Was this an evil act?

[Cybris75]

Last session my paladin arranged for a mark of justice to be put onto the village miller. That guy was a heavy drinker and endangered himself and his family while drunk. The trigger for the mark was the miller starting to drink again, and he was told of this and of the consequences. An hour later, the curse kicked in...

The paladin is a paladin of St. Cuthbert, so he is heavy into "if you break the rules, accept the consequences so that you can learn not to do it again".

Now, the consequence is that the miller is unable to work while the mark is in effect. The village cleric was horrified, and then we got in a OOC discussion about substance addiction which I found terribly misplaced. I had the mark removed in the end because the miller was no good to the village under the curse either. But I refused to concede the point that a quasi-medieval champion of the god of the cudgel had the necessary psychological understanding of how addiction works and that it can't just be stopped by telling someone not to do it again. I was even told that it might be interpreted as an evil act!

Was I wrong in playing the character this way? Mind that I don't condone the character's actions myself, merely tried to think like he would.

I realize this is a group-specific question, and this will be no problem in the future because it was a one-shot adventure. Would you as players (not characters) have been shocked by this?

[Slipperychicken]

I would have had total disbelief.

So you want to keep this guy from endangering his family while being drunk? Why not make him unable to support his family too. That totally will not have any negative consequences whatsoever, or cause him to drink more, or make him violently angry at all. It totally won't make him lose his house and force his family into homelessness and destitution. Nope, there is absolutely no foreseeable problem with this at all.


Get the village Cleric to cast Remove Addiction (Clr/Drd 2, BoED). Easy peasy. Just cast the spell and tell him not to drink again. And even if he does somehow re-acquire alcoholism, just cast it again. It's free and Instantaneous. The village doesn't have to understand addiction because they don't need to.

[The Trickster]

Isn't there a spell that just removes addictions?

Was this evil? Meh. Was it horrible misguided? I would think so.

Edit: Swordsage'd and such.

[Jon_Dahl]

I would say no.

It was a good effort, trying to scare him out of it. It didn't go as planned, and your character was able to undo the whole thing without any actual damage.

I like the fact that good men and women try to do the right thing, but sometimes it goes wrong. That's part of the fun. Good is not flawless.

"The road to hell is paved with good intentions."
Playing with that quote in mind makes the game more interesting and less black and white.

[Grod_The_Giant]

I'd say Lawful Neutral. So, not a great thing for a Paladin to do, but not fall-worthy either.

[eggynack]

I would say no.

It was a good effort, trying to scare him out of it. It didn't go as planned, and your character was able to undo the whole thing without any actual damage.

I like the fact that good men and women try to do the right thing, but sometimes it goes wrong. That's part of the fun. Good is not flawless.

"The road to hell is paved with good intentions."
Playing with that quote in mind makes the game more interesting and less black and white.
I definitely agree on this one. Good may not necessarily be stupid, but good definitely has the capacity to be stupid. There's a good logic behind the action, so it's not really a falling offense, but it's probably a thing that you should avoid doing a second time.

[Deophaun]

Placing the mark wasn't evil. It's kind of what the mark is supposed to be used for. But, your approach was not good.

Your medieval defense cuts both ways. Yes, a medieval anyone isn't going to have a solid understanding of addiction. At the same time, though, considering the quality of the water, not drinking beer is just asking for problems. There's a reason beer and wine are the main staples of beverage in those times, and it has as much to do with avoiding disease as it does preservation of food. So, you want to say that your paladin wouldn't comprehend addiction, fine, but he would comprehend that he was basically condemning the man to sickness or death.

But the curse rider? That was the cherry on top. Can't work? What? No wonder the cleric was horrified.

So, you want to make him? Make it trigger off of him getting drunk, and make the curse something that ostensibly rectifies the situation (e.g. "when you get drunk, you will only feel the sadness you inflict on your loved ones"), not makes it worse.

[Slipperychicken]

So, you want to make him? Make it trigger off of him getting drunk, and make the curse something that ostensibly rectifies the situation (e.g. "when you get drunk, you will only feel the sadness you inflict on your loved ones"), not makes it worse.

That might make it worse, simply compelling him to try to drink to stop the sadness.

