Good-aligned morality question

[myancey]

So my players (in a predominantly good aligned campaign) will be coming upon a crypt with random bits of loot inside (jewels, coins, magic items) on corpses.

The question sort of a two-parter.

1) As a DM, would you allow your good aligned characters to rob from these corpses?

2) As a DM, would you allow 'exalted' good characters to rob from the corpses?

There aren't any right answers...unless someone can find RAW that suggests otherwise. Thanks.

Edit: And I'm not referring to NPCs that the players kill. Looting after combat I don't have an issue with.

Edit: This particular crypt is from City of the Spider Queen and the party members, being from another region, won't have the knowledge to determine alignment of the deceased. (Copied from a later post).

[Talakeal]

Yes. However I would insist exalted characters either donate the loot to a museum or use the proceeds for some sort of good cause rather than selfish ends.

Respecting the dead is nice and all, but it is hardly the most responsible way of using your excess wealth. As Gandalf said, the tombs of the dead should not exceed the houses of the living.

[DontEatRawHagis]

So my players (in a predominantly good aligned campaign) will be coming upon a crypt with random bits of loot inside (jewels, coins, magic items) on corpses.

The question sort of a two-parter.

1) As a DM, would you allow your good aligned characters to rob from these corpses?

2) As a DM, would you allow 'exalted' good characters to rob from the corpses?

There aren't any right answers...unless someone can find RAW that suggests otherwise. Thanks.

Edit: And I'm not referring to NPCs that the players kill. Looting after combat I don't have an issue with.

I was posed this very question when I killed zombies in a church. These zombies though deadly and dangerous were just perverted by a necromancer against their will. So I decided not to cut off their heads and use them as trophies. :smallfrown:

Are these dead bodies of good people? Yes. Then they should not loot them, but if they do their should be some nasty curse placed upon them. This way the alignment hit isn't the only thing that hurts them. Now they must deal with the ghost of the original owner or something.

It all depends on who the dead person was; king of the entire realm, probably no looting.

[myancey]

I was posed this very question when I killed zombies in a church. These zombies though deadly and dangerous were just perverted by a necromancer against their will. So I decided not to cut off their heads and use them as trophies. :smallfrown:

Are these dead bodies of good people? Yes. Then they should not loot them, but if they do their should be some nasty curse placed upon them. This way the alignment hit isn't the only thing that hurts them. Now they must deal with the ghost of the original owner or something.

It all depends on who the dead person was; king of the entire realm, probably no looting.

Nice. This particular crypt is from City of the Spider Queen and the party members, being from another region, won't have the knowledge to determine alignment of the deceased.

I'm gonna repost this at the top too.

[Hirax]

Well, I'd allow them to do it, they'd just have to face the consequences of their actions if they chose to, of course. Grave robbing is bad if your sole motivation is greed, regardless of who you're doing it to. Would that in itself be enough to take them below good on the alignment continuum? No in my opinion, however it would definitely kick them out of the exalted camp. In principle I'm not a big fan of saying grave robbing evil people is worse than doing it to your friends, renowned people, or anyone. It's the forethought that goes into the character's actions that would be of interest, in that respect.

[Frozen_Feet]

Yes and no, respectively, depending a bit on the nature of the crypt in question and specifics of the setting.

A setting where dead bodies are dead bodies, and there isn't anything mystical to them or the crypt? I might allow it for both. It's just stuff without a real owner

A recently made crypt? Chances are it still has great relevance to people living close by, so it'd more than a bit questionable for an Exalted character to effectively steal their stuff.

In setting where spirits linger, or the crypt is otherwise sacred to forces of Good? Looting it counts as defiling it, and thus counts as an Evil act. A Good character might tough it out without an alignment change, but an Exalted character is pretty sure to fall.

Overall, graverobbing ranges from Chaotic to Evil. Usually, it's rather minor Chaotic act (looting abandoned places which don't really fall under any existing law), but can be major Chaotic act (looting graves at middle of civilization when such is explicitly forbidden and frowned upon). It gets Evil when it starts screwing over other people for fun and profit (risking spreading diseases and undead, destroying Good crypt guards and so on).

All in all, I'd not prevent Good or Exalted characters from doing any of this - they might just cease to be Good or Exalted as a result. I'd warn them before hand, of course.

