Why must I go full-Vader?

[Drakevarg]

CONTEXT:
Yesterday was the first session of a new campaign run by a friend of mine, his first attempt at DMing. The campaign started at 3rd level, with the following party:

Elf Ranger
Catfolk Monk
Human Dread Necromancer
Gnome Bard
Vampire Spawn
Human Paladin

With myself as the Paladin. Now obviously I had immediate concerns concerning the Dread Necro and the Vampire, but the DM ruled that a) mindless undead are True Neutral (being essentially automatons), meaning I didn't have to worry about the (similarly True Neutral) Necro so long as he didn't go around creating ghouls or other psychotic cannibal monsters, and b) the Vampire was also Non-Evil (probably going for some nancy-boy Anne Rice angle).

So, that covered, the party was set to go. The session starts and we pull into some backwater ****hole and are immediately told to see the mayor. He sizes us up and asks for our help to deal with some goblins that have been raiding the town. I agree without hesitation, but point out that while I'd be willing to do it altruistically, my party would demand payment. He mutters something about being poor but happy to throw treasure in our general direction once the problem's dealt with, which I take as good enough and head out to deal with it.

Now, my first instinct was to simply have our ranger start tracking the goblins back to their lair. Unfortunately it was already early in the afternoon and we had to worry about tonight's raid. Here's where I go off-script.

See, the DM had originally expected us to simply hang out along with the guards or something, and had planned for us to fight some goblin Rogues that snuck past the lines as the guards held off the bulk of the horde. However, I decide instead to march straight to the guard barracks and inform the Captain that I'm taking over the defenses.

So the very first thing I do is have the guards dismantle the destroyed buildings near the wall the goblins have been attacking and use them to reinforce the holes in the wall. Then I order every otherwise unoccupied civilian in the city to dig a 10 foot wide, 20 foot deep trench along the entire length of the wall, with spikes on the bottom. Next, I have them place a mound of hay in front of this trench, coated with oil. I then have the local alchemist design special arrows with built-in vials of alchemist's fire. He designs enough for 5 volleys from our archers. Finally, I have the local clerics on hand to buff our trained guardsmen.

All this set up and me unable to thing of anything else to do with the time we have available to me (I was originally going to have cauldrons of boiling water/acid along the walls, but there was no time, or rather the DM forgot about it until halfway through the battle and vetoed it), we waited along the wall until nightfall.

Eventually, we spot movement beyond the trees as the raiding "party" approached (I use quotes because the force probably numbered around 150 goblins or so). I ordered a volley of Fire Arrows to the woods edge in order to illuminate the enemy, revealing their ranks. The enemy charges, a volley of normal arrows hitting them about halfway across the field. As they're about to approach the hay, I order a volley of Fire Arrows on the mound, setting it ablaze. Unfortunately this pushes the hay into the pit, rendering the spikes harmless for the next rank of goblins. At this point I have a volley of Fire Arrows (3/5) fired into the rear ranks of the enemy to prevent them from fleeing.

By the time the third rank of goblins pile in, enough corpses litter the pit that it only qualifies as 10 ft. deep instead of the original 20. Even so, any attempts to scale the walls are responded to with a hail of arrows to the face. Fourth goblin rank falls in, taking their damage but their bodies finally filling the pit. The fifth rank carries ladders, and at this point we're finally given something to do other than laugh.

Through sheer numbers they finally overwhelm the fire, arrows, and wall and we're suddenly in a melee with the goblins. Finally, the goblin rogues that were to be our original encounter make their move (the civilian lookouts I'd placed on nearby rooftops proving entirely useless). Not putting up with this ****, I order the archers to set the wall we were standing on on fire. The party jumps off and the wall goes up in flames, our goblin enemies either perishing in the flames or dying on impact as they leap down to continue the fight.

At last the fight is over. Final count: countless goblins dead, 2 guardsmen dead (one clumsily falling off the wall as he tried to kick down one of the ladders, the other getting his neck snapped when a goblin fell on him at the very end).

One finally upset ruins the congratulatory high-fives, though. A pair of goblins are spotted fleeing the battle, carrying a captured townsfolk. Unwilling to accept any downside to this victory, I leap through a flaming hole in the wall and start sprinting towards the captors, the Dread Necro following, as the Ranger snipes at them. One is dropped by the arrows before I reach them, the other one dropping their prisoner and scurries up a tree. Unable to reach there in the same round, I slow to a jog and transmute a Chaos Flask into some Alchemist's fire and throw it into the tree, setting it ablaze.