I'd make it something like "When you drink more than X alcohol in Y period of time (enough to get drunk), any further consumption of alcoholic beverages stings, tastes like ash in your mouth, and makes you want to drink water instead". Ideally the water he needs to wash out the ash-taste will also help him sober up.

[Fouredged Sword]

I would have made the mark make all the beer he drinks taste nasty or cause him to vomit uncontrolidly when he gets tipsy. These would solve the problem.

But, no it wasn't an evil act.

The intent was good, and the result was a wash. You come out somewhere on the good side of LN with a good dose of stupid.

Now, if the miller starved without the ability to feed his family and left his whole family starving, then the paladin gets a talking too from his deity about proper use of divine gifts like magic. As is, a stern talking to by a cleric about the foolishness of his actions is fine.

[Deophaun]

That might make it worse, simply compelling him to try to drink to stop the sadness.
Which is why I added the word "ostensibly." Anything you can think up to change his behavior might make things worse. For example, I already explained that people drank beer because often water supplies were contaminated (since water is boiled in the process of making beer, that sterilizes the water and makes it safe to drink; but no one really understood that as germ theory hadn't been invented yet). Yet, your suggestion was to have him drink water, which is often contaminated. I wouldn't knock you for a curse that inadvertently made the guy get sick and die, because ostensibly the curse is there to correct the situation.

[Krobar]

I wouldn't say it was necessarily EVIL, but it definitely wasn't a good idea.

You can bet addiction is a common thing in D&D land, and they have ways in place to deal with it. If, for example, the head of the town guard becomes an alcoholic, and he's known as the best fighter far and wide, and has a long history of valorous service, they're going to want to find a way to cure him.

Maybe have the appropriate party members make a knowledge check of some sort to figure out that addiction can be considered a disease and a Cure Disease or Heal would fix him right up. Or maybe it's a curse, and a Remove Curse will solve the problem.

[Slipperychicken]

Yet, your suggestion was to have him drink water, which is often contaminated.

Well, water purified by Purify Food and Drink (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/purifyFoodAndDrink.htm) (a cantrip) is also safe to drink, and the place does have a town Cleric. Since each casting purifies ~8 gallons/level, even a 1st level Cleric could get roughly 24 gallons purified each day if he really wanted to, more if he used higher-level slots on it. With even a 3rd level Cleric, he could get a lot of water cleaned via magic.

[Sith_Happens]

Evil? No. Stupid? Extremely.

[Spiryt]

It really depends on under what set of 'morals' on operates on.

But if it was without miller consent, then I would call it evil under pretty much most invented ones.

With his at least somehow coherent agreement, fair play, I guess.

[cerin616]

I would rule it as an evil act because of the fact that the miller has an "addiction".

When you become an addict, you have a physical dependency, and even someone who truely wants and needs to stop an addiction can't do it.
It takes a lot of mental will just to want to stop an addiction.

The fact that you looked at a sick person and said "stop being sick or ill punish you" is what makes it evil. The miller has arguably no control over it, and its setting him up to fail. And not only that, puts him in a situation that exacerbates the addiction.

[Jon_Dahl]

I would rule it as an evil act because of the fact that the miller has an "addiction".

When you become an addict, you have a physical dependency, and even someone who truely wants and needs to stop an addiction can't do it.
It takes a lot of mental will just to want to stop an addiction.

The fact that you looked at a sick person and said "stop being sick or ill punish you" is what makes it evil. The miller has arguably no control over it, and its setting him up to fail. And not only that, puts him in a situation that exacerbates the addiction.

Am I the only one who imagines a random commoner coming up to the paladin and saying all this, with these exact words?
Hint: Read between the lines...

[Vizzerdrix]

The miller has arguably no control over it, and its setting him up to fail.

This. What you should have done is put the mark on the bar tender.

[JoshuaZ]

This is a good example of how most alignment discussions try to use notions from modern morality in a way that just doesn't historically work. But since D&D is a bunch of anachronism stew already that shouldn't be that surprising.

Note also that in fact treating addictions with aversion therapy is something that has been attempted in the modern times with some success. See for example here (http://www.cms.gov/medicare-coverage-database/details/ncd-details.aspx?NCDId=30&ncdver=1&bc=BAAAgAAAAAAA&).