[Luckmann]

Depends.

As a question of alignment, I don't think I'd call appropriation of the apparel of the living-impaired an inherently evil act. If they're there on a quest and happen to pick things up while carrying it out, why not? Kill a undead skeleton and take his sword - same thing, really. Even if it's dead now, it was once a living person, the only difference being that he was animated by someone or something.

If they go out of their way to actually rob graves, however, that's another story. Someone takes the time to go to a cemetery, deliberately desecrate the burial sites and disrespect hallowed soil; Bam, evil action.

As a question of character, I would think that divine characters with a code of conduct as tenets set defined their faith would be worse (or better) off in this context. For example, I think it's clear that even if casual appropriation of objects lost by the formerly living isn't inherently evil in and of itself, a Radiant Servant of Pelor should definitely be "slipping" if he did it. So for him, I would judge it an evil act and his diety would definitely be appropriately pissed.

[PollyOliver]

I wouldn't say that there's necessarily anything inherently evil about stealing from the dead or good about respecting the dead. They're...well, dead. It's not like taking their things hurts them. However, in most societies there would be a strong cultural prohibition and probably even laws against it, so I'd say it's probably fairly chaotic to go against that. Maybe in some bizarre circumstances it could be evil--say, if the material goods of the dead actively affect their afterlife, such as what the Ancient Egyptians believed--but otherwise I don't think it merits much on the good-evil spectrum.

Edit: I'd say that the way that respect for the dead impinges on alignment is mostly as a symptom. If someone is reverent of life and views killing as ranging from a necessary evil to flat out wrong, they will probably tend to treat the dead well because death has significance to them--that these people are no longer living is a significant change for the worse in the world. They will probably want to tread bodies according to whatever custom they believe in, or hold rites, or whatever. Whereas someone who is "evil" and doesn't think killing is seriously wrong or holds a lot of significance might ignore the dead or treat their bodies poorly. But that's more a side-effect, in my opinion, of whether the person views death/killing as significant when it's not happening to them, and less of an actual moral act in and of itself.

[Bhaakon]

It seems more of a lawful vs. chaotic question to me. A CG player might reasonably argue that corpses are empty husks without need for fineries, that it is in fact a vulgar waste of resources, and the only reason not to loot them would be angering superstitious relatives. A LG player, however, would have a difficult time squaring such blatant disregard for social norms with his alignment even if he held the same belief towards the dead.

Granted, D&D morality is decidedly not relative, so behavior that seem perfectly reasonable and inoffensive (or at least morally gray) from the PC's perspective could be objectively evil by the game worlds' strict definition.

[myancey]

Nice. Yeah, alignment is a pretty interesting thing in D&D...

[Knaight]

What has yet to be addressed directly is that alignment is descriptive by nature, not prescriptive. As such, I'd allow it in any case, just like I'd allow anything else, though there is alignment change to consider -though that seems very, very extreme in this case.

[Gecks]

While I agree this is probably more of a chaos/law issue that good/evil issue, I do think good/evil does come into play, since presumably the grave good are there because the dead person or their family wished to the items to be interned with them, and violating the expressed wishes of a sentient being for personal gain (even if said sentient being has since died) is very probably a minor evil act. Minor is the key word here, though, so probably it would take quite a bit of grave robbing to cause a good aligned character to change alignment.

Role-play might be the best way to decide this one. "I am very sorry to disturb you, but the world has become a very dangerous place since you went to sleep here. The sword you have at your side is needed again in the world of the living, I am afraid. Please take mine as a replacement," for example, would probably be fine, even for an exalted character, while systematically breaking open every casket in a room with a pry bar and then stipping the corpses of valuables, sawing of fingers as needed to get at gold rings and such, would probably be pretty clearly on the bad guy side of the fence.

[AugustNights]

I am very sorry to disturb you, but the world has become a very dangerous place since you went to sleep here. The sword you have at your side is needed again in the world of the living, I am afraid. Please take mine as a replacement

Why do I see a Chaotic Neutral thief sort saying exactly this as they replace the +5 Awesome Sword of Don't Steal From This Guy's Tomb with a wooden rapier?