Now in the forest, the Dread Necro spots more goblins hiding in the woods, while we both hear more rustling behind us. I decide enough is enough, picking up the captured townsfolk and stepping out of the woods. Calling back to town, I declare that our aggressors will not be permitted to run from us, and order the final volley of Fire Arrows be launched into the woods in order to burn the whole place down. Unfortunately, the archers somehow manage to miss an entire FOREST, striking only the underbrush which quickly goes out. Fortunately, the Necro simply casts summon swarm and makes short work of the survivors.

So, that was fun. I took what was supposed to be a simple fight with goblin Rogues and turned it into an awesome roflstomp against our besiegers.

Afterwords, however, the DM expressed concern over my whole "burn down the forest on the off chance more goblins are hiding in there" strategy, saying it was rather un-Paladin-like.

And it's true. While I denied accusations that it was non-Lawful (citing the idea of having a personal code to the effect of "Never allow the Enemy to escape while it is within your power to prevent it. To do so allows them to return to cause more suffering." However, I conceded that it did lean on the LN side of things.

However, that's the sort of character I want to play. My Paladin is patient, kind, charitable, and all those other positive buzzwords that Paladins should be. On the other hand, he's also completely ruthless, more than willing to go way into overkill mode to assure that the current threat is neutralized as thoroughly as possible. Unfortunately, this does mean he sits on the LN border of LG. I try to think of him as "a saner Rorschach" or "the LG Kratos," but these are both characters that are considerably less than the Paragon of Virtue that Paladins seem to be expected to be. Ergo, I'm in definite risk of Falling.

Now to get to my "full-Vader" remark. The falling is not the issue I have. It's the character I choose to play, and being a Knight in Sour Armor/He Who Fights Monsters type is interesting. My issue is that to the best of my knowledge, there aren't many PrCs I can dip into to make use of my now-mostly-useless Paladin levels that don't involve going way off the deep end.

For some reason, WotC seems to have decided that a Paladin will never fall to the point where he'd be unable or unwilling to atone, yet not far enough where he'd turn right around and become a murderous evil overlord type. There's the Corrupted Avenger, but my issue there is that the PrC requires total obsession over one particular enemy, and this campaign has no particular focus that I know of. I've of course looked at the Grey Guard, but that looks essentially like "Paladin, only slightly more lax" and not "Paladin, only Rorschach-levels of ruthlessness."

So my question to you, Playground, is "are there any PrCs that hit my sweet spot of no-longer a Paragon of Virtue, but not yet a cackling Evil Overlord? Or should I just shrug, take Corrupted Avenger with the BBEG's creature type as my focus and start cross-classing into Rogue or something?"

[Greymane]

Well, botched my reading comprehension at first. As far as I know, Grey Guard is the closest thing you're looking for. Barring that, as long as you never willingly perform an evil act or switch alignments, you can always keep your powers, so multi-classing for whatever abilities you may want is still on the table.

Really, it sounds like this is mostly an RP thing, and you're going to have to work with your DM on how he wants to handle the archetype you're shooting for. Best case scenario, he's on board and you teeter close to the Neutral side of the Good/Evil axis and you keep your powers. Worst case? Well, how much use do you want out of your Fighter-Without-Bonus-Feats? :smalltongue:

[NNescio]

Well, botched my reading comprehension at first. As far as I know, Grey Guard is the closest thing you're looking for. Barring that, as long as you never willingly perform an evil act or switch alignments, you can always keep your powers, so multi-classing for whatever abilities you may want is still on the table.

There's also the whole "grossly violates the code of conduct" clause, which seems to be the part the DM is taking issue with, at least in the potential future.

[Rhaegar14]

Shadowbane Inquisitor (Complete Adventurer) is a hybrid Rogue/Paladin that allows you to retain class features even if you fall, though you cannot take more levels in that particular class.

I would also recommend bailing out of Paladin as soon as you hit five (by then they have all of their good stuff) regardless of what else you do. Five levels of Fighter-Without-Bonus-Feats is a whole lot better than an entire build of Fighter-Without-Bonus-Feats.

[Drakevarg]

I would also recommend bailing out of Paladin as soon as you hit five (by then they have all of their good stuff) regardless of what else you do. Five levels of Fighter-Without-Bonus-Feats is a whole lot better than an entire build of Fighter-Without-Bonus-Feats.

I was gonna get to at least 6 before bailing out, on the grounds that I'm using the Planar variant and if I don't fall, a Celestial Mount is pretty neat.

[Greymane]

There's also the whole "grossly violates the code of conduct" clause, which seems to be the part the DM is taking issue with, at least in the potential future.

That's also good point. I almost exclusively play Lawful characters, so breaking a code of conduct didn't even register to me as a possibility. :smallredface:

Though the whole scenario did kind of make me think more bordering on evil act and not so much as breaking the code.

Rhaegar14 gives some sound advice, too. I sometimes forget about non-casting PrCs out of Complete Divine (I think it's from there?).