It really depends on under what set of 'morals' on operates on.

But if it was without miller consent, then I would call it evil under pretty much most invented ones.


It might be evil under your own personal moral system, but emphasizing consent is also something that happens largely with modern moral systems and only a fraction of them. Claiming that it is evil under most constructed moral systems is empirically wrong. Prominent counterexample classes of systems where this wouldn't be the case would be utilitarianism and most forms of Kantianism.

[navar100]

It was Lawful.

As a worshipper of St. Cuthbert, he would not disapprove.

As a paladin, learning of the consequences your compassion, the Good part of you, wanted to rectify the situation. You did.

As far as your Paladinhood is concerned, you're fine. If anything you learned a lesson to think more carefully of consequences to your actions, but your Status is unharmed. Just because you are a Paladin doesn't mean you must be Absolutely Perfect In Every Way. Not that you would intend it, but you can and will make mistakes. The mistakes aren't evil; they're just mistakes you will try to fix once you realize they are mistakes.

It's ok, understandable, and perfectly Paladin-like to feel remorse, but you have no blotch on your record.

[JFahy]

The last two posts (in the last couple minutes) said most of what I was going to.

Your intent was to try and help him and his family. Trying to help is a good act, even if you aren't successful. As for your methods, they could have been better - but when you saw they weren't working, you admitted error and tried to put things right.

Not a chance you did anything evil, but a more senior member of your order would admonish you to use your power more wisely, and/or with a lighter hand, lest you do harm that can't be undone next time.


(TLDR: Per one of the gazillion magnets my mom has on her fridge, "Mistakes and sins are not the same thing".)

[hamishspence]

(TLDR: Per one of the gazillion magnets my mom has on her fridge, "Mistakes and sins are not the same thing".)

The WoTC site says pretty much the same thing:

Save My Game: Lawful & Chaotic (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/sg/20050325a)

Though a paladin must always strive to bring about a just and righteous outcome, she is not omnipotent. If someone tricks her into acting in a way that harms the innocent, or if an action of hers accidentally brings about a calamity, she may rightly feel that she is at fault. But although she should by all means attempt to redress the wrong, she should not lose her paladinhood for it. Intent is not always easy to judge, but as long as a paladin's heart was in the right place and she took reasonable precautions, she cannot be blamed for a poor result.

[Spiryt]

It might be evil under your own personal moral system, but emphasizing consent is also something that happens largely with modern moral systems and only a fraction of them. Claiming that it is evil under most constructed moral systems is empirically wrong. Prominent counterexample classes of systems where this wouldn't be the case would be utilitarianism and most forms of Kantianism.

I guess 'moral' system would be wrong indeed.

In practice, though, forcing what to do with own body and family would mostly apply to slaves, and not really always.

And I guess that miller in question is free man.

I think that this is information lacking in the OP - miller was 'informed of consequences' but there's nothing about his agreement.

[Nerd-o-rama]

Not Evil, just not terribly well thought-out.

[AKA_Bait]

Just chiming in to agree with the Lawful, and poorly thought out, but not Evil contingent.

[Segev]

The impression I got from reading the OP was that the miller was a drunk who was abusing his family when intoxicated. I would guess the Paladin was moved to place the Mark upon his head not out of personal self-righteous indignation that a man might be an alcoholic, but out of horror and outrage at how this drunkard was abusing his family. If the drink is to blame, then it is the miller's fault for getting drunk. Or so, I would assume, goes our Paladin's logic.

Casting a Mark of Judgment on a person who regularly takes action that leads to the harm of innocents in order to abjure him from taking said actions is well within a Paladin's purview, and would not normally be an evil act.

I am unclear on the "The curse made him unable to work" part. I'm guessing, again from context, that the fact that it made him unable to work was a side effect of the actual curse, not the direct curse itself.

The Paladin acted well within character for an LG person of that time period and culture.

I'd be annoyed with the DM, personally, because he's effectively making the case that it isn't the drunkard's fault at all and that he's a victim.

While it's true that addiction is not an easy thing to get over, naively failing to comprehend addiction does not make somebody evil. It has the makings of tragedy, but it is not evil. Trying to say it's an evil act is actually rather disturbing, as it implies that the Paladin must be omniscient or fall.

[Beleron]

If it wasn't a paladin involved, the question of whether the act was evil probably wouldn't arise. Small wonder so many players just can't be bothered dealing with that kind of garbage.

[Medic!]

It was Good:
Though it may be a painful lesson, the miller will have help shoring up his weak willpower to overcome a deadly and destructive vice. A little divine nudge to keep him on a straighter, holier path. Though he may curse my name today, one day he will be thankful once he is freed of the demon of drink that possesses him. Praise Heironious for giving me the tools to help this poor man who cannot help himself to see the Light and live a better life for himself and his family, and thank St. Cuthbert for allowing me the power to set this miller's feet on the path of self-discipline.

It was Evil:
I shall mark this miller, returning him to a productive member of society whether he likes it or not. A little magic is a great way to ensure the cooperation of the ignorant and near-worthless masses in building a grander society that conforms to my ideals. Praise Hextor for the proletariat garbage he has supplied me with, and for their backs, upon which I build His empire!

[Deophaun]

Though it may be a painful lesson, the miller will have help shoring up his weak willpower to overcome a deadly and destructive vice. A little divine nudge to keep him on a straighter, holier path. Though he may curse my name today, one day he will be thankful once he is freed of the demon of drink that possesses him. Praise Heironious for giving me the tools to help this poor man who cannot help himself to see the Light and live a better life for himself and his family, and thank St. Cuthbert for allowing me the power to set this miller's feet on the path of self-discipline.
Problem is, mark of justice doesn't work that way. You do the deed once, and then you have to deal with the consequence of the curse until you get hit with remove curse or similar. Changing your behavior after the fact does not later make you all squarsies and have the curse go away, so self discipline doesn't enter into it.

At least with the curse the OP attached to his mark. Which is why the act was deeply aligned with stupid.

[Equinox]

It wasn't an evil act. But, from the perspective of your character, it might have been a learning moment. Maybe in the future your paladin can be a bit more tolerant of personal weakness?

[cerin616]

The biggest challenge to it is based on the fact that good and evil are both set in stone, and very vague. There is a huge grey area, but a small list of "Evil Acts" that can never be justified. Paladin has it worse off because they even have some neutral acts they can't perform, and that pesky "etc" attached to their code of conduct.

The archetypal evil in most fantasy settings though, usually includes the concept of "do what i say or you will suffer"

I think it comes down to the mentality of the alcoholic. Is he the Angelas ashes alchoholic? comes home and beats his wife and kids? doesn't give a ****?

Or does he mourn his addiction, but cant seem to find a way to stop?

Either way, its not an unforgivable evil act. I'm not saying "make the paladin fall and never able to atone" but instead let the paladin feel that this is something to atone for.

[Grayson01]

I acctually don't think Saint Cuthbert Would have a problem with this one though. Agread the attempt was made in good faith trying to do the right thing, the plan was just a little flawed. I don't think a flawed plan would make a Good act become a netural one.


I would have made the mark make all the beer he drinks taste nasty or cause him to vomit uncontrolidly when he gets tipsy. These would solve the problem.

But, no it wasn't an evil act.

The intent was good, and the result was a wash. You come out somewhere on the good side of LN with a good dose of stupid.

Now, if the miller starved without the ability to feed his family and left his whole family starving, then the paladin gets a talking too from his deity about proper use of divine gifts like magic. As is, a stern talking to by a cleric about the foolishness of his actions is fine.

[denthor]

heavy handed but not evil. You do follow St. cuthberth

[JFahy]

The archetypal evil in most fantasy settings though, usually includes the concept of "do what i say or you will suffer"


But so do most parenting strategies, the legal systems of pretty much every country, kindergarden pedagogy and the rules of hockey, so arguing that coercive tactics imply evil is pretty shaky. (Blah blah fallacy of affirming the consequent blah)

You could get some RP juice out of the experience, if next time your character is more deliberate, or maybe tries to persuade instead of compel. That's the classic difference between the grizzled old knight and the young firebrands. :smallsmile:

[Trinoya]

Is drinking in the town illegal?

If not you've actually infringed on his rights. You declared yourself his judge, jury, and executioner in regards to something that wasn't even against the law. You've also denied him one of the few clean drinks he can get access to, short of someone casting create water for the town consistently or otherwise purifying it. Additionally the 'curse' condition would set him up to fail automatically, and you've doomed his family to poverty when he looses his job.

There were literally dozens of other ways to go about this. In the same spell level you can remove poison as paladin no less and could have set about curing him in that fashion, though it would certainly have required a lot more effort than just dooming him via a mark... but I'd argue that's part of the point of a paladin.

Furthermore you could have set it so the 'condition' for his curse was based on doing harm to his family, and have it be that he couldn't ever drink again if he did it. As others have noted you could have also used other spells to remove his compulsion to drink, you could have asked him to swear to not drink again upon his god and let the town bare witness to the action so that they would not sell him more... any number of things before jumping to 'mark of justice.'

At the end of the day the act you did I would argue was evil based on its consequences, not its intentions,. but if drinking in town isn't illegal then I'd say it wasn't lawful and you'd certainly have issues there, and if I was your DM I promise the god of law wouldn't like you acting outside of it and there would be consequences, I may not make you fall automatically, mostly because your intentions were good, but you should expect to have your god sending you on a quest shortly there after to gain his grace again.

[Alaris]

Last session my paladin arranged for a mark of justice to be put onto the village miller. That guy was a heavy drinker and endangered himself and his family while drunk. The trigger for the mark was the miller starting to drink again, and he was told of this and of the consequences. An hour later, the curse kicked in...

The paladin is a paladin of St. Cuthbert, so he is heavy into "if you break the rules, accept the consequences so that you can learn not to do it again".

Now, the consequence is that the miller is unable to work while the mark is in effect. The village cleric was horrified, and then we got in a OOC discussion about substance addiction which I found terribly misplaced. I had the mark removed in the end because the miller was no good to the village under the curse either. But I refused to concede the point that a quasi-medieval champion of the god of the cudgel had the necessary psychological understanding of how addiction works and that it can't just be stopped by telling someone not to do it again. I was even told that it might be interpreted as an evil act!

Was I wrong in playing the character this way? Mind that I don't condone the character's actions myself, merely tried to think like he would.

I realize this is a group-specific question, and this will be no problem in the future because it was a one-shot adventure. Would you as players (not characters) have been shocked by this?

Yeah... there are much better ways to take care of that. For instance, if you have access to Mark of Justice, then you definitely have access to Bestow Curse.

Now Bestow Curse has the nifty clause at the bottom that you can make your own curses. I would personally have issued a curse that "You cannot become Drunk. At best, buzzed." That is easily within the limitations, and definitely considered a curse for the person.

Without becoming Drunk, he won't harm his family. Just give him the stipulation that, if he proves himself reliable and that he will not harm his family (give him a time frame), then you will remove the curse.

Now, moving onto whether or not I thought you were wrong. You 'cannot' play your character wrong. It is your character. Now, were you playing a "Devout, Lawful Good Paladin" wrong? Possibly. It's hard to say... you were infringing on his rights, though technically he was infringing on his family's right to live (possibly), if he were to become drunk enough to kill them.

At the end of the day, you're in the wonderful Grey Area, making things difficult to interpret.

Like I said, I think the above solution would have worked better, personally.

[TuggyNE]

But so do most parenting strategies, the legal systems of pretty much every country, kindergarden pedagogy and the rules of hockey, so arguing that coercive tactics imply evil is pretty shaky. (Blah blah fallacy of affirming the consequent blah)

Society is evil, all Good characters are also Chaotic!

Seriously, though, coercion/threat of violence/etc is just bog-standard Lawful behavior, nothing more or less. The particular course chosen was definitely Lawful Stupid, but not particularly Lawful Evil, or even necessarily strongly Lawful Neutral. Paladin could use a bit more Wis for future endeavors, however.

[Trinoya]

At the end of the day, you're in the wonderful Grey Area, making things difficult to interpret.

He's only really in the gray area* if the action he prohibited was against the law. That said the rest of your post is basically spot on.



*grey area referring to how his god should view the action of course.

[Menzath]

If a follower of Pholtus has just grounds to kill for another NOT worshipping the one true god of blinding light, then this sounds reasonable to me