[Talakeal]

Once again we get into the muddy waters of Logic equals Chaos and Irrationality equalling Law.

Logically, the dead have no use for gold. But according to tradition, the dead must be respected and given tribute even though they have no idea they are receiving it.

[NichG]

I think this question is strongly cultural, which means that alignment isn't generally a good barometer for it. In D&D, that means you have to decide whether some beliefs are true or not in the setting.

For a culture that believes that things done to the bodies of the dead influence their afterlife, it would be an evil act to loot a tomb. For a culture that believes that the body is just a shell, then it would mostly be disrespectful (which'd angle it towards chaotic rather than the good-evil axis), and the potential for harm is more the anguish of family/friends/etc seeing that the grave of their loved one has been robbed (which becomes a non-issue if the tomb is old enough).

Beyond that though, there's likely a 'true answer' to the question of what looting does to the spirits of the deceased in the GM's setting, which would impact the alignment consequences of the deed since alignment is an absolute morality.

[Sylivin]

Robbing graves have never been considered a "good" action no matter what culture you were from. It is usually considered a selfish action (they don't need it anymore). If it was my campaign:

1: It should be frowned upon by good characters, but there's nothing "evil" about robbing a grave so there's no alignment change but they should be trying to suggest the party not do such a thing.

2: An exalted character is worse off - exalted are supposed to be paragons of light and should always be an example to others (aka: the party). An exalted character would be warned and then fall if they continued to do so.

Obviously some exceptions could be created: aka, the tomb holds a powerful relic needed to defeat the Big Bad, so they go into the tomb and take only that and leave the rest alone.

[PollyOliver]

Exalted characters can perform neutral actions, though. And frankly, barring weird afterlife shenanigans, what harm is caused by taking things from a corpse? Would you consider it unexalted if the exalted character was giving the spoils of their grave-robbing to charity or actively using them to fight evil? How about if the people have been dead for so long that there are none living who remember them to be upset?

Because the only actual harm I can think of in taking from the dead is in its emotional impact on living relatives. Unless they are in the picture, it's simply a question of cultural mores, and that makes it a question of chaos, not of evil.

[NichG]

Well, for an Exalted character goodness goes beyond mere practicality, at least in principle. However, BoED is hardly consistent enough to create any really strict standards (e.g.: poisons are evil because they cause suffering, except these poisons that just cause suffering to evil creatures, but using other poisons against evil creatures is still evil...)

I could see how one could claim that tomb-robbing is problematic for an Exalted character because others will see them do it and may follow their example, and by doing so may rob from tombs of the more recently dead, or may otherwise clash with people from cultures that find tombs sacrosanct and kill innocents who are attempting to protect the tomb, or ... It's setting a bad example as a paragon of virtue.

[PollyOliver]

But if we're using the standard of "someone might see what you're doing, not realize the circumstances and the reasoning behind it, and attempt to replicate in another situation, leading to EVUL", exalted characters shouldn't adventure, because what if someone misunderstands the whole killing people thing and tries to replicate it in a different situation.

Though I agree that exalted rules make so little sense you could pretty much say anything. :smallsmile:

[NichG]

But if we're using the standard of "someone might see what you're doing, not realize the circumstances and the reasoning behind it, and attempt to replicate in another situation, leading to EVUL", exalted characters shouldn't adventure, because what if someone misunderstands the whole killing people thing and tries to replicate it in a different situation.

Though I agree that exalted rules make so little sense you could pretty much say anything. :smallsmile:

Many exalted characters might argue that one shouldn't generally adventure, that what they're doing isn't 'adventuring' but fighting for a cause, which (at least for for non Vow of Nonviolence people) is just fine in D&D morality. I like the idea (but not the particular implementation) of characters that are so strongly connected to some particular ethos that they become just a little bit alien and break out of the basic expected roles.

Then again, I'm usually pretty lax about any sort of alignment issues in my games, so its more of a 'huh, neat character concepts, horrible meshing into the system' wistful thought.

[Curmudgeon]

1) As a DM, would you allow your good aligned characters to rob from these corpses?
It's not my job to dictate player actions. However, since this is a crypt (a structure purposely built to house and memorialize the dead) and those "random bits of loot" were purposely left with the bodies by their heirs, the PCs would actually be stealing from the families who laid the bodies of their dead here for their final repose. That's an entirely Evil, willful act, and I'd shift any Good PC alignments to Neutral immediately.

2) As a DM, would you allow 'exalted' good characters to rob from the corpses?
Again, I'm not going to dictate player actions. Their PCs would immediately lose all exalted benefits as their alignment changed.

Would you want someone digging up your grandfather's grave to steal the antique pocket watch buried with him? Or the diamond wedding ring buried with your grandmother? :smallfurious:

[hamishspence]

That's an entirely Evil, willful act, and I'd shift any Good PC alignments to Neutral immediately.

I wouldn't go that far (there's plenty of room for Good characters that committ occasional Evil acts).

If they kept on doing it, an alignment change to Neutral might be appropriate.

BoVD does say that stealing in general is an evil act. However, it may rank fairly low.

Fiendish Codex 2 singles out "stealing from the needy" as a corrupt act- and a moderately severe one- worse than casting an evil spell.

[Knaight]

Would you want someone digging up your grandfather's grave to steal the antique pocket watch buried with him? Or the diamond wedding ring buried with your grandmother? :smallfurious:

This is not a fair comparison. Its a crypt, which has implications of it having been there a long time. Whoever is in it has probably been entirely forgotten, maybe they have some writings about them somewhere and are in genealogical writings, certainly well out of living memory. Someone digging up a grandparents grave for a pocket watch or wedding ring? That's something to be ticked about. Someone going into the crypt of a long dead ancestor nobody remembers, who may not even have any living heirs, in a world before archaeology was invented? Much less of an issue.

The fundamental issue with digging up someone who is still a part of living memory is that the discovery of that action is going to cause emotional trauma to those that loved them, and willfully causing emotional trauma to people for nothing more than money is somewhat less than acceptable behavior. If its some ancient, forgotten person, there isn't an issue. If its some ancient person who is still loved, or even worshiped, the issue comes back up in force.

[Curmudgeon]

This is not a fair comparison. Its a crypt, which has implications of it having been there a long time. Whoever is in it has probably been entirely forgotten, maybe they have some writings about them somewhere and are in genealogical writings, certainly well out of living memory. Someone digging up a grandparents grave for a pocket watch or wedding ring? That's something to be ticked about. Someone going into the crypt of a long dead ancestor nobody remembers, who may not even have any living heirs, in a world before archaeology was invented? Much less of an issue.
It depends on how you feel about your heritage. The younger members of my family have ancestors going back 9 generations in the same part of New England. Even though of course nobody remembers people dead over two centuries, they're still part of the family heritage, and desecration of their graves would affect me just as much as that of one of many family members I interacted with directly.

You spend the resources to build a crypt specifically because you want future generations to remember the departed of the past, and to give memories concrete form so they'll outlast the crypt-builders. Robbing a crypt steals from that investment in precious memories, depriving both present and future of the legacy your family tried to preserve.

[Knaight]

It depends on how you feel about your heritage. The younger members of my family have ancestors going back 9 generations in the same part of New England. Even though of course nobody remembers people dead over two centuries, they're still part of the family heritage, and desecration of their graves would affect me just as much as that of one of many family members I interacted with directly.

You spend the resources to build a crypt specifically because you want future generations to remember the departed of the past, and to give memories concrete form so they'll outlast the crypt-builders. Robbing a crypt steals from that investment in precious memories, depriving both present and future of the legacy your family tried to preserve.
I think we are assuming a slightly different time scale. 9 generations is relatively little, that could easily be as low as 180 years. I'm assuming something alone the lines of 2 or 3 thousand years, with what is probably an entirely dead culture, where very few people from that time are even remembered. These are likely people who are completely forgotten, and as such the only issue is in regards to the idea of preservation of history, an idea which probably doesn't exist to that level in a D&D world.

[Diarmuid]

Robbing graves have never been considered a "good" action no matter what culture you were from. It is usually considered a selfish action (they don't need it anymore). If it was my campaign:

1: It should be frowned upon by good characters, but there's nothing "evil" about robbing a grave so there's no alignment change but they should be trying to suggest the party not do such a thing.

2: An exalted character is worse off - exalted are supposed to be paragons of light and should always be an example to others (aka: the party). An exalted character would be warned and then fall if they continued to do so.

Obviously some exceptions could be created: aka, the tomb holds a powerful relic needed to defeat the Big Bad, so they go into the tomb and take only that and leave the rest alone.

What if you are robbing the graves of well documented evil people/creatures who more than likely got whatever items you'd be taking by spreading their evil?

[Curmudgeon]

I think we are assuming a slightly different time scale. 9 generations is relatively little, that could easily be as low as 180 years. I'm assuming something alone the lines of 2 or 3 thousand years
On that time scale the chances of finding a crypt at all are ludicrously small. Tutankhamun's tomb was buried and forgotten well within 180 years, and is famous today because of the wealth of material recovered from it. (It's worth pointing out this tomb was buried and forgotten is in a culture that expended great resources to memorialize the dead.)

Howard Carter worked for 5 straight years, with solid funding for the effort, to find Tutankhamun's tomb. 400,000,000 lbs. of rubble were removed just from the passageway to the tomb entrance. It took another 10 years of work just to finish clearing out the crypt.

Basically, finding any crypt "something alone the lines of 2 or 3 thousand years" old doesn't ever happen without years (maybe decades) of work, generally by hundreds of people working together. Archaeological digs exist because things just naturally get buried over time. Almost all of archaeology is carefully removing soil and rock in the hopes that you've got the right location of some valuable historical site, but with many feet of accretion covering it. And usually you don't have the right location. So really, the only crypts you'll ever encounter are the ones going back but a handful of generations, because D&D adventuring doesn't support decades of patient exploration (without any XP earned) necessary to find crypts as old as those you assume.

[Knaight]

Basically, finding any crypt "something alone the lines of 2 or 3 thousand years" old doesn't ever happen without years (maybe decades) of work, generally by hundreds of people working together. Archaeological digs exist because things just naturally get buried over time. Almost all of archaeology is carefully removing soil and rock in the hopes that you've got the right location of some valuable historical site, but with many feet of accretion covering it. And usually you don't have the right location. So really, the only crypts you'll ever encounter are the ones going back but a handful of generations, because D&D adventuring doesn't support decades of patient exploration (without any XP earned) necessary to find crypts as old as those you assume.

Sure, some stuff naturally gets buried over time. Other things, other ancient structures, survive just fine and are plainly visible. Stone henge is well over a thousand years old, and nowhere near buried. The great pyramids and the sphinx are several thousand years old, and again clearly visible. A bunch of clearly visible temples survive from the South and Central American empires.

Moreover, genre convention is at least as important as reality in matters such as these. Genre convention dictates that structures be big, structures be visible, that the past is all around, easily found, and better than the present. Sure, parts of genre convention are routinely played with if not ignored outright, but there is no reason to assume that this is a part of them, and once genre convention is considered very old buildings and surprisingly intact ruins are acceptable.

[theForce017]

Hey DM, what up? Due to the fact I am a Chaotic Good Warlock :smallwink: I think I am going to loot them. Unless of course a Gargantuan Spider shows up or you decide to kill me. *Just Kidding* If it were my campaign I would do as some other Forumers mentioned and make the exalted characters give it up for charity or do something "good" with the money/loot. As for the straight good players, if it were to help them on their quest to rid the world of evil, then I would think it would be alright. I'll make sure to get on of the Strength based characters in our group to help give the corpses a proper burial.:belkar: :haley:

[Rejakor]

Alignment is stupid.


Having gotten that out of the way, the least stupid kind of alignment is objective alignment. Otherwise, you could go to drow-town, and stop someone torturing someone to death, and you'd go down to neutral because in drow-town stopping someone torturing someone to death is evil.

Or you could have a personal set of beliefs which differ from those of your region or where you grew up or your nation's god, or whatever, and as a result you get the 'evil' alignment. Or you could firmly believe that murder and rape is good, and thus, be 'Good' even while doing things that everyone else thinks is evil. Ideally any 'alignment' system would be able to stand up to that, but DnD's one can't, and too many spells and abilities rely on alignments existing and making sense to allow subjective alignments.

First, Law and Chaos. Lawful is rule-following. Chaotic is rule-breaking. Lawful and Chaotic characters could both break the Law of the Land, even the one they live in and accept, but they would do it for different reasons. The Lawful character would have a rule or law or plan or belief, personal or otherwise, that he was following, that required him to break the law in order to follow it. The Chaotic character, while also possibly having a rule or plan (all creatures have rules or plans except Slaad. Chaotic means 'chaos-tending' not 'only chaos'.), would also break the law because.. it's a law. And they break laws, even if only to prove that it can't hold them. Chaos can be more organized than Law. It just usually isn't.

Second, Good and Evil, which is harder. Good is usually things which support people, cause less pain and fear, and create things which have positive effects on people. Evil is the opposite. There's a lot of value judgements and judgement calls on what is evil and what is good. The reason evil and good are fightin' all the time and law and chaos kind of aren't, is mainly cause it's a lot harder to separate good and evil and good and evil get pretty shirty about it and blame each other.

So, under this system, taking from the dead is either good or evil or neutral depending on the motivation.

Are they taking these items in case there is a necromantic taint on them and they need to check them at the church? Are they fighting the forces of evil and need the items in order to fight those forces of evil? Is the tomb in a place that they feel is under the purview of evil, (drow city.. hm) and so taking these riches is removing them from the forces of evil? Are these tombs the tombs of their enemies? What are their beliefs on the subject of disturbing tombs vs the living being more important than the dead?

To be honest, it sounds like a Neutral act. It'll pull Good characters towards Neutral, more or less depending on what the answers to those questions are above. In some circumstances, it would be a Good act, but it sounds like it's probably Neutral. Similarly, under some circumstances, it would be Evil, about as much chance as it being Good, depending on those answers.

Exalted, though, I dunno if it would make them 'fall' but... they're not ever supposed to do anything that could even EVER be evil. If it's to fight a great evil or if their lives are in danger, then yeah, okay. But otherwise, they should either be arguing against it, possibly not too strongly if there are mitigating circumstances, or not doing it. Exalted is very specifically 'goody good goody good two shoes good'. With Good on top. They're gooder-er than solars. That's very specific, and has rules connotations, so it has to be enforced.

The rest of alignments? Every time someone tries to tell someone else that they 'can't do that' 'because your character is Good', I die a little inside. Good, Evil, Chaos, and Law are just metagame tags. People might use the meanings in game, but the metagame tags are the only part of the system that is actually rules. There is no 'you are good so you should act in THIS way' rule, or even guideline. It's just 'if you have acted in this way a lot, you resonate as 'Good', and as such, you are affected by these spells and not by these spells and oh yeah, you can be a Gwynharyfyr if you want'. That's all. Full stop.

EDIT: To put this into perspective, very few people are good. You are not Good, and your mum is not Good. Being Good is really hard, you have to be selfless and loving and protecting and helping to pretty much everyone all the time, or at least the majority of the time. It's really rare, and for a good reason, since life tends towards self-helping, and while altruistic behaviour exists because the species needs it and rewards it, most people are still concerned with the bottom line.

Being Exalted is a whole ten rungs on top of that where every deed and word you utter is the very crystallized lovely beautiful essence of pure goodness with sugar and cherries on top. Playing a proper Exalted character is really really hard, because you basically have no choice when faced with two bad choices than to forge a third, with your life, blood, luck, and sheer chutzpah. It's significantly harder than just being Good.

[Viktyr Gehrig]

EDIT: To put this into perspective, very few people are good. You are not Good, and your mum is not Good.

Heh. Almost everyone believes they're Good. As their alignment moves toward Evil, this percentage approaches 100%.

[hamishspence]

Don't know about "very few"- the PHB does say that humans tend toward no alignment, not even neutral.

Good power centers in the DMG aren't exactly rare, either.
And in Cityscape, there's a table for the general alignments of larger settlements- large towns, small cities, etc. Again, Good is not super-rare.

If the alignments are fairly evenly distributed, with Neutral being only slightly more common than Good and Evil (rather than having the vast majority be Neutral) - then it may not take all that much to be Good.

The PHB states that Good people make personal sacrifices to help others. This is probably the primary factor of Good alignment- it doesn't have to make huge sacrifices all the time- some sacrifice, of time, comfort, wealth, personal safety- is all that's needed.

[Thurbane]

Heh. Almost everyone believes they're Good. As their alignment moves toward Evil, this percentage approaches 100%.
I'd probably put myself down as Neutral with Good tendencies. Some days I can tend to be quite Lawful, and others fairly Chaotic. I freely admit that most of my motivations are basically selfish.

To be honest, I find trying to define real world people (such as myself) in terms of D&D alignment all but impossible. D&D (3.5) seems to imply there are only 9 personality types in the entire world, that everyone slots neatly into one of these, and that they rarely (ever) change alignment.

If the alignment system wasn't so deeply entrenched in the mechanics of D&D, I'd like to scrap it altogether. I've seen homebrew versions of exactly this, that work (or don't work) to varying degrees of success.

When I DM, I hate trying to shoehorn players into alignment moulds. I basically run it as a loose guildeine, and rule that behavious dictates alignment far more then alignment dictates behaviour. I do make exceptions for characters with a rigid moral code (mainly, Paladins and Clerics).

[Coidzor]

So my players (in a predominantly good aligned campaign) will be coming upon a crypt with random bits of loot inside (jewels, coins, magic items) on corpses.

The question sort of a two-parter.

1) As a DM, would you allow your good aligned characters to rob from these corpses?

2) As a DM, would you allow 'exalted' good characters to rob from the corpses?

I see no reason why I would have to forbid them from taking these actions in character if I were ze DM. If they're already in the crypt and not doing things like cracking open sealed sarcophagi then there's no real defilement involved... and if they're going through it, it sounds like the crypt has come pre-defiled or at least with secret passageways in it as a matter of course which makes things different from deliberately going grave-robbing.


Yes. However I would insist exalted characters either donate the loot to a museum or use the proceeds for some sort of good cause rather than selfish ends.

Respecting the dead is nice and all, but it is hardly the most responsible way of using your excess wealth. As Gandalf said, the tombs of the dead should not exceed the houses of the living.

Pretty much. Magic Items are to be used, not hoarded and wasted amongst the dead... especially if one is on a mission of urgency against forces of great evil.

City of the Spider Queen module sort of implies that the loot is going to be used for some sort of good cause, given these are good characters that are going to or have already been interacting with drow to some extent.

[Viktyr Gehrig]

I'd probably put myself down as Neutral with Good tendencies. Some days I can tend to be quite Lawful, and others fairly Chaotic. I freely admit that most of my motivations are basically selfish.

I'm Lawful Neutral with Evil tendencies at best, and I suspect I'm probably actually Evil. I'm not so evil that my friends don't try to convince me otherwise; if it weren't for them I wouldn't have any doubts. I'd be much, much worse if I ever thought I could get away with it.


When I DM, I hate trying to shoehorn players into alignment moulds. I basically run it as a loose guildeine, and rule that behavious dictates alignment far more then alignment dictates behaviour. I do make exceptions for characters with a rigid moral code (mainly, Paladins and Clerics).

This. Unless there is a logical reason why your character must follow a code of conduct-- like your powers are granted by a deity-- then all your alignment should mean is who gets to smite you, and there's no reason that shouldn't change over time.

[Siosilvar]

EDIT: To put this into perspective, very few people are good. You are not Good, and your mum is not Good.

Given that 33% of people ("Humans tend toward no particular alignment, not even neutrality") are Good, I'd have to disagree with that.

[hr]To answer to OP's question... I'd let a Good character get away with it, so long as they put it to use instead of hoarding it for themselves. "Robbing", no.

Exalted? I'll have to think about that one. Probably not, unless the Apocalypse is coming, in which case they have better things to do.

[Rejakor]

Given that 33% of people ("Humans tend toward no particular alignment, not even neutrality") are Good, I'd have to disagree with that.

I believe that quote is from the racial alignments section? Racial alignments is a leftover from the bad old days of All Orcs Are Evil All Elves Are Good Except Drow And It's Easy To Tell Because They're Black. I tend to ignore things that blatantly stupid.

So what that is saying there is that humans have no racial alignment leanings. Alright. So, their alignment is determined by individual psychology, society, and lifestyle. Going by the descriptions of the alignments in the PHB, and the actions of the vast majority of humans in today's world, the vast majority of humans are neutral. Most humans are selfish in most things they do, and while they care for others, won't go out of their way for someone they don't know.

Also, if you really want to bring rules quotes into it, table 6-1 'typical alignments by race or class' lists Humans under Neutral.

[MarkusWolfe]

Truth be told, I'd like to see the alignment broken down into further levels of good and evil....you'd have 'Exalted' at the very top of the good scale and 'wants to be good' at the bottom, with stuff like 'jackass with his heart in the right place' in between. Similarly, evil ranges from 'selfish' to 'card carrying villain' to 'complete monster'. And I guess there'd be further breakdown for law, chaos and both kinds of neutral....but I digress.

Chaotic good? Then they can take whatever they want provided they don't have their own reasons for respecting these particular dead.

Neutral good? They should feel bad about this, since it is disrespectful, but in the end it is a victimless crime and they can go through with it, especially if the money is needed for a good cause.

Lawful good? Only if they come from a society where the dead receive little to no respect. However in a case where the treasure might be used for a good cause, if he communed with his deity on what the appropriate reparations to the descendants would be, swore to find the descendants and carry out those reparations and then did so when all was said and done, a paladin could grave-rob without falling.

Exalted? Can't even play the game.

[Talya]

Chaotic Good, absolute, without question. The dead aren't using these things, they have no need of them. This wouldn't even have a potential to impact their alignment.

Lawful Good? Well, i'd question their lawfulness if they went around looting crypts in general. However, one chaotic act (or even one chaotic general viewpoint) isn't enough to change one's alignment if it still averages out to being lawful.

Neutral Good? This is a chaotic act. So what? Neutral characters are not required to skirt the line down the middle of that axis at all times.

[Rejakor]

Again, Chaotic is rule-breaking, Lawful is rule-following. If their society has a rule 'don't take stuff from dead people/tombs', then taking it (in a vacuum with no other situational or personal things going on) is Chaotic, and leaving it there is Lawful.

Again, if they have personal rules regarding this, following those rules is Lawful, and breaking those rules is Chaotic.

However, if a Lawful person had a plan, goal, or personal rule that conflicted with the societal one.. for example, 'don't let evil prosper', and this was a tomb of evil things, taking the things would be a Lawful action as he is following his own rule, even if he is breaking the societal/legal one. If the loot is necessary for him to survive, most lawful characters have rules or plans about 'doing what is necessary in order to live' and how far they're willing to go for that... taking items from a drow tomb that they're already in (i.e. he didn't come there to graverob, which is actually an important distinction) and which probably houses evil people? That's not actually that far to go, especially considering personal survival is usually very important to people, Lawful or not.

So it depends on the character as to whether it's Lawful or Chaotic, but unless these were/are sealed tombs they're breaking into, or they're the tombs of great heroes, as long as the purpose is survival and not 'loot loot loot lol lol lol' it's very unlikely to be Evil and might even be Good. If not, it's just Neutral.

[MarkusWolfe]

as long as the purpose is survival and not 'loot loot loot lol lol lol'

Given the price on magical items and how badly the melee classes do without them, I don't see the difference.

[Rejakor]

Given the price on magical items and how badly the melee classes do without them, I don't see the difference.

It's subtle, but it's there.

Note: Stripping people down to their underwear is not, traditionally, an honourable or respectful way of looting your allies.

[Coidzor]

It's subtle, but it's there.

Note: Stripping people down to their underwear is not, traditionally, an honourable or respectful way of looting your allies.

Generally if your allies have died, you really need every edge you can get to survive because things have gone Murphy, so showing them respect goes out the window in comparison with surviving to even think about giving them a proper burial or rezzing them.

[hamishspence]

Also, if you really want to bring rules quotes into it, table 6-1 'typical alignments by race or class' lists Humans under Neutral.

That simply means TN is slightly more common than any other alignment.

Not common enough though, for humans to come under "alignment- Often Neutral" though- if they were to be statted out in a book.

[Talya]

It's subtle, but it's there.

Note: Stripping people down to their underwear is not, traditionally, an honourable or respectful way of looting your allies.

Rather depends on how one views the body, doesn't it? If a dead body is just a rotting shell, no more the person who once inhabited it, "showing respect" to it becomes rather irrelevant.