[TroubleBrewing]

Divine Crusader (CD) could have what you want. It gets spells, which can help manage the pain of losing Paladin class features, if it goes that far.

Justicar (CW) can be LN, but you'd still lose your Paladin stuff if you become non-good.

Warpriest (CD) can also be LN, and with this PrC, you'd be more likely to be successful in arguing that performing slightly less-good acts in service of your god in a time of war is acceptable.

Grey Guard (CS) really is what you want here. You can fluff the class however you like, and your option would likely be "I'm still acting as a service to my god. No exceptions." Very Rorschach.

Knight Protector (CW) is also a good option. It mentions that it's code of service is held to higher ideal than service to a god, and it also says that ex-paladins are common among their ranks. Unlike other ex-Paladin PrCs, however, it gains nothing special to replace your former abilities.

The best option, in my opinion, falls outside of PrC-land altogether, however. Ask your DM if you can retrain as a LN Paladin Variant from one of the Dragon Magazines (I've forgotten which). Crusader (ToB) would normally be my first suggestion, but they can't be any Neutral alignment.

EDIT: In the interest of optimization, and so nobody with poor intentions beats me to it, I feel obligated to point out that all of these PrCs, with the possible exception of Grey Guard, are awful. Then again, you intend to take Paladin past the usual jump-off point of level 2, so I'm guessing that the point of your question was non-optimization related. All of which is totally fine, I'd just feel bad if you took one of my suggestions and later realized what a terrible, terrible class it was. Conscience cleared! :smallbiggrin:

EDIT PART 2: ELECTRIC BOOGALOO: The variant in question is out of DrMag 310. If the usual Paladin is the "crusader", the LN variant is the "enforcer". Its class features all change to represent the Neutral alignment (Detect Chaos, Aura of Law, etc.) but one extremely noticeable change is the fact that you gain Leadership as a bonus feat at 5th level.

[Mr.Bookworm]

The best option, in my opinion, falls outside of PrC-land altogether, however. Ask your DM if you can retrain as a LN Paladin Variant from one of the Dragon Magazines (I've forgotten which). Crusader (ToB) would normally be my first suggestion, but they can't be any Neutral alignment.

Crusader can't be True Neutral. NG, NE, LN, and CN are all fine.

I'd suggest that, really. ToB is always fun, and you aren't at any risk of falling.

It's also only been a single session, so I'd just ask him if you can just switch classes without retraining. Most DMs I know are pretty lenient with stuff like that in the first session.


I was gonna get to at least 6 before bailing out, on the grounds that I'm using the Planar variant and if I don't fall, a Celestial Mount is pretty neat.

Does the Planar variant not get Mount at 6th level?

[Drakevarg]

It's also only been a single session, so I'd just ask him if you can just switch classes without retraining. Most DMs I know are pretty lenient with stuff like that in the first session.

Maybe so. But I do want my character to be a Paladin. I just want an option to fall back on if I get too ruthless.


Does the Planar variant not get Mount at 6th level?

Exactly my point. That's why I would reach 6 before considering taking another class. Rhaegar's suggestion was that I bail after 5.

[Mr.Bookworm]

Exactly my point. That's why I would reach 6 before considering taking another class. Rhaegar's suggestion was that I bail after 5.

Er. I meant to put "5th level" there. So I take it the Planar variant gets a Celestial/Fiendish mount at sixth level instead?

[Drakevarg]

Er. I meant to put "5th level" there. So I take it the Planar variant gets a Celestial/Fiendish mount at sixth level instead?

Planar variant gets the mount as usual at 5th, but then adds the template to the mount they already have at 6th (in place of their first remove disease SLA).

[TroubleBrewing]

Crusader can't be True Neutral. NG, NE, LN, and CN are all fine.

I went back and read the ToB. I always thought that when they say that they "can choose any alignment except Neutral" it meant that they were referring to all neutral alignments, but they go on to mention that they must stand for "chaos, good, evil, law, or some combination of principles". Interesting.

[Mr.Bookworm]

I went back and read the ToB. I always thought that when they say that they "can choose any alignment except Neutral" it meant that they were referring to all neutral alignments, but they go on to mention that they must stand for "chaos, good, evil, law, or some combination of principles". Interesting.

Yep. Although I just know someone out there was incredibly upset they didn't get to play their committed-neutral Crusader of Balance.
"What makes a man turn neutral... Lust for gold? Power? Or were you just born with a heart full of neutrality?"

[TroubleBrewing]

Yep. Although I just know someone out there was incredibly upset they didn't get to play their committed-neutral Crusader. "What makes a man turn neutral... Lust for gold? Power? Or were you just born with a heart full of neutrality?"

GAH curse your white text. I was about to quote that...

[Kol Korran]

hhmmmm... interesting defense stroty. some thoughts (the first more general, the last few more related to the PrC question):

- first of all, why is burning down the forest considered not good? last i heard, paladins didn't have any druid like tendencies... only thing i can think of is that you it would hurt the village's economy, which is more of an economic thing, not an evil thing. care to clarify that?

- paladins start "turning to the dark side", when they are fully aware of the consequences of their actions, knowing that there is an evil element to them consciously. what you did seem more a "heat of the moment thing/ not realizing the consequences". i'd hardly consider it "turning evil"

- also, this has been a slight (IMo), one time aggression, in the first meeting of the campaign... hardly the hall mark of a character's development. wjhy not give it some time to develop? to flesh out?

- also, there seem to be many schools of thought about how a paladin should act. i won't go into the (tiresome, overly done, never getting to any point) argument, but IMO there are basically 2 approaches: one is that paladins are the embodiment of virtue, honor, sacrifice, leadership, goody to-shoes who are bloody unrealistic, hard to play with, and frankly quite a pian in the ass. the second one depict them as humans, striving to follow a greater moral, a great code, perhaps elevating themselves (and others) through their choices and behaviour. but these are hard choices, and they are still human. and they have other feelings, other ideas and so on. there is a great e-motivator that i think captures the idea perfectly

http://i283.photobucket.com/albums/kk295/meir_8/BatmanLawfulGood1.jpg

please lets not get into an argument about this one!

you and your DM know what you feel a paladin should be like. but this is a suggestion. there are many paladins out there, some done wrong, some good, some bloody freaking awesome!

- ok, about character advancement. one option would be to go the "paladin of tyranny/ slaughter" route once you fall. the blackguard is also there but... kinda lame... the Eberron book "five nations" may have an interesting solution- the BoneKnight- it is available to Ex paladins, and grant them some powers according to the paladin levels (don't quite remember). the class focus on crafting a bone armor (as strong as metal) and bone weapons that gain some powers, but also has a theme with commanding undead, i think even boosting them? (basically these guys led units of strong undead in defense of their country) fluff wise, the dread necro (and maybe even vampire?) can lead you down the path, and your powers may mignel and compensate them... or you could be stepping on each other's toes. not sure, been a long time since i read the class features. don't know of other worthy "paladin fall" PrCs...

hope it helps,
Kol.

[Calanon]

Just throwin this out there that nobody mentioned Warblade (EVERY THREAD HERE MENTIONS IT ATLEAST ONCE)

you can always label the whole Grossly violation rule as "Something so obviously evil that you'd have to be as blind as a Fighter* that is fighting a force dragon, that has blink cast on it TO not see it..."

*LF> Prestige class that requires you to be blind...

but that is just a trick you can use to pull the wool over on the DM :smallwink:

Gray Guard sounds to be exactly what your looking for but what keeps coming up is the whole (god forbid the player accidentally trips and kills a celestial butterfly) so I'm thinking Blackguard is ultimately the best you can pick... Yes, Evil players CAN do good deeds without there alignment shifting. An Evil Necromancer can set up an army of wights to defend a town of innocent as long as it furthers his/her evil scheme ("Muwahahahaha i shall protect this town and use it as my breeding pool for my wight army!"). so justify it as "I'm trying to set up a powerful government by removing our current weak government or something like that..."

[Drakevarg]

- first of all, why is burning down the forest considered not good? last i heard, paladins didn't have any druid like tendencies... only thing i can think of is that you it would hurt the village's economy, which is more of an economic thing, not an evil thing. care to clarify that?

"Friend to all living things" or some such bull****? I dunno. I figured that since any cleared forest could be used as agricultural land and there were no non-Goblin settlements within the forest to the best of my knowledge, all that would happen was displacing a few deer, but I'm not the DM.


- also, this has been a slight (IMo), one time aggression, in the first meeting of the campaign... hardly the hall mark of a character's development. wjhy not give it some time to develop? to flesh out?

I'm not worried about falling anytime soon, so much as I'm setting a precedent that has implications I should consider.

[Mr.Bookworm]

"Friend to all living things" or some such bull****? I dunno. I figured that since any cleared forest could be used as agricultural land and there were no non-Goblin settlements within the forest to the best of my knowledge, all that would happen was displacing a few deer, but I'm not the DM.

Probably because the potential for indiscriminate murder isn't very Paladin-ish.

Saying "There's probably no one innocent in there. Just burn the whole thing down." is pretty damn morally grey at the very least. Not to mention killing fleeing foes is another grey area.

Not that that's a negative comment on your character, mind you, it's just that if I were DMing for a Paladin, I would be warning the player over something like that.

[Worira]

OP, I think you may be slightly underestimating (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ce/Rodeo-Chediski_Fire.jpg) how dangerous a forest fire is.

[Acanous]

Point of note- Starting a Forest Fire is not always easy. Unless you live in Arizona, in which case rubbing your hands vigorously may cause one.
The DM was totally OK to say that the arrows went out after a short while. Alchemist's fire is a chemical excellerant, which burns for somewhere betwen 6 and 24 seconds.
Take some hairspray, light it on fire, and spray a tree for 30 seconds(Under carefully controlled and monitored conditions). It won't catch fire(Unless you're in Arizona).

Living trees are actually quite moist, and tree bark is designed to protect them from things like being set ablaze.

[Worira]

Yeah, I thought about mentioning that. But it's basically either completely ineffective, or ridiculously, crazy dangerous. There's no real middle ground of "kind of on fire".

[Lither]

Point of note- Starting a Forest Fire is not always easy. Unless you live in Arizona, in which case rubbing your hands vigorously may cause one.
The DM was totally OK to say that the arrows went out after a short while. Alchemist's fire is a chemical excellerant, which burns for somewhere betwen 6 and 24 seconds.
Take some hairspray, light it on fire, and spray a tree for 30 seconds(Under carefully controlled and monitored conditions). It won't catch fire(Unless you're in Arizona).

Living trees are actually quite moist, and tree bark is designed to protect them from things like being set ablaze.

Or Australia. If you try that trick on one of our eucalyptus trees, it will explode. So it really depends on where you are.

[Fouredged Sword]

Most besiged castiles used pitch becuse it was actualy the only real way to get large swaths of land to light up. Even grass won't burn unless you have the right conditions, and those conditions are rare in any area that has enough moisture to support a forest.

Tell your DM that lawful good does not mean lawful nice, and you feel that it is both within honor and goodness to set on fire the hundreds of goblins charging you.

Though greyguard does sound like a good match to the character you want to play. They make atoning for your mistakes much much easier even when you do fall.

[Telonius]

What exactly about the Paladin class appeals to you? From the way you've described the character, it sounds like he could be anything from a Knight to a Crusader to a Marshal.

Also, you are hereby ordered to recruit one of the townsfolk into your party, and call yourselves the Magnificent Seven. :smallbiggrin:

[Greenish]

Since undead are true neutral, you could go Bone Knight (if you got access to Five Nations). It allows you to keep most of the neat paladin stuff, is easy to qualify after paladin 4, and even allows you to stay LG without being constrained by paladin code.


I went back and read the ToB. I always thought that when they say that they "can choose any alignment except Neutral" it meant that they were referring to all neutral alignmentsWhat is called "true neutral" by people is almost always referred to by WotC just as "neutral". Haven't you noticed?

[koscum]

Paladin alignment 101:

Rule 1: (∃P)((Lawful Good(P) ≠ Lawful Nice(P))∧(Paladin(P))

Rule 1a: (∃P)((Lawful Good(P) ≠ Lawful Anal(P))∧(Paladin(P))

Rule 2: (∀P1, ∀P2)(((Lawful Good(P1) ≠ Lawful Nice(P1)∧(Lawful Good(P2) = Lawful Nice(P2))∧(Paladin(P1))∧(Paladin(P2))∧(Level(P1) < 5)∧(Level(P2) < 5))⇒(Count(P1) < Count(P2)))

Rule 2a: (∀P1, ∀P2)(((Lawful Good(P1) ≠ Lawful Nice(P1)∧(Lawful Good(P2) = Lawful Nice(P2))∧(Paladin(P1))∧(Paladin(P2))∧(Level(P1) ≥ 5)∧(Level(P2) ≥ 5))⇒(Count(P1) > Count(P2)))
Rule 2b: (∀P1, ∀P2)(((Lawful Good(P1) ≠ Lawful Nice(P1)∧(Lawful Good(P2) = Lawful Nice(P2))∧(Paladin(P1))∧(Paladin(P2))∧(Level(P1) ≥ 12)∧(Level(P2) ≥ 12))⇒(Count(P1) ≫ Count(P2)))



Burning down a forest to defend a town is most certainly NOT an Evil act. It's not Chaotic either. Maybe slightly Neutral on Good/Neutral/Evil scale, but not even close enough to get a Fall from Grace as a Paladin.

Heck, I'd say that tossing an Alchemist's Fire at a Goblin who tried to run away and hide in a tree to save his own life is a bit worse. Sure, you can go along with the whole justice/retribution/whatever-you-want-to-call-it and be the judge, the jury and the executioner, but killing an unarmed (I presume it ran for it's life and actually dropped weapon/weapon-like objects to run faster) creature that is no longer a threat is not very Good act unless you have no other options. And you always have other options.

[Lord.Sorasen]

Burning down a forest to defend a town is most certainly NOT an Evil act. It's not Chaotic either. Maybe slightly Neutral on Good/Neutral/Evil scale, but not even close enough to get a Fall from Grace as a Paladin.

Heck, I'd say that tossing an Alchemist's Fire at a Goblin who tried to run away and hide in a tree to save his own life is a bit worse. Sure, you can go along with the whole justice/retribution/whatever-you-want-to-call-it and be the judge, the jury and the executioner, but killing an unarmed (I presume it ran for it's life and actually dropped weapon/weapon-like objects to run faster) creature that is no longer a threat is not very Good act unless you have no other options. And you always have other options.

I would argue that those ideas are one in the same. Both are "possibly killing people who are, least at the moment, definitely not attacking you." It's also, as some people have pointed out, incredibly dangerous, probably moreso than goblin raiders.

I actually hate the paladin code of conduct, even whilst loving the paladin class. And I do so for one reason.

There's this idea that it's not enough for a paladin to fall. And that seriously trivializes paladin morality, because the player begins to ask not "what should this character do" but "what could this character get away with". It turns morality into numbers, into a legal system where players try to present arguments to suggest they should be able to get away with certain acts. "Get away with" is just the wrong attitude with such a class, way I see it. Falling is a big deal to a paladin strength-wise, but it should never be the paladin's motivation for doing good. Paladins should be good because they are good. They were chosen because of such.

Someone on this board, probably on this thread, posted a suggestion that maybe Batman is a paladin. Batpaladin is actually one of my favorite ideas. Here you have a hero who A. Wants to serve good, B. breaks many moral codes and is entirely aware, and C. Tries his best regardless of a world where his code of honor creates incredible complications. You have someone who is undoubtably a great hero, but who is human and imperfect. I don't see batman arguing with people about what would be evil but not too evil. He might need to justify an immoral act to Superman, but he doesn't try to sugarcoat is or even deny it's bad. It's just what needs to be done.

What I'm trying and failing to get out is that you should talk to your DM about this one, and see if you can maybe avoid falling except by seriously gross crimes. After all, your God (or the spirit of righteousness) chose your character, probably at least somewhat aware of his character. It's hard to flesh out a character if you have to worry constantly about no longer having a character to flesh out. I feel a good DM might be willing to agree.

Also, there's a good chance he would be more sympathetic to your idea if your character reacted to the act. I mean, he saw a goblin running away with a hostage before he set the forest aflame. If even a single other goblin managed to do the same, the paladin has killed an innocent. Have your character be somewhat aware of the danger of his actions, and he'll seem less evil for it. A paladin who recognizes his human limits in morality has always fealt, at least to me, a lot more noble than a paladin who has no capacity for darkness.

[Tyndmyr]

Well, YES, that's an evil act. Things live in the forest. In D&D worlds, this frequently includes intelligent beings. Hell, lots of them are probably non evil, like Dryads.

None of which are threatening you in the slightest. In fact, nothing from the forest is threatening you at all, and you don't even know that evil things are in there.

But still, you want to burn it all down in an uncontrolled flash fire of destruction because there might happen to be some creatures in it of the same race as some that once caused you problems.


Of *course* it'll cause problems. It would for any good character. It's especially problematic for a paladin, because killing innocents even WITH a very good reason is bad. Killing them just because it might also kill people who might be bad? That's not far off the CE/CN practice of stabbing random people in town.

[Abaddon87]

I'll comp out in a ways by saying I agree and +1 to what Lord.Sorasen said...

However, since the OP seems to want a PRC to turn to should his DM prove insistant on his "falling"... I present your options in a nut shell:

If you want to remain as close to a Paladin who still works for the church, Grey Guard is the BEST choice. This class is the answer to wanting a Paladin that is still supported by his superiors, but is free to act "in the best intrests of the church" without punishment.

If you want to play a Paladin that still views himself as good but actually is fallen, the Shadowbane Inquisitor fits that perfectly (it even suggests such an example when describing the PRC).

If you want to play a fallen Paladin, Blackguard is the class you need. Good guy who said "forget this good stuff... I'm evil now!"

That about sums it up, but again I see no reason why you cant play the character you want without worrying about all this morality stuff...

[MukkTB]

Killing things that are running away from you: Meh. Not great but I would be comfortable doing it with a l/g fighter no problem.

Destroying a non magical forest: Meh. I'm sure that you destroyed valuable resources for the village. You had a chance of killing innocent humans. That's a moral grey area. Somewhat irresponsible. Also what about the people who could live in there?

Destroying a magical forest: Evil. Between the sentient trees, the forest spirits, and the spirit of the forest that's a lot of intelligent things that just went up in flame. The question is - was it a magic forest or not? Would your character know? Then the L/G argument rises up again. Does it matter if your character knows?

And the final question - Is it a good act to kill a goblin army and some innocents in order to prevent the army attacking other towns? Damned if I know. Stupid paladin alignment issues. Any other character could just declare that they feel they made the best moral choices that they could based on their character.

[raymundo]

Would you mind to elaborate the meaining of "going full-Vader"? I seem incabable of figuring it out myself.

[Tyndmyr]

And the final question - Is it a good act to kill a goblin army and some innocents in order to prevent the army attacking other towns? Damned if I know. Stupid paladin alignment issues. Any other character could just declare that they feel they made the best moral choices that they could based on their character.

Im not sure that these are the only options. Hell, Im not sure that the army attacking other towns was an option. They were quite obviously defeated and fleeing by the time he opted to burn the woods.

Now, striking down fleeing people? Morally questionable, but I'd probably allow it given the circumstances. Burning an entire forest? Much less questionable, since you can't possibly know the extent of the damage you will cause.

Fires don't just burn forests, after all.

[Drakevarg]

Would you mind to elaborate the meaining of "going full-Vader"? I seem incabable of figuring it out myself.

The main issue I'm having is the apparent idea that if a Paladin falls to the point that he's now Lawful Neutral, he doesn't have a Lawful Neutral PrC option to trade his (now-useless) powers for. His only real options are "become Good again" or "abruptly go from stalwart champion of justice to black-clad evil Space Nazi so he can get power again."

Sort of like Anakin Skywalker going from respected Jedi to Dark Lord of the Sith with nary a pause midway down the spectrum. Ergo "going full-Vader."


Im not sure that these are the only options. Hell, Im not sure that the army attacking other towns was an option. They were quite obviously defeated and fleeing by the time he opted to burn the woods.

The force we fought was very explicitly only a raiding party and by no means the bulk of the horde. I wanted to make absolutely sure no one escaped, thereby providing the horde with both survivors and intel.


Now, striking down fleeing people? Morally questionable, but I'd probably allow it given the circumstances. Burning an entire forest? Much less questionable, since you can't possibly know the extent of the damage you will cause.

That was actually part of the point. I knew for a fact that at least 4 goblins were out there but for all I knew there could be dozens more in hiding or fleeing. I wanted to cause a massive amount of damage to increase the chances nobody made it out.

As for the concern that the fires might kill innocents beyond fluffy bunnies, I was also assured that the Goblins had pretty much total control over the region, to the point that no maps exist because no one travels there. Maybe there's some old hermit out there or whatever, but I can't be expected to account for all conceivable collateral damage, or I'd never be able to do anything.

[hamishspence]

One could go fully evil, but restrict one's evil deeds to "deserving targets".

Somewhat like Dexter or The Punisher- only a little more vicious.

[marcielle]

Being a paladin of St. Cuthbert might fix your problems if your DM agrees specific god rulings outweigh the general paladin code. Cuth is basicaly a LG Kratos in that he is on the side of Good but is all 'KILL EVIL NO MATTER WHAT'. Warning, Cuthbert is so intolerant of evil that if your vamp or Dread Necro slip up, you will be obliged to hunt them down unless they can atone and I mean IMMEDIATELY. Basically, if it ends in killing evil stuff, St. Cuth will wholly condone it. Even if a few (reasonable) sacrifices must be made.

[Drakevarg]

One could go fully evil, but restrict one's evil deeds to "deserving targets".

Somewhat like Dexter or The Punisher- only a little more vicious.

I get that, but the problem I have is why it's necessary. It's the lack of a middle ground that bothers me. And plus, my character isn't really prone to cruelty so much as he's prone to being exceedingly thorough. He wouldn't torture an enemy, but he'd kill them and then destroy the remains and scatter and/or seal them away if he felt there was a chance of them returning.


Didn't read entire post but being a paladin of St. Cuthbert might fix your problems if your DM agrees specific god rulings outweigh the general paladin code. Cuth is basicaly a LG Kratos in that he is on the side of Good but is all 'KILL EVIL NO MATTER WHAT'. Warning, Cuthbert is so intolerant of evil that if your vamp or Dread Necro slip up, you will be obliged to hunt them down unless they can atone and I mean IMMEDIATELY.

I'm a Paladin of Bahamut, akshully. As for the Vamp/Dread Necro, that'd be my response anyway. Also, isn't St. Cuthbert LN?

[Aegis013]

If anyone hasn't mentioned it, you can grab a phylactory of faithfulness from DMG and I think that makes the DM have to warn you if you're about to do something that would make you fall? So you could play to the extreme limit of not falling by the DM's eyes through that I think.

If I'm misremembering that item feel free to correct me.

[TroubleBrewing]

I'm a Paladin of Bahamut, akshully. As for the Vamp/Dread Necro, that'd be my response anyway. Also, isn't St. Cuthbert LN?

There's a couple of "holy warrior of Bahamut" style PrC's, but they're almost exclusively LG.

Cuthbert is LN and REALLY intolerant of breaking laws in general, even Evil ones.

Why does having Neutral as the good/evil side of the alignment scale seem to turn the law/chaos side up to 11?

[Drakevarg]

There's a couple of "holy warrior of Bahamut" style PrC's, but they're almost exclusively LG.

Plus Platinum Knight isn't even that good unless your campaign is centered entirely around dragons.


Why does having Neutral as the good/evil side of the alignment scale seem to turn the law/chaos side up to 11?

Probably because people seem to think that if you basically had 10 zealot points to spend, Neutral would always be set to 0 (because you're not biased one way or the other) unless you're TN and then you've either got 0 points in anything or 10 points in "chronic backstabbing disorder."

Meaning if you're LG, CG, LE, or CE you could (for example) have 5 points in Lawful and another 5 points in Good, but if you're LN, CN, NG or NE you have (for example) 10 points in Lawful and 0 points in Neutral.

So in sum, you're never Lawful Neutral. You're LAWFUL neutral.

[Keld Denar]

Eh, they were green. They had it coming to them anyway, armed, unarmed, or otherwise. Racism, color-coded for your convenience!

Another option for you, since you seem to have very few Pally levels, is Sorcadin. Bahamut = Dragons = Sorcerers. Sorcadin is a paladin who embraces his deities platinum nature alongside his arcany dragony nature.

[Drakevarg]

Eh, they were green. They had it coming to them anyway, armed, unarmed, or otherwise. Racism, color-coded for your convenience!

Eh, my character's not racist. To him the goblins just happened to be "the Enemy" at the time and thus must be utterly obliterated.


Another option for you, since you seem to have very few Pally levels, is Sorcadin. Bahamut = Dragons = Sorcerers. Sorcadin is a paladin who embraces his deities platinum nature alongside his arcany dragony nature.

I've considered this, but due to my admittedly Vaderlike stature (about 6'3", wears a helmet at all times (for reasons I won't say here because a few of my party-mates may be making accounts here), prone to interrogating via one-armed neck lift, etc.), I didn't want to put points into Squishy.

[marcielle]

Also, isn't St. Cuthbert LN?
All the MORE reason to convert. You could have an awesome RP moment when your character realizes Bahamut is STILL too soft on the baddies and swear alleagiance to St. Cuthbert. That aside, I don't see the problem in spending only 2-4 of your zealot points. My chars are generally pretty laid back about their alignment. Then again, I've never really played a divine character. Note, Law is not the same everywhere. Like how polygamy is allowed in some nations and not others. It doesn't matter if it was legal where you did it, if someone is from a nation where polygamy is illegal, they will likely GIVE YOU HELL. Thus, just choose to be a subject of a good nation.

[Drakevarg]

Note, Law is not the same everywhere.

Eh. I've never made a Lawful character that actually cared what the local law was. To me "Lawful" means having a strict code of honor, and if local law happens to coincide with that, duces.

[Greenish]

The main issue I'm having is the apparent idea that if a Paladin falls to the point that he's now Lawful Neutral, he doesn't have a Lawful Neutral PrC option to trade his (now-useless) powers for.*cough*Bone Knight*cough*

Of course, that would mean that you die if you take off your armour, so maybe it's a bit too vader-y. :smalltongue:

[Abaddon87]

I've considered this, but due to my admittedly Vaderlike stature (about 6'3", wears a helmet at all times (for reasons I won't say here because a few of my party-mates may be making accounts here), prone to interrogating via one-armed neck lift, etc.), I didn't want to put points into Squishy.

Bolded for point of focus... I cant say it any more clearly that this kind of activity is done by a Grey Guard. Period. IF your DM wants to shoehorn you into being a goody goody, ask him if your church will sponsor you to become a Grey Guard for them.

[Keld Denar]

The first rule of the Grey Guard: Don't talk about the Grey Guard.
The second rule of the Grey Guard: DON'T FREAKIN TALK ABOUT THE GREY GUARD ALREADY!

The Grey Guard are something that bishops and abbots talk about in back rooms with the proper wards in place. They aren't something most clergy even acknowledge exist. Cause sometimes, damnit, evil just needs to get smote, and all that red tape is a royal PitA.

St Cuthbert and Pholtus are the two Greyhawk deities I'd MOST associate with having a Grey Guard. Except Pholites wouldn't call them the Grey Guard...they probably be like, the Most Brilliant Ones, or something equally gaudy and blinding.