repentant. For example, a repentant double-murderer who never got his victims Raised.

[Optimystik]

@ hamish: Roy's deva said as much, saying that if he hadn't gone back for Elan he would be in the True Neutral pile regardless of all the other Good he'd done in his life.

Don't bother quoting the rulebooks though, Lurker doesn't care.

[hamishspence]

True, but for those that do approve of rulebooks, its useful to know where the rules or fluff are that fix atonement, ensuring it is not a Get Out Of Jail Free card.

a possible example of BoED content in strip- Soon's probably Deathless spirits, since such things first appeared ijn BoED, predating Eberron.

concerning irrationality of Being Evil when you know the fate awaiting- according to FC2, most LE mortals either don't know that becoming a devil after death involves painful extraction of their identity and personality, or assume that the rules don't apply to them- they are Mighty Villain and will get instant promotion.

Not sure what principle is for NE and CE mortals. Probably similar.

[David Argall]

You forgot the preceding part of that cite: "Creatures without corrupt hearts simply dispatch their foes quickly, believing that sending a villain off to the justice of the afterlife is punishment enough." In other words, if you must kill them, do it quickly and get it over with - anything else implies a corrupt heart.
Of course this reading would mean you should never accept surrender. You simply dispatch all foes, whether or not they try to surrender.
We of course reject such an absolute reading, which in turn means we also reject the reading that soul binding is automatically evil. The statement is simply too general to support such a claim.


In addition, from your own quote: "never granting them the release of death" implies that being stuck on this plane is part of the torture. Sorry, but binding someone's very soul is far, far different from "a locked door."
Being stuck on the plane is part of the torture because the soul is being tortured, not because the binding itself helps or harms the soul. So yes, Soul Bind here takes the part of a locked door that merely blocks escape.



Nobody in the LG has Haley's lockpick skills (even the cell in the first town the Order went to was able to hold Nale).
This is not a town the party ever went to. Celia took Nale & Thog to unnamed town, where Sabine rescued them. It is distinctly unlikely they stayed in town after escaping jail. We can assume a few days, but on the text as given, they may have only been there a few hours.
And while Haley's lockpick skills are quite good, she is only a 13th level rogue and knows others can do better. Note 404 here. So we have more reason to question the choice.


As for Miko and the LG escaping from AC, clearly those were exceptional circumstances.
High level characters create exceptional circumstances. So the presumption is that those exceptional circumstances will happen, and the jail is insecure.


No, being helpless is a very unique situation in which killing him without due process would be wrong. No case can approximate that - you're either helpless and subdued or you aren't.
Rather clearly wrong. You can be helpless against only certain threats, or can be partly subdued or helpless, or... Helpless is not different from any of several other conditions this way.
Roy & V both kill helpless foes who will not be helpless much longer, and will be threats once they are free to act.


The death penalty is, by definition, the result of due process. In what way did I reject it?
Because due process is just due process. It is only good when it produces good results. The Good can not accept the killing of the innocent on the grounds that he received due process. In a mortal situation, we assume due process prevents the innocent from being convicted, but we know that does not always happen, and that due process can be used by the evil to convict the good. Due process then is not necessary nor sufficient grounds to justify execution.



It's unambiguously good only if Nale is actively threatening someone else, and you are acting to protect that person immediately. Killing him while subdued and tied may not be evil, but it can't be good either.
As noted before, if he is killable at all, killing while subdued and/or tied up is simply a matter of convenience. Now in a great many cases, being subdued and/or tied up means you are not killable at all. The threat he may represent is now trivial, and he is much the same as an innocent. But this is merely the general case. Roy kills the sleeping goblins. V kills the charmed dragon. Both are threats that are merely help in temporary abeyance. Since they will become active in the future, they may be killed now.


BoED: Prisoners and dominated characters are both helpless, and killing them is an evil act. (Page 10)
BoED and BoVD should both be considered books of general advice rather than hard and fast rules. And as moral guides, they are not particularly accurate. The rule suggested here is of general accuracy. Since the prisoner is harmless, he should not be harmed. But that is true because the prisoner is harmless. We note on p. 28 of BoED a discussion of prisoners that approves of various measures needed to keep a prisoner harmless, measures that would not be acceptable with less difficult prisoners. The same logic applies to killing the prisoner. He is normally harmless, but if he is still dangerous, that threat can be met by effective measures.


As for there being "no other effective way" I agree with that statement completely. But the burden of proof was on V and he didn't demonstrate a lack of options.
So what were these options? A trial would seem to result in his execution, no different from V acting, or his ability to resume his crimes and killings, definitely not desirable. All other choices seem to end up as killing him, or letting him stand trial.



Again, I would bind his soul if necessary. That merely makes it a necessary evil, not a non-evil act.
The term necessary evil is something of a poor term. If it is necessary, it is not evil. The first door on the left is the last door on the right.
A general D&D case is the common D&D battle. It is a necessary evil that your foes die in most cases. But that of itself is no sin on your part for killing them. Depending on circumstances, the act may be ruled good, neutral, or evil. The degree of necessity is quite important here.



Spare me the semantics, by better I meant "morally preferable." Eating ice cream is better than getting shot, that doesn't make getting shot good. Flawed logic is flawed.
Nor does it make being shot evil, or eating ice cream good. It merely ranks the two. That in turn means we can not say that because another spell is morally superior, Soul Bind is evil.
Our comic example would be the ogre battle. Roy suggests a plan, and Miko carries out a morally superior plan. We do not say that Roy’s plan was morally evil, merely that her plan was better.

[Optimystik]

Of course this reading would mean you should never accept surrender. You simply dispatch all foes, whether or not they try to surrender.
We of course reject such an absolute reading, which in turn means we also reject the reading that soul binding is automatically evil. The statement is simply too general to support such a claim.

Incorrect. The context of the quote was "If we MUST kill enemies, it is better to dispatch them quickly to their judgment than draw out their punishment into suffering." In other words, it only applies to enemies for whom we have already determined death to be an appropriate penalty. Once you've already decided to kill them, binding their souls is cruel and unusual. By BoED, if an enemy surrenders, they should not be killed.


Being stuck on the plane is part of the torture because the soul is being tortured, not because the binding itself helps or harms the soul. So yes, Soul Bind here takes the part of a locked door that merely blocks escape.

Also incorrect. The quote maintains that blocking their release to the afterlife ("the release of death")is part of the torment. A locked door can't do that; only powerful necromancy can.

Why would it describe death as a "release," if preventing it was not onerous to the one so barred? Other forms of torture may accompany the binding, but the binding itself is bad enough.


This is not a town the party ever went to. Celia took Nale & Thog to unnamed town, where Sabine rescued them. It is distinctly unlikely they stayed in town after escaping jail. We can assume a few days, but on the text as given, they may have only been there a few hours.
And while Haley's lockpick skills are quite good, she is only a 13th level rogue and knows others can do better. Note 404 here. So we have more reason to question the choice.

There are no pure Rogues in the LG - our heroes know that. They also know that the LG have comparable, not superior levels. There is no reason for them to consider antimagic cells that Haley only escaped from due to a circumstance bonus to be inadequate.


High level characters create exceptional circumstances. So the presumption is that those exceptional circumstances will happen, and the jail is insecure.

It wasn't. It held them quite securely until the entire city was besieged, and even then they only escaped because of something that nobody could have predicted (namely, Tsukiko's defection). Had she not been released either, they all would have stayed imprisoned at least until Xykon and Redcloak took over the city. Binding is not the next logical step in that progression.


Rather clearly wrong. You can be helpless against only certain threats, or can be partly subdued or helpless, or... Helpless is not different from any of several other conditions this way.

So you can be tied up securely and not helpless? Show me where it says that in the rules.


Roy & V both kill helpless foes who will not be helpless much longer, and will be threats once they are free to act.

Being tied up under lock and key is a much different situation than being under the effects of a limited duration sleep effect. (I won't say sleep spell since it wasn't)


Because due process is just due process. It is only good when it produces good results. The Good can not accept the killing of the innocent on the grounds that he received due process. In a mortal situation, we assume due process prevents the innocent from being convicted, but we know that does not always happen, and that due process can be used by the evil to convict the good. Due process then is not necessary nor sufficient grounds to justify execution.

That would be a fine conclusion if they were out in the wilderness. Within Azure City, V simply has no authority to kill anyone of his own volition, and that's final. If he really wanted to erase Nale he could, but then he would be forced to either flee or answer for his actions.


As noted before, if he is killable at all, killing while subdued and/or tied up is simply a matter of convenience. Now in a great many cases, being subdued and/or tied up means you are not killable at all. The threat he may represent is now trivial, and he is much the same as an innocent. But this is merely the general case. Roy kills the sleeping goblins. V kills the charmed dragon. Both are threats that are merely help in temporary abeyance. Since they will become active in the future, they may be killed now

Again you are confusing durations. If the dragon's Charm effect or the goblins' Sleep effect wears off (and we are certain it will), then it is absolutely true that they will resume aggression. But a rope and gag is not a spell. There is no duration on being tied up. Even if Nale Takes 20 on his Escape Artist check, by the time he has done that he will be in prison.

Durations matter. If they don't, then we should execute all prisoners immediately, because at some distant point in the future they may escape. Clearly this is a ridiculous conclusion.


BoED and BoVD should both be considered books of general advice rather than hard and fast rules. And as moral guides, they are not particularly accurate. The rule suggested here is of general accuracy. Since the prisoner is harmless, he should not be harmed. But that is true because the prisoner is harmless. We note on p. 28 of BoED a discussion of prisoners that approves of various measures needed to keep a prisoner harmless, measures that would not be acceptable with less difficult prisoners. The same logic applies to killing the prisoner. He is normally harmless, but if he is still dangerous, that threat can be met by effective measures.

That discussion concerns devils and other powerful villains that can teleport out of shackles and bonds if allowed to regain consciousness. But antimagic is specifically mentioned in the passage as a counter to this, and we know that antimagic enclosures are available in Azure City. There is thus no dilemma.


So what were these options? A trial would seem to result in his execution, no different from V acting, or his ability to resume his crimes and killings, definitely not desirable. All other choices seem to end up as killing him, or letting him stand trial.

What kind of logic is that? "He'd be sentenced to death anyway, so I might as well kill him first." Not even a CG character would sanction that approach, as we've clearly seen with Elan and Kubota. Furthermore, as I said earlier, the decision isn't up to V because he's within the bounds of Azure law. Not complying wouldn't just be cruel, it would be criminal.


The term necessary evil is something of a poor term. If it is necessary, it is not evil. The first door on the left is the last door on the right.

BoED directly contradicts you. Page 9: "Good ends might sometimes demand evil means. The means remain evil, however, and so characters who are serious about their good alignment and exalted status cannot resort to them, no matter how great the need.


A general D&D case is the common D&D battle. It is a necessary evil that your foes die in most cases. But that of itself is no sin on your part for killing them. Depending on circumstances, the act may be ruled good, neutral, or evil. The degree of necessity is quite important here.

Killing is not a necessary evil. It's not aligned at all by itself - Celestials kill fiends constantly, Good deities arm and empower their followers to kill evil creatures. And this act is always tempered with mercy - if at any point your foes surrender, the battle must end or you risk losing your Good status.

What makes killing Good, Evil or Neutral are the circumstances, and I have never disputed that fact.


Nor does it make being shot evil, or eating ice cream good. It merely ranks the two. That in turn means we can not say that because another spell is morally superior, Soul Bind is evil.

Our comic example would be the ogre battle. Roy suggests a plan, and Miko carries out a morally superior plan. We do not say that Roy’s plan was morally evil, merely that her plan was better.

You seem to be saying that I paint every two acts of different morality in black and white. I am not.

Miko's plan was never labeled "the Good version" of Roy's plan, so my description of Soul Bind and Sanctify don't apply to the ogre fight at all. Sanctify the Wicked however is plainly labelled as Good several times in BoED. The assumption therefore is that Soul Bind cannot be used for Good purposes. Repeatedly throughout this debate I've called Soul Bind "neutral AT BEST," and that coupled with the other pieces of evidence that I believe it to actually be Evil.

[B. Dandelion]

I didn't see anything in OotS to counter that assumption.
I don't see why we should start with it as a default assumption.


Belkar is repeatedly described as "twisted";
That is a word with a rather broad range of meaning, especially in casual speech.


Xykon clearly is unnatural;
I would have thought he had that base covered already seeing as how the natural state of a corpse is to not be possessed of an independent mobility. Xykon, meanwhile, was evil long before he was undead, and seems to have started out that way -- which does absolutely nothing to bolster an argument that all things are good in their pure, unadulterated form.


Redcloak knows he is doing evil things (particularly his association with a psychotic lich) but considers it necessary for his race.
Redcloak has the most screwed up, contradictory, hypocritical and confusing sense of morality in the entire strip. He cannot tell up from down. He's a great character and I love him, but I think he only works in a setting that deliberately incorporates the most arbitrary elements of the alignment system. Which is supposed to approximate concepts of good and evil but in his case winds up redefining them. Redcloak does a lot of things that are evil and he will often recognize and refer to them as such, but on the occasions that he feels a need to justify himself, it's for the perceived violation of his own personal code -- not the "evil" of the act per se. He was perfectly content to order hobgoblins to their death in a needless, even wasteful manner for the sole purpose of his amusement and the thought that finally brought him up short wasn't a realization that he was doing more evil than he had to... it was his horror at the idea of turning in to Xykon. You'd think those two concepts would go hand in hand, but this is exactly why I say he's confused. Redcloak can't even define good and evil. Literally. When he tries you wind up with a definition of "evil, as defined by our opposition to those who choose to call themselves good," and then he'll explain "good" as "a pyramid scheme." It is kind of like the D&D version of Newspeak where people lose the ability to understand concepts that they don't have the right word for.


In fact, BoED would consider certain events in SoD to be anathema:Such as when the Paladins sack Redcloak's village; BoED states that attacking a tribe of orcs that have done nothing wrong is unjust, even if they are evil.
This sounds like better evidence against your argument. The gods created the humanoids so that the PC races could kill them for XP. They were made evil by design. That would mean the natural version of a humanoid is the evil one. It's the good humanoids that are the anomalies.


But if it's a rulebook quote you wanted, look no further than the opening paragraph of BoVD: "Evil is vile, corrupt, and irredeemably dark.
That definition is completely meaningless and almost offensively trite besides. Sheesh, guys, can you be any more generic? Evil is bad, you say? Amazing! I feel so enlightened by that revelation. Does it say evil can only come after good? Does it say evil originates from elsewhere? You can't just seize on a word like "corrupt" used in this kind of context and call that an argument. It's just plain blather you're quoting at me. I need something more substantial.

(And this is, incidentally, not meant as a slam towards you because you were only quoting and I asked you to. It just... augh. It's lame.)


It is not naughty or ill-tempered or misunderstood. It is black-hearted, selfish, cruel, bloodthirsty, and malevolent."
This somehow manages to be even less relevant. You can't even stretch to find something that implies "evil is never the natural state of anything."


BoVD goes on to mention the effects that particularly evil acts (like being the site of a mass murder) or presences (a lich or archfiend), can have on a location in the material plane and the creatures that live there, including but not limited to: preventing plant life from growing there, turning neutral creatures like animals evil, making mundane objects gradually warp and grow cold, and causing nightmares and neuroses in intelligent beings living nearby.
Is it possible to influence the environment positively with numerous "good" acts? I suspect that it is. Which would make neutral the default state of being.


For the first question, it is not, because there is no sacrifice involved in that. BoED makes it clear that it is the sacrifice involved that makes Sanctify Good, not merely the result. Even spells that usually accomplish Good ends (such as healing spells) don't get the Good descriptor because their relative goodness depends heavily on circumstances.
Okay, so... giving up my experience points for some altruistic goal is always good where giving up my magic points for some altruistic goal is only sometimes good. I hesitate to ask where HP falls in this line of reasoning. Or god forbid, our attribute points. You can slap a helm of reverse alignment on a captured evil guy and that's not an intrinsically good thing to do but it is good to cast sanctify on that same bad guy in order to achieve the same effect with some additional mental anguish because it's a sacrifice. What if I had to pay a huge sum of money to get that helm, or go on a quest, or give up one of my kidneys? Is it now good to use it?


Both its means (invoking large amounts of positive energy, requiring meaningful sacrifice from the caster) and its ends (redemption of a villain, resulting in a 2-point swing for Team Holy) make it Good. How could it be anything else?
That is kind of conveniently overlooking that the "means" in question includes keeping a person imprisoned and in mental anguish until they crack under the strain. With the intent that they should crack. I am honestly made a little bit uneasy by the fact that you would actually have to ask whether it could be anything but good.


Binding isn't for their own good.
Then what makes it worth bothering with, compared to your other options?


It might be for yours,
How is a sacrifice made on your OWN behalf a sacrifice at all? I'm gonna... sacrifice my livelihood working for corporate America so that I can, you know, eat. It's tough, being so generous.


or the welfare of the villain's potential future victims, but he gets nothing spiritual out of the experience besides downtime, which is tedious at best and torment at worst. Worse, he has no hope of escape, even to his rightful judgment, which sets this treatment apart from prison.
Ok, so again... why is it ever a compelling option?


I can't see why you wouldn't like it.
It's... well, it's not that I don't want to think of people as being basically good. Because I do want to think it and I do actually think it most of the time except during rush hour. It's this idea that at our core everybody's malleable, intellectually and spiritually. Nobody can hold out. It's a repudiation of human strength. In this scenario it is only "truth" and "goodness" that have that ultimate power, yeah... but, in a weird way, it actually diminishes those concepts to elevate them above all the others. Part of the reason "good" is good comes from the fact that people choose it. We are the ones that gave it shape and imbibed it with strength. By contrast "Good" the intrinsically ultimate power of the universe makes adherence to itself a simple surrender to the inevitable. A foregone conclusion. If evil is explicitly not as strong and doesn't stand a chance of winning, what does the triumph of good over evil even mean?


From a philosophical standpoint, it would save the villain's soul from damnation, no matter how dark his deeds were before Sanctification. From a game standpoint, it opens all kinds of interesting avenues, such as Good-aligned mind flayers, demons, vampires and chromatic dragons. (BoED includes a good mind flayer monk as an example of a Sanctified creature.) And in a very real sense, it's not against his will, because once he is redeemed the very thought of returning to his old ways is repugnant to him - as it should be.
You act as if those avenues are ONLY open in the "good is the almighty supreme and natural state of being" scenarios.


I see it more akin to pulling a veil away from the villain's eyes than imposing some kind of 'conformity ray' on him.
You make him accept that there is no way to struggle or defy the inevitable all-pervading force of good. He must surrender to that. Can you understand why I am still drawing parallels to rape?


You've touched on another powerful distinction between Sanctify and Soul Bind.
Dude. I do not freaking CARE about Soul Bind. It's hardly even relevant.


The spell's provision that it only target evil creatures prevents it from being used for oppression.
It's not possible to oppress evil people?! Somebody better send Redcloak a memo.


It targets only the soul, which has willfully been made dark and evil,
...and they LIKE it that way. They don't want your "help."


That's just it, turning them evil cannot be for their own benefit.
That you simply state it does not make it so. You need to back up your assertions here. And I don't mean in a general philosophical sense, I mean in OOTS or at least D&D canon.


Only the evil to good path can lead to that favorable outcome.
::Facepalm:: The section of mine that you are quoting refers directly to the favorable outcome of reigning in hell.


It is not a call to be made lightly... but if the alternative for that soul is an eternity of damnation and I was convinced of the good they could do otherwise, I would take the gamble.
No offense but your phrasing here is incredibly sanctimonious. The situation as you present it does not pose a significant enough risk to you, personally, that I should just automatically perceive your actions as admirable. Doing it with the best of intentions, yeah, but the world is FULL of people who take that attitude and wind up marching in to one atrocity after the other. Hence the saying about the road to hell.


Keep in mind that the process is reversible; the target is free to become evil again, and indeed may be likely to do so if the reasons it became evil in the first place are both compelling and still present. This spell gives those characters who were evil for psychotic ("Cause it's fun!") or racial reasons a chance to maintain their redemption.
In D&D just about everything is reversible. You could chop off a guy's fingers and then regenerate them. It's nice and all, but it's fairly weak as far as mitigating circumstances go.


Furthermore, the sacrifice involved ensures that neither I nor any other caster would succumb to false pride and think we could change the world all on our own.
You do think that. You already think that. You're going to save your spell for the most powerfully evil creatures that can be turned to a force for the side of righteousness. Remember?


Mechanically, the price is humongous. A 10,000 GP minimum diamond plus an entire level is steeper than Wish, Miracle and True Resurrection. But Sanctified Magic this powerful demands no less.
That is the least impressive sacrifice I could even imagine. Wow, currency. You must really be dedicated to good as a philosophy if you're willing to PAY for crap.


If you see another, by all means enlighten me.
You're serious. You can't think of any other motive but pure selflessness. It's this forced imposition of YOUR values. Which was not a position you were capable of arguing for on its own merits. Here it gets validated when the imprisoned wretch finally cracks and comes around to your (correct) POV. You don't see anything there about potential insecurity, or control freak issues, or megalomania?


D&D hell is the one we're talking about here; if you're in it, it's too late for redemption (barring a rez giving the evildoer a second chance.)
Yeah I wasn't sure. I think it adds weight to your argument, but it doesn't really win me over.


That rarity, stemming from the difficulty of casting, is in direct opposition to your concerns about hubris and abuse.
If it can only be used once a week, it can't be abused. If we only dropped two nuclear bombs...


It isn't my definition; whichever entity processes souls in D&D would decide where to send an evildoer. In a broad view of D&D, you either go to hell when you die or you don't. Soul Bind both delays the inevitable and torments souls in the process; Sanctify does neither.
It's still an imposition of your values. The fact that other people have those values -- even if they are the ones running the show -- does not make you right and your victim wrong. If they just don't know or believe that that's how things work, that's one thing. Otherwise, they know it already and are free to reject it.

[Optimystik]

I don't see why we should start with it as a default assumption.

You don't? Evil is an inherent contradiction; the beings that commit evil acts do so to either harm, subjugate, or outright destroy the world they live in. Like a virus or a cancer, they exist to kill their *host,* and will thereby end up killing themselves.

The only exceptions are fiends (because they live elsewhere) and undead (because they don't live at all), but they are just as unnatural and belong here even less than evil natives.


That is a word with a rather broad range of meaning, especially in casual speech.

So what? I specifically used it to describe Belkar, and it can only have one possible meaning there. One.


I would have thought he had that base covered already seeing as how the natural state of a corpse is to not be possessed of an independent mobility. Xykon, meanwhile, was evil long before he was undead, and seems to have started out that way -- which does absolutely nothing to bolster an argument that all things are good in their pure, unadulterated form.

Jumping to conclusions? By "clearly is unnatural" I was not only referring to his appearance, but his attitude as well. Even if he was still flesh and blood I would have said the same, and I would still be right.



Redcloak has the most screwed up, contradictory, hypocritical and confusing sense of morality in the entire strip. He cannot tell up from down. He's a great character and I love him, but I think he only works in a setting that deliberately incorporates the most arbitrary elements of the alignment system. Which is supposed to approximate concepts of good and evil but in his case winds up redefining them. Redcloak does a lot of things that are evil and he will often recognize and refer to them as such, but on the occasions that he feels a need to justify himself, it's for the perceived violation of his own personal code -- not the "evil" of the act per se. He was perfectly content to order hobgoblins to their death in a needless, even wasteful manner for the sole purpose of his amusement and the thought that finally brought him up short wasn't a realization that he was doing more evil than he had to... it was his horror at the idea of turning in to Xykon. You'd think those two concepts would go hand in hand, but this is exactly why I say he's confused. Redcloak can't even define good and evil. Literally. When he tries you wind up with a definition of "evil, as defined by our opposition to those who choose to call themselves good," and then he'll explain "good" as "a pyramid scheme." It is kind of like the D&D version of Newspeak where people lose the ability to understand concepts that they don't have the right word for.

You're strengthening my argument admirably; Redcloak's "necessary" evil is not only still evil, but repeatedly he does unnecessary evil things. Further proof that it is an unnatural state.


This sounds like better evidence against your argument. The gods created the humanoids so that the PC races could kill them for XP. They were made evil by design. That would mean the natural version of a humanoid is the evil one. It's the good humanoids that are the anomalies.

Ah, but where did the evil gods (Loki, etc.) themselves come from? Broaden your scope. Assuming a FR-style origin of the gods, they came from strife, war and chaos in the heavens. With Greek mythology, they came out of Pandora's Box. True Norse doesn't paint as evil a picture of Loki as we have in OotS, but Surtur is similarly out of place. We just don't know.


That definition is completely meaningless and almost offensively trite besides. Sheesh, guys, can you be any more generic? Evil is bad, you say? Amazing! I feel so enlightened by that revelation. Does it say evil can only come after good? Does it say evil originates from elsewhere? You can't just seize on a word like "corrupt" used in this kind of context and call that an argument. It's just plain blather you're quoting at me. I need something more substantial.

(And this is, incidentally, not meant as a slam towards you because you were only quoting and I asked you to. It just... augh. It's lame.)

It sounds generic because it's such a basic concept. The author likely couldn't imagine anyone who could see Evil -absolute, D&D, send-you-to-hell Evil - as something that belongs in the world, and rightfully so.

And the word "corrupt" means the same thing in every context: depraved;perverted;wicked;evil;tainted;infected.


This somehow manages to be even less relevant. You can't even stretch to find something that implies "evil is never the natural state of anything."

Ah, but it does. A being that is otherwise Good, like a child, can have bouts of naughtiness or ill-temper. We expect him to have those episodes because they are natural for him. Actual malevolence is something you don't expect from a child, because it is not natural


Is it possible to influence the environment positively with numerous "good" acts? I suspect that it is. Which would make neutral the default state of being.

I never said it wasn't, just that evil was unnatural.


Okay, so... giving up my experience points for some altruistic goal is always good where giving up my magic points for some altruistic goal is only sometimes good. I hesitate to ask where HP falls in this line of reasoning. Or god forbid, our attribute points. You can slap a helm of reverse alignment on a captured evil guy and that's not an intrinsically good thing to do but it is good to cast sanctify on that same bad guy in order to achieve the same effect with some additional mental anguish because it's a sacrifice. What if I had to pay a huge sum of money to get that helm, or go on a quest, or give up one of my kidneys? Is it now good to use it?

Well, there are no "magic points" in D&D, unless you count Psionics; but Sanctified Magic sacrifices all of the other things you mentioned. Casters sacrifice HP, take ability damage or even ability drain, lose levels, and even less concrete sacrifices (such as abstaining from sex or food) before being able to cast certain sanctified spells.

As for a helm of reverse alignment, that's hardly the same thing as Sanctify. The villain never once examines his past actions or feels remorse, or even considers the wrong of his actions. As Soon told Miko, that's a necessary part of true redemption.


That is kind of conveniently overlooking that the "means" in question includes keeping a person imprisoned and in mental anguish until they crack under the strain. With the intent that they should crack. I am honestly made a little bit uneasy by the fact that you would actually have to ask whether it could be anything but good.

The means are benevolent. Sanctify's description clearly states the desire to change comes from within the villain's own soul - it is not imposed by the spell. It doesn't even have the Mind-Affecting or Compulsion descriptors. Rather, it simply finds the perfect argument, formed within the context provided by the creature's own evil acts, to convince it of the error of its ways. For all such beings, that perfect argument exists; it must, because no soul is beyond redemption, no matter how steeped in evil.


Then what makes it worth bothering with, compared to your other options?


How is a sacrifice made on your OWN behalf a sacrifice at all? I'm gonna... sacrifice my livelihood working for corporate America so that I can, you know, eat. It's tough, being so generous.


Ok, so again... why is it ever a compelling option?

When I said Binding, I was referring to Soul Bind, not Sanctify. I thought that was clear, and I apologize if it wasn't.


Dude. I do not freaking CARE about Soul Bind. It's hardly even relevant.

My apologies. I know you want to focus our discussion on Sanctify the Wicked, sometimes it's hard to keep lines of thought discrete when arguing on 3 fronts simultaneously.


It's... well, it's not that I don't want to think of people as being basically good. Because I do want to think it and I do actually think it most of the time except during rush hour. It's this idea that at our core everybody's malleable, intellectually and spiritually. Nobody can hold out. It's a repudiation of human strength. In this scenario it is only "truth" and "goodness" that have that ultimate power, yeah... but, in a weird way, it actually diminishes those concepts to elevate them above all the others. Part of the reason "good" is good comes from the fact that people choose it. We are the ones that gave it shape and imbibed it with strength. By contrast "Good" the intrinsically ultimate power of the universe makes adherence to itself a simple surrender to the inevitable. A foregone conclusion. If evil is explicitly not as strong and doesn't stand a chance of winning, what does the triumph of good over evil even mean?

Again you're incorporating real-world morality (e.g. people aren't benevolent during rush hour) into a game that it doesn't fit in. D&D is a world of moral absolutes - Sanctifying someone is a useful concept in D&D because there ARE no "necessary Evils."

I wasn't talking about running around and Sanctifying everyone in our world, where evil is relative and very difficult to define. Sanctify was designed for the game world, where Evil is quantifiable, detectable, and leads invariably to self-destruction.


You act as if those avenues are ONLY open in the "good is the almighty supreme and natural state of being" scenarios.

As I pointed out above, I never said that Good was the natural state of being, just that Evil wasn't. Wild animals and plants, elementals, even constructs are all neutral and they do nothing to corrupt the landscape like evil does. But the spell doesn't raise them to Neutral and then stop, because they'd never feel the need to atone for their lives of Evil that way. If you're Evil all your life and then start being Neutral, you're still going to hell and redemption has failed.


You make him accept that there is no way to struggle or defy the inevitable all-pervading force of good. He must surrender to that. Can you understand why I am still drawing parallels to rape?

The "all-pervading force of good" is already within him. The fact that he even HAS a soul is proof of that. Drawing parallels to rape is nonsensical.


It's not possible to oppress evil people?! Somebody better send Redcloak a memo.

What I meant was that you can't use it to force Neutral characters, who would usually rather be left alone but are not on the path to self-destruction, to champion the side of Good.


...and they LIKE it that way. They don't want your "help."

The only possible reasons they could "like it that way" are that they are twisted or misguided.


That you simply state it does not make it so. You need to back up your assertions here. And I don't mean in a general philosophical sense, I mean in OOTS or at least D&D canon.

Fiendish Codex 2: LE villains believe (falsely) that their actions will be rewarded in Baator. Instead, their souls have been reserved for particular archdevils to toy with and stockpile even before they arrive.

Fiendish Codex 1: CE villains are stripped of their identity and become manes, and must ascend the hierarchy without being preyed upon by the stronger demons of the Abyss.

There you are, nice and canon.


::Facepalm:: The section of mine that you are quoting refers directly to the favorable outcome of reigning in hell.

I won't say it's impossible to reign in hell, but that is such a rare outcome it might as well be.



No offense but your phrasing here is incredibly sanctimonious. The situation as you present it does not pose a significant enough risk to you, personally, that I should just automatically perceive your actions as admirable. Doing it with the best of intentions, yeah, but the world is FULL of people who take that attitude and wind up marching in to one atrocity after the other. Hence the saying about the road to hell.

Redeeming (not brainwashing) someone cannot be perverted to atrocity. I think the issue you have with Sanctify is that the spell has a 100% success rate; as I explained above, that's because it's able to find exactly the right way for each individual to make them see the error of their ways. Only a being without a soul altogether would be beyond that method of correction, and the spell won't work on them anyway.


In D&D just about everything is reversible. You could chop off a guy's fingers and then regenerate them. It's nice and all, but it's fairly weak as far as mitigating circumstances go.

The reversibility is proof that it is neither brainwashing nor coercion. If the circumstances that caused you to turn evil are both compelling and still present, you will likely turn evil again. If Sanctify was truly coercing your Goodness, then that wouldn't be possible. Therefore, it isn't.


You do think that. You already think that. You're going to save your spell for the most powerfully evil creatures that can be turned to a force for the side of righteousness. Remember?

Right, and the rest can be convinced - or punished - the old-fashioned way.


That is the least impressive sacrifice I could even imagine. Wow, currency. You must really be dedicated to good as a philosophy if you're willing to PAY for crap.

*shrug*
Attributes, experience and gold are just about the only currencies in D&D; add some more yourself if you think it's too simple. Souls too, but that's down in hell so I won't bother including those.

I'd think the fact that this spell is more expensive than one that can change reality would be an indication of the sacrifice involved.


You're serious. You can't think of any other motive but pure selflessness. It's this forced imposition of YOUR values. Which was not a position you were capable of arguing for on its own merits. Here it gets validated when the imprisoned wretch finally cracks and comes around to your (correct) POV. You don't see anything there about potential insecurity, or control freak issues, or megalomania?

It is not "imposition," nor are they "my values." They are the villain's Good values, being allowed to surface, in some cases for the first time in their entire lives. Anyone with a soul has these values, period, no matter how far they've been submerged or repressed by a lifetime of evil deeds.

"The evil soul undergoes a gradual transformation. The soul reflects on past evils and slowly finds within itself a spark of goodness. Over time, this spark grows into a burning fire."


If it can only be used once a week, it can't be abused. If we only dropped two nuclear bombs...

Once a year, actually. Unless you're in epic levels anyway, at which point the game is mutable to the point that nothing is absolute anymore.


It's still an imposition of your values. The fact that other people have those values -- even if they are the ones running the show -- does not make you right and your victim wrong. If they just don't know or believe that that's how things work, that's one thing. Otherwise, they know it already and are free to reject it.

As I said above, it is not an imposition of the caster's values. Stop laboring under that assumption and you'll understand Sanctify much better.

[B. Dandelion]

You don't?
...

You are in seventh grade. Please tell me that. "Gosh somebody has a worldview that's not the same as mine?! How can it be?!"


Evil is an inherent contradiction; the beings that commit evil acts do so to either harm, subjugate, or outright destroy the world they live in.
The purpose of evil is destruction? Yet you exactly contradict this later on. Evil causes destruction.


Like a virus or a cancer, they exist to kill their *host,* and will thereby end up killing themselves.
You're a seventh grader who's flunking biology. Christ almighty. Yeah, cancer exists TO kill its host. I can't believe you. Look, I want you to spend 30 seconds perusing the very simple wiki article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer) and then I want you to come back and explain to me why this is in error.


So what? I specifically used it to describe Belkar, and it can only have one possible meaning there. One.
Because you say that it does.

Yeah you know what? I was gonna go through this line by line but your whole argument keeps getting back to how the definition of any one thing is always the definition you're going to say it is, as if your uninformed opinion represents some kind of immutable fact. You're not even going to listen to what I'm saying because I don't "understand" the absolute and irrevocable "goodness" of something that we're not allowed to define without starting with the presumption of ultimate good and then working backwards. Forget it.

[Optimystik]

...

You are in seventh grade. Please tell me that. "Gosh somebody has a worldview that's not the same as mine?! How can it be?!"

It's an expression of incredulity; there's no need for theatrics.


The purpose of evil is destruction? Yet you exactly contradict this later on. Evil causes destruction.

Uh... what?
Let's look at it backwards: how does evil NOT result in, or cause, or end up being, however you want to refer to it, destruction?


You're a seventh grader who's flunking biology. Christ almighty. Yeah, cancer exists TO kill its host. I can't believe you. Look, I want you to spend 30 seconds perusing the very simple wiki article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer) and then I want you to come back and explain to me why this is in error.

It propagates itself at the expense of its host environment. The result is that they both die, the host and the cancerous cells alike. Why is that hard to understand?


Because you say that it does.

If you say a person is twisted, what meaning could that possibly have other than them being perverted? Unless you mean physically forced into a spiral shape, in which case you're resorting to mere semantics.


Yeah you know what? I was gonna go through this line by line but your whole argument keeps getting back to how the definition of any one thing is always the definition you're going to say it is, as if your uninformed opinion represents some kind of immutable fact. You're not even going to listen to what I'm saying because I don't "understand" the absolute and irrevocable "goodness" of something that we're not allowed to define without starting with the presumption of ultimate good and then working backwards. Forget it.

That presumption is implicit in the rules, which you asked me to quote from. If you don't want that presumption in the argument, then don't ask for a rules quote. It's not a hard concept, really. Our framework is D&D morality, as it has been for this entire thread, so any presumptions provided by the rules are not only valid, they are indispensable.

But leave if you wish, I certainly won't lose sleep.

[magic9mushroom]

Ok, I'm way too tired to read all the megaposts on this page. But the gist of most arguments is pretty well set.

@Optimystik: Your points on Soul Bind I agree with, your points on Sanctify the Wicked I don't. Firstly, you seem to be placing too much emphasis on the fact that sacrifice is involved. Basically, I don't see the point of sacrifice if the same result can be achieved without it. I go off effects for that sort of thing.

Secondly, Dandelion and Lurker are entirely right that forcibly and permanently altering someone's mind is rightfully repulsive to anyone with a shred of decency. No matter whether it's "for their own good" or not, noone has the right to violate another like that.

@Dandelion: It seems that we're only arguing over very tiny details, and I don't see the point of continuing. We are in agreement on the big things.

@Lurker: Noone is saying that Soul Bind isn't justifiable in any circumstances. What we're all saying is that it's inherently evil.

My point is not that you can't presume anything. My point was that your presumption specifically of it being identical to prison was horribly flawed. Because it's off exactly 0 evidence. Presuming it to be similar to sensory deprivation is likely to be a better presumption because it fits some of the evidence extremely well. Presuming that there's some spiritual torment involved is also likely to be a valid presumption because of all the language in D&D books describing souls and the afterlife.

Both these valid presumptions point to Soul Bind being Evil inherently because it is torture. All the other evidence we have, ie BoVD, BoED and others, support this view. We aren't saying it's Evil just because the splatbook says so, we're saying it because the splatbook reinforces what are already the most reasonable deductions about its nature.

[Optimystik]

Forum's back! Wahee!


To those who made it this far: I only brought Sanctify into the equation to further debate (and BOY did it work). To reiterate my thoughts on the spell: While all souls have the capacity for evil, that is not their natural state; in D&D, all souls originate from the Positive Energy Plane, a rather heavenly locale if a bit hostile to flesh and blood. I see no reason not to believe that deep down, all souls would want to stay true to those origins, and therefore a spell that recovers that nascent spark of good at every souled being's core is not only possible, it is intuitive. Whether it should take one year regardless of depth of evil committed is about the only thing I find skeptical about it; Nevertheless, I'm willing to concede that not everyone will see things my way.

However, whether you agree with Sanctify or not doesn't negate any of the other points against Soul Bind. A tool it may be, but it is an inherently vile and wicked one. Sensory depravation without any loss of awareness; A requirement of murder whose very nature negates the concept of self-defense; to be utterly and totally at your captor's mercy; And no escape, not even the release of death a mundane prison would provide. And that's not even counting what you can do to such a soul once bound - The Fiendish Codices and BoVD get fairly... inventive on this point.

That said, I did enjoy debating with all of you, and would enjoy continuing. And remember that I think you're all wonderful additions to the Playground no matter how heated our arguments may get! I guess seventh-graders are optimists like that :smallsmile:

[David Argall]

The context of the quote was
...not to be found in the paragraph, or the page, and possibly not even the book. That is not necessarily unreasonable, but what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. We have to be equally free in determining the context of the other statements too.


"If we MUST kill enemies, it is better to dispatch them quickly to their judgment than draw out their punishment into suffering." In other words, it only applies to enemies for whom we have already determined death to be an appropriate penalty. Once you've already decided to kill them, binding their souls is cruel and unusual.
And if we have an unusual case, the soul bind becomes a valid option.


By BoED, if an enemy surrenders, they should not be killed.
That is a general case, and we are considering specifics. Since BoED accepts turning the prisoner over to those who will kill him, it accepts killing him yourself. [We can add "under the right circumstances". We routinely turn the prisoner in to the law because we think they can usually make a better decision, but this is only a general case. We know full well the law fails at times and that there will be times where the good is better served by our direct action.



The quote maintains that blocking their release to the afterlife ("the release of death")is part of the torment. A locked door can't do that; only powerful necromancy can.
One denies physical freedom, one denies spiritual freedom. It is not a big difference.


Why would it describe death as a "release," if preventing it was not onerous to the one so barred? Other forms of torture may accompany the binding, but the binding itself is bad enough.
Why would I use "release" to describe opening a prison door and letting the prisoner out? Prison cell or Soul Bind, they are both the same. The torture may well include either as a way to keep the victim from escaping, but they themselves do not constitute torture.



There are no pure Rogues in the LG - our heroes know that. They also know that the LG have comparable, not superior levels. There is no reason for them to consider antimagic cells that Haley only escaped from due to a circumstance bonus to be inadequate.
But Haley tells Lord Shojo the cells need improvement. So yes they do feel the cells can be beaten.



It wasn't. It held them quite securely until the entire city was besieged,
A period of under 48 hours.



Binding is not the next logical step in that progression.
Why not? It would seem to be a more secure prison


So you can be tied up securely and not helpless? Show me where it says that in the rules.
Well, there is Animate Plants for druids, Blasphemy for clerics, Blindness for wizards, and a number of other spells that don't require gestures, but do allow threats of "untie me or else". I am not too familiar with the rules of psionics, but they may not require gestures or voice. A contingency spell that goes off when you are tied up, or a variety of magic items that don't require verbal instructions... Keeping a high level character tied up can be real difficult.



Within Azure City, V simply has no authority to kill anyone of his own volition, and that's final.
True, and irrelevant. The question is not whether it is legal, but whether it is good.



Again you are confusing durations. If the dragon's Charm effect or the goblins' Sleep effect wears off (and we are certain it will), then it is absolutely true that they will resume aggression. But a rope and gag is not a spell. There is no duration on being tied up.
There is no set duration. Rope and gag will fail eventually. Sometimes they fail almost immediately. The spells simply have a more definite ending point.



That discussion concerns devils and other powerful villains that can teleport out of shackles and bonds if allowed to regain consciousness. But antimagic is specifically mentioned in the passage as a counter to this, and we know that antimagic enclosures are available in Azure City. There is thus no dilemma.
That particular dilemma is not present. But the discussion is there to illustrate general principles, not to any sort of exhaustive list of circumstances. "A certain amount of caution is reasonable."


What kind of logic is that? "He'd be sentenced to death anyway, so I might as well kill him first." Not even a CG character would sanction that approach, as we've clearly seen with Elan and Kubota.
Elan said Kubota deserved it. That is not exactly a ringing condemnation of V.


BoED directly contradicts you. Page 9: "Good ends might sometimes demand evil means. The means remain evil, however, and so characters who are serious about their good alignment and exalted status cannot resort to them, no matter how great the need."
Which is one reason BoED is roundly condemned. It is reaching Celia silliness here.


Killing is not a necessary evil. It's not aligned at all by itself - Celestials kill fiends constantly, Good deities arm and empower their followers to kill evil creatures.
BoVD rather disagrees. Killing is evil, but also necessary, particularly for the PC. These books accept reality on the point because the game demands it. On points not so central to the game, they are free to indulge in folly.


And this act is always tempered with mercy - if at any point your foes surrender, the battle must end or you risk losing your Good status.
Obviously, but the word is "risk", not lose. There are times when the prisoner should be killed on the spot.



You seem to be saying that I paint every two acts of different morality in black and white. I am not.
Denial without evidence is not much.


Miko's plan was never labeled "the Good version" of Roy's plan,
Do you wish to deny its superiority? Moral or otherwise? Miko's idea turned a tough fight into a walk, and it allowed the ogres to make their moral status clear instead of simply accepting the word of the dirt farmers.



Sanctify the Wicked however is plainly labelled as Good several times in BoED. The assumption therefore is that Soul Bind cannot be used for Good purposes.
Radiant Fog is labeled as a Good spell. So Solid Fog can't be used for Good purposes. Same logic and I suspect I will find a dozen other cases if I go thru BoED.
No, the logic is clearly flawed. One can be suspicious of the use of either Solid Fog or Soul Bind, but they are not evil until we see they are used for evil purposes.

[Optimystik]

...not to be found in the paragraph, or the page, and possibly not even the book. That is not necessarily unreasonable, but what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. We have to be equally free in determining the context of the other statements too.

If I was half as "free in determining context" as you are, I'd have everyone convinced Fiendish Codex was a book about Elysium. The fact that you can infer "kill all prisoners immediately" from the quote I posted isn't just disturbing, it's downright laughable.


And if we have an unusual case, the soul bind becomes a valid option.

I already said it would, numerous times. That doesn't make it non-evil, merely useful. Many evil spells are *useful* yet they remain evil.


That is a general case, and we are considering specifics. Since BoED accepts turning the prisoner over to those who will kill him, it accepts killing him yourself. [We can add "under the right circumstances". We routinely turn the prisoner in to the law because we think they can usually make a better decision, but this is only a general case. We know full well the law fails at times and that there will be times where the good is better served by our direct action.

...None of which V was prepared to do. TWICE. What was your point again?


One denies physical freedom, one denies spiritual freedom. It is not a big difference.

For an outsider, sure. But most of us can actually leave a prison after we die.


Why would I use "release" to describe opening a prison door and letting the prisoner out? Prison cell or Soul Bind, they are both the same. The torture may well include either as a way to keep the victim from escaping, but they themselves do not constitute torture.

You can't definitively state that until we see the condition of Dorukan/Lirian. In the meantime, we only have analogues to draw upon, like I did.


But Haley tells Lord Shojo the cells need improvement. So yes they do feel the cells can be beaten.

The LG has no pure rogues.


A period of under 48 hours.

Why not? It would seem to be a more secure prison

So they kill him, bind his soul... and a butterfly flaps its wings, startling Tsukiko into breaking a piece of wall that hits V, making him drop the gem which Xykon and Redcloak recover and revive out of curiosity. See, I can make up unforeseen circumstances too.


Well, there is Animate Plants for druids, Blasphemy for clerics, Blindness for wizards, and a number of other spells that don't require gestures, but do allow threats of "untie me or else". I am not too familiar with the rules of psionics, but they may not require gestures or voice. A contingency spell that goes off when you are tied up, or a variety of magic items that don't require verbal instructions... Keeping a high level character tied up can be real difficult.

Funny thing about verbal components... your mouth kind of has to be unobstructed. (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0399.html) :smallsigh:


True, and irrelevant. The question is not whether it is legal, but whether it is good.

Killing bound prisoners cannot BE Good. Done.


There is no set duration. Rope and gag will fail eventually. Sometimes they fail almost immediately. The spells simply have a more definite ending point.

You fail to realize that the ending point makes all the difference. A man with a sheathed sword is not an imminent threat, the same man drawing it IS.


That particular dilemma is not present. But the discussion is there to illustrate general principles, not to any sort of exhaustive list of circumstances. "A certain amount of caution is reasonable."

For most people and campaigns, anti-magic cells are more than reasonable.


Elan said Kubota deserved it. That is not exactly a ringing condemnation of V.

No, he said "it's not like he didn't totally deserve it." Not the same thing. And again you zoom in narrowly on the quote that supports your line of thought and neglect subsequent facts. He certainly condemned V later.


Which is one reason BoED is roundly condemned. It is reaching Celia silliness here.

The ends don't justify the means is a perfectly viable real-world philosophy, whether you personally agree with it or not. 'Celia' silliness is "Not only should I not use violence to preotect MYSELF in a D&D world, but neither should my companions"; a completely different issue, with much less viability, and one that would only derail this discussion if I let it.


BoVD rather disagrees. Killing is evil, but also necessary, particularly for the PC. These books accept reality on the point because the game demands it. On points not so central to the game, they are free to indulge in folly.

Wrong again. MURDER is evil by BoVD, not merely killing. "The heroes who go into the green dragon’s woodland lair to slay it are not murderers." (Page 7)


Obviously, but the word is "risk", not lose. There are times when the prisoner should be killed on the spot.

Doing so to Nale when he isn't threatening anyone and has no immediate way to escape may not be evil, but it sure as hell isn't Good.


Denial without evidence is not much.

If you lack the reading comprehension to gather evidence from all the posts I've made so far, clearly I'm beyond convincing you anyway.


Do you wish to deny its superiority? Moral or otherwise? Miko's idea turned a tough fight into a walk, and it allowed the ogres to make their moral status clear instead of simply accepting the word of the dirt farmers.

As in other threads, you confuse "effective" with "morally superior." I never had a problem with Miko's plan in any case, so it's quite irrelevant.


Radiant Fog is labeled as a Good spell. So Solid Fog can't be used for Good purposes. Same logic and I suspect I will find a dozen other cases if I go thru BoED.
No, the logic is clearly flawed. One can be suspicious of the use of either Solid Fog or Soul Bind, but they are not evil until we see they are used for evil purposes.

Solid Fog is 9th level Necromancy that requires killing the target first? Hmm, must've missed that bit of erratum.

[LurkerInPlayground]

Amazing. You completely missed the point of why I linked that strip, don't you?

You said: "BoVD is inadmissible since it has never come up in the strip." Yetthere it is, at Redcloak's feet, in strip #431. I suggest you read again.
Clearly, The Giant has not only read it, he decided to incorporate elements into his own work. Now, as I have said repeatedly, your desire to ignore it is irrelevant.
And the Giant is using the Player's Handbook, so what? He ignores that too.
0y to a demon. But so would transferring a prisoner to the custodianship of a nation known for a cruel penal system. I could also abuse the prisoner if I wanted to as a warden.

So that changes exactly nothing. I don't have to mistreat a prisoner anymore than I have to mistreat a soul.


None of their souls were bound, were they? So how can you be convinced there is "less pressure?"

And you weren't proposing binding Nale's soul for just one night, either, so your "study" is completely irrelevant.
I'm not convinced that there is less pressure. I'm convinced that it's irrelevant. Firstly, because you automatically assume Soul Binding causes more torture. Secondly, because torture really isn't the intent.



Willing benign guardian spirits.

Rebuttal invalidated.
I could maintain that undead are always evil just for being undead, even if they're willing undead. You're essentially saying the same thing for Soul Bind. It's always evil, no matter how I utilize it.

Such a notion is ridiculously puritan. Why does this exception exist for undead but not for spells?

Could it be that labeling a spell inherently evil kind of misses the point? They're purely neutral items until a will is applied behind it. So even on a vaunted "rules" basis, the rules could use a teensy amount of work.


Did you know that hammers and nails have other purposes besides being capable of hurting people?

Negative energy exists only to weaken and sicken life, power curses and disease, induce misery and nightmares, and animate evil undead creatures. Putting more of it into the world cannot be a good thing, no matter how QUOTE]
Benevolent or benign undead aren't evil but inanimate forces and spells are inherently evil. Wow-whee. Special pleading.

Also, it's liguistically pretty useless.


No, see, I'm the one actually paying attention to the rules. Sorry, try again.
Yeah, why talk to me if all you're going to do is talk about how logical the rules are? If you can't show me your own capacity for narration and logic, then why am I bothering with you?

Speaking of which the rules really aren't made of harmonious sense, which is the whole point of OoTS, to poke fun at them. I'm sure there are plenty of people who could point out the discrepancies in the game better than I can, so I'm not gonna bother.

Which don't apply, as we've established. Rich will diverge from D&D canon. But that's not even the entire point. I'm asking what you'd do in an equivalent situation. The joke is also that the characters will exploit outside sources to their own advantage.

So, as it turns, out, you're right. Rich does ascribe to the "rules." He also breaks them.


Justified Evil IS STILL EVIL in D&D. If a paladin burns down a plague-ridden village to save the countryside, he will still Fall for ending the innocent lives of the villagers, no matter how many other villages he saves by doing so. The ends do NOT justify the means.
\
Fine, in D&D, it is. And the paladin burning down a village, I would call "evil." That's not adequate justification on the paladin's part, unless there are extremely extenuating circumstances.


Again, BoVD is not irrelevant, despite how determined you are to shove your head in the sand.

You're disregarding my logic too. I've pointed out the evils of negative energy.
The same negative energy that makes benign undead who willing stay behind? Oh, so we agree that evil is consequence based? Great.

Again, I'm not asking you to cite rules. I'm asking for you ability to reason ethically. I'm not shoving my head in any sand, precisely because I don't care what those books say. I'm asking about ethics, not merely what is "ethical" in the game.

The books are nonsense and inapplicable to the argument besides.


Wrong again Lurk. If the CREATOR of Superman (D.C. Comics in my example) tells you he is Good, then that can't possibly be superficial because he is an authority on Superman. For this same reason, Rich can tell us "Belkar is Chaotic Evil" and we have to agree because he made the character and he knows what he's talking about.

Unless you think the Creator is lying to you, in which case you'd need a basis for that assumption.
Hell will have frozen over if Rich has said anything on the subject. He's more likely to mercilessly parody it than give a straight answer though.

And don't bother citing the strip again. V clearly didn't think it was wrong and it's a stretch to say otherwise. V understood perfectly that his friends thought it was, which is why he covered his ass.


Gee, you'd think a rulebook would count as evidence in a game that relies on them, wouldn't it?
Which the characters consistently "metagame" and break at every turn.


That is not a contradiction. As I have said repeatedly, Sanctify's existence is just one indication. Now see, A rational person is supposed to take that indication, combine it with BoVD and BoED's thoughts on the subject of a person's soul, throw in the methods Soul Bind requires you to employ (such as, oh I don't know, murdering the target), add that in to the evidence we have of other forcibly bound souls feeling misery and pain, sprinkle with common sense, and serve. Feeds a family!
No, what you're talking about is an unvalidated suspicion. Don't presume to rationality if you can't be bothered to think for yourself and think that merely waving the phrase "common sense" in my direction is substitute for actual reasoning on your part.

Common sense is influenced on subjective judgments and accultured biases. Common sense isn't the same thing as good sense. And common sense can often be anything but rational.


A preponderance of the evidence makes it extremely likely that a thing is what we think it is. If it looks like a duck, has feathers like a duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's probably a duck.
As if you'd understand what that actually means in application.


The authority that YOU acknowledge gods to have is IRRELEVANT. The Giant clearly intends them to have the final say on the deeds in a person's life; Roy and Eugene are proof of that. If you want a world where gods judge adventurers differently from everyone else, make your own! The last time I checked, Roy and all the nameless NPCs went to the same cloud; they were separated by place of origin, NOT occupation.
My own opinion on their authority is perfectly relevant. Just because they do judge souls and have the power to do so doesn't make them right by necessity. Devils and demons believe they have exactly the same authority.

Rich didn't intend anything except that the afterlife *sometimes* has judgment and is usually pretty vague on what "enlightenment" is. It's rather vague if god-like aliens happen to be flawless moral entities.

If I have the power and the vision to deny them that by using Soul Bind, then I will do so. That's perfectly valid on my part. Just saying "authority is always" right doesn't mean anything.



Again you're contradicting the author.
Shojo: "The gods are not limited in their jurisdiction."
Which just goes to show that you actually don't know what conclusions facts will reasonably support.

Because that's Shojo's opinion of the gods. He's saying they're ultimately powerful and can do pretty much what they want (in this case, doing "good"). Excuse me if I happen to do exactly the same under my own power.

Ironically, Shojo was also nothing if not the posterboy for taking the law into his own hands, to the point that he fixed a divinely-sanctioned trial by using Eugene's spirit. He had no respect for laws when it came down to it. So it's more than a little silly to say that Shojo didn't think that he knew better than even the gods. (The whole chaos versus law thing.)


Murder without due process is murder. As hamish mentioned, even Chaotic Good societies (like elves) have courts.
Murder is killing that promotes self-interest purely over social harmony.

Which is to say that killing in self-defense far from a court of authority in a dark dungeon isn't what most people would call "murder." It *is* killing however. So if you want to harp about how bad that is, go ahead.

I'm still killing the orc if he attacks me. And no, I'm not interested in going on trial for it. Sue me.



It's not a contradiction, because plainly one of the rules sources he has picked for his world is BoVD. You're the one refusing to acknowledge it.
See above.


You're the one forgetting his own position. We were talking about Nale, remember? Who would have "repeatedly" resurrected him? Only if they knew someone who would be likely to do this would the Order be justified in binding his soul. And it would still be evil.
Now you're just trying to weasel out on technicalities that don't even apply. You would bind Nale's soul if spent a lot of time killing you and it had been proven that he is capable of being resurrected over-and-over.

It's called a hypothetical.


Even if they did know of someone who would have no problems popping a True Resurrection for Nale's sake, guess what? Leaving him alive and locked up in an Antimagic cell has a funny way of preventing that too. So Soul Bind is still excessive.
I agree. Except that we've also established that you'd Soul Bind him to if there were no antimagic cells or other convenient way of imprisoning him.

Or if you *did* know that Azure city would fall, or would soon fall, you'd probably do it, assuming it wasn't too difficult to do so.



The ends do NOT justify the means in D&D. I've said this repeatedly. Pay attention.

I have been paying attention. Your logic is pretty lackluster. You said that the ends, even if they're evil, can still be justified. What is justified isn't necessarily "good."

That really has nothing to do with what I consider to be good or right. And I'm willing to say that if the gods do subscribe to a D&D view of morality, they're pretty silly for having adopted it as a legal framework for the cosmos. I wouldn't flinch at calling them idiots for it.

Putting aside that little gem of nonsense, you haven't "said" it repeatedly, much less implied it repeatedly.


Your glasses are not opposite in moral spectrum to Sanctify. It's a foolish example and you should drop it. You're trying to say that Soul Bind is just a tool and therefore unaligned, and you'd be right IF it didn't trap someone's soul indefinitely (subjecting them to all the misery that entails) and require them to be killed first. If it was like Temporal Stasis and just kept them from being killed or revived that would be different, but it's not.
Precisely. My glasses aren't the moral opposite of Sanctify because Soul Bind isn't either. They're tools. Good and evil come from what use you make of them.

Ever heard of the term "false dichotomy"? Because that's exactly my point here. Comparing the two is and assuming that they have predetermined antagonistic moral relationships based on appearances is an example of "false dichotomy." It's a lazy way of thinking, so don't do it.

Setting up Sanctify and Soul Bind as "opposites" and making moral judgments on that isn't necessarily valid. So for all intents and purposes, it's exactly like my glasses, except that it isn't nearly as powerful a tool. They aren't opposite. They have the exact same moral status as my glasses.


The comic proves that a person can commit a certain number of evil acts and still get into Celestia, especially if he is justified. You seem to think I'd be saying you'd be damned just for using Soul Bind no matter how dangerous the criminal in question is; I'm not. But that doesn't make it evil, and more than it was evil for Roy to abandon Elan, yet he got into heaven because he showed that he had a change of heart.
I wouldn't call a lot of what Roy has done as "evil." Some were evil, but they weren't interested in counting up how many wrong deeds he had commited, but how well he lived up to the example of being "good." If he did something, wrong, he usually tried to improve the situation on his own moral judgment. (e.g. curtail Belkar's destructive tendencies, go back and rescue Elan)

So no. You're wrong to say that they're just counting deeds. They're also counting for intent, and to a degree, the action they take to rectify misdeeds.

Saying "the good parts negate the bad parts" is a gross oversimplification.


Note too, that one incident was almost enough to get his file "chucked into the True Neutral bin." So if you'd want to risk that via a Soul Bind, be my guest.
According to you, I would and you would. Life is nothing if not risk. Let's move on.


Oversimplifying is not the same as summarizing. No really, look it up. Now observe:



Wrong again; I did not claim that failing will saves is proof of "moral weakness". I said that character classes with STRONG will saves invariably have strong senses of self. If you have such a strong sense of self, chances are you have a will save to match and the attempt to show you your misdeeds will fail. If you are open to convincing, you're open to both this spell and a charm spell also.

I'm tired of you trying weasel out on the assumption that your arguments are deeper than they are. They aren't.

Your original example was that if there was a spell that made evil people good and by failing a will save. Your conclusion is that they weren't really committed to their philosophical position anyway if they couldn't resist the effects.

You could argue that it's a "stronger sense of self" and I'd agree. But I don't think you actually have any idea by what you mean by it.

If I made a good person do bad things, just because they did so under coercion or manipulation, it doesn't mean they aren't committed to that position with what strengths that they do have.

You think "good" is a natural state while "evil" is some sort of artificial state. I find this patently ridiculous. And even if evil were artificial, it doesn't make it right to coerce an evil person to adopt your views.

You have done nothing to rebut this or explain what you might have actually meant by that example, so please don't bother raising it again. I'm past the point of actually believing that you actually know how to read the subtext of your own arguments, much less making them coherent.



A statement of possibility? Like "it's POSSIBLE Nale might get resurrected if we kill him, so we need to bind his soul?"

How far do you stretch that possibility? It's possible this baby will grow up to be a serial killer, we need to execute him now? It's possible this criminal will go back to his life of crime, we should keep him in jail past his sentence?
That's not what I mean. If that possibility *DID* arise, you would Soul Bind Nale.

Note that I didn't say to act without good evidence first.


Ah, so Hitler was acting perfectly naturally, and had a proper place in the world. I never thought of it that way.

Congrats on Godwinning the thread too.

You are a tiresome person.

It's only "Godwinning" in spirit if I relate you to Hitler as a way of attacking you. Which I'm not doing.

If you want to crow about how I'm such a horrible person for using such a cliched example to make my point, you're free to do so. But I'm not comparing you to Hitler.

I'll just say that you'll cling to anything to get the perceived moral high ground.



Emphasis mine. Pedophilia and disease are also "observable in humans." Does that make them natural?
YES! Because that's what "natural" means by definition!

You need to pull you head out and realize that evil isn't supernatural and it definitely has a place in this material universe!


If they have thought it out and still chose to be evil - not once or twice, but as an entire spiritual alignment - then they are not being rational. BoVD makes this clear in a D&D setting:

"Evil people might not always call themselves evil. They would be wrong or simply lying to do so, but they might still deny their evil nature. Even the most deranged mass murderer might be able to justify his actions to himself in the name of his beliefs, his deity, or some skewed vision of what is best for the world."
Zzzzzz. . . .
So even when you do cite the rules, they're actually pretty banal and irrelevant?

The impetus is on you to define what "evil" means. Not just say that mass murders fail to live up to a certain arbitrary standard. We all know that already, so what? The burden is on you to prove that the actions in question don't live up to that standard.


Committing one evil act, or two, or three over the course of one's life isn't going to damn my alignment if I balance it with sufficient Good and am truly repentant. Roy proved that.
Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's an accurate reflection of how you really view morality, and not just in a fictional or hypothetical context.


What is irrational is choosing to pursue a life of evil, thereby willingly changing your alignment to "XXX Evil" and ensuring your own soul's eternal torment. Coincidentally, those irrational people are the only ones Sanctify will work on. I already told you that binding someone and explaining the mitigating circumstances at your review might prevent your file from being tossed from Celestia, but thinking that binding a soul wouldn't come up at your review at all is ridiculous.
No it isn't. Many politicians and corporate leaders are "evil" and can get away with it with huge benefits. Many simply never get caught or punished for acting so maliciously. How exactly did pursuing a life of evil come out to be "irrational"?

"Evil" is usually just shorthand for "destructively predatory actions." It's not unnatural weird or unprecedented. It's a natural consequence of animal behavior. Whining that it happens to exist and labeling it "unnatural" is distinctly unproductive.




Yeah you know what? I was gonna go through this line by line but your whole argument keeps getting back to how the definition of any one thing is always the definition you're going to say it is, as if your uninformed opinion represents some kind of immutable fact. You're not even going to listen to what I'm saying because I don't "understand" the absolute and irrevocable "goodness" of something that we're not allowed to define without starting with the presumption of ultimate good and then working backwards. Forget it.
I must confess to being amused over this statement.

Even, if I'm clearly establishing that I'm talking about "ethical abstractions." You [Optimystik] can't be bothered to actually argue on that basis alone or simply tell me that you're not interested in that.

No, you must cite higher authorities or books which, even if we were to take them seriously, are completely incoherent, irrelevant or simply banal. You'll even tell me that I "Godwinned" the thread -- I'm not sure what you get out of that.

Okay, I'm lying. I know exactly what you get out of it. You want to make an appeal to false authority. It makes you look good. Which is essentially all you're capable of. You simply can't do anything under your own power or precedent. In other words, you have nothing original to say.

And since apparently you need me to repeat everything ad nauseum to actually get you to think about it: I haven't compared you to Hitler.

This hasn't been a conversation for at least two pages now, and I'm tired of perpetuating the illusion that it is. I think I'll join the club of "throwing my hands up in the air."

[Zanduar]

I was just thinking about this as well and I'm going to have to vote true neutral.

[LurkerInPlayground]

Ok, I'm way too tired to read all the megaposts on this page. But the gist of most arguments is pretty well set.

@Optimystik: Your points on Soul Bind I agree with, your points on Sanctify the Wicked I don't. Firstly, you seem to be placing too much emphasis on the fact that sacrifice is involved. Basically, I don't see the point of sacrifice if the same result can be achieved without it. I go off effects for that sort of thing.

Secondly, Dandelion and Lurker are entirely right that forcibly and permanently altering someone's mind is rightfully repulsive to anyone with a shred of decency. No matter whether it's "for their own good" or not, noone has the right to violate another like that.

@Dandelion: It seems that we're only arguing over very tiny details, and I don't see the point of continuing. We are in agreement on the big things.

@Lurker: Noone is saying that Soul Bind isn't justifiable in any circumstances. What we're all saying is that it's inherently evil.

My point is not that you can't presume anything. My point was that your presumption specifically of it being identical to prison was horribly flawed. Because it's off exactly 0 evidence. Presuming it to be similar to sensory deprivation is likely to be a better presumption because it fits some of the evidence extremely well. Presuming that there's some spiritual torment involved is also likely to be a valid presumption because of all the language in D&D books describing souls and the afterlife.

Both these valid presumptions point to Soul Bind being Evil inherently because it is torture. All the other evidence we have, ie BoVD, BoED and others, support this view. We aren't saying it's Evil just because the splatbook says so, we're saying it because the splatbook reinforces what are already the most reasonable deductions about its nature.
I appreciate you trying to mediate the discussion and grant concessions and all that, but I don't think it's needed.

I'm well aware of what you meant when you said both are presumptions, I don't need any clarifications there. But I'm saying my judgment is a default position in the lack of evidence. Innocent until proven guilty, not guilty until proven innocent.

But your presumption isn't a better one. Firstly, because it is a presumption to say that it is like sensory deprivation for a number of reasons involving science.

Souls can see, but don't have eyes. Do they see by light? Do they need sleep? If not, doesn't that mean they won't go insane from the lack of an internal meaty time regulator (circadian rythyms)? There are hundreds of these little paradoxes that need resolution, so your presumption that the treatment is like sensory deprivation is exactly that, a presumption.

The only thing that is "factual" is that mind/personality persists. And if we talk about OotS, souls also don't eat or sleep and tent do lose their sense of time without regular patterns in place. There's also a "second" life. None of this supports the notion that torturing a soul is possible or how it is possible.

But let's assume you're correct. It still does little to change the ethics of the situation. Prison is a horrible and demeaning punishment. I'm not claiming that one is worse than the other. That simply isn't the point. Torture simply isn't my intent. It might be painful, but it isn't necessarily so by design. I want to contain a threat, much like I would for a prison. And that comparison *is* valid. I'm depriving them of a future, for the short-term or long-term, for reasons that I deem just and necessary. I'm isolating them from their peers both here and later.

You'd also have to explain to me why it's any less torturous to send anybody to prison, since prison is psychologically painful and permanently life-altering.

You can also argue about whether I'd be *right* to imprison somebody under my own power, but that's a seperate discussion. But suffice it to say, I you'll have to prove to me why your afterlife can't be meddled with. You may consider it to be sacred, but I don't. What is ephemeral or occurs in a "higher" plane isn't necessarily more important or better than what you get in your first life.

I should also possibly mention that I also think the BoVD and Exalted Book of Deeds are pretty incoherent, when they merely aren't irrelevant or dead wrong. Even within the context of mechanics, "evil" actions are practically neutral. I just have to be "more evil than good" to actually turn evil.

Which is exactly the same thing as saying that I let power get to my head and didn't think through my actions enough. That's my fault and responsibility. Such concepts as "fault" and "responsibility" simply don't apply to inanimate tools, so calling them "inherently evil" is pretty meaningless.

Some tools may have no good or valid use, but the onus is on you to prove that this is the case. By your admission, you cannot submit to me any such thing.

Soul Bind is a neutral action then. It can be used for good or evil. And on Optimystik's part, he has pretty much conceded this to me the moment he told me he would do it for a "greater good."

Frankly, I could care less about your internal moral angst.

[Larspcus2]

Even from a Chaotic perspective, killing without some form of trial is not Good. Thats why DMG2 mentions Chaotic justice systems.

if the only evidence you have that a killing was just is "I give you my word that I witnessed the crime" you'd be a bit suspicious of the person claiming this.

Well, for example, if you knew without doubt that someone has a long history of committing evil acts, and could easily evade a guilty verdict in whatever type of trial would take place, I think that killing them would be a chaotic good act.

[hamishspence]

an act can be "Evil" and still "done for a greater Good"

The Operative in Serenity "What I do is evil, but it must be done."

One of the most famous authors to raise this dichonomy (Machiavelli) calls such acts Evil, but pardonable, excusable, etc: the commentator for The Discourses Penguin edition, Bernard Crick said:

"But if one is willing, he seems to say, recognize that what for the moment you are doing is evil, and do not fall into call it Good" and

"He did not go on to say that the way we have to act is good"

so, no, necessary acts are not "Good by definition"

[Big Al]

Vaarsuvius could be any alignment. The DnD law/chaos + good/evil system is extremely vague.

I'm going to go with: True Enigma.

I agree with Troll. It's futile to try to use the D&D alignments system. I have seen SO many players supposedly of the same alignment but acting totally different. Usually, they'd find a way to do what they wanted and then justify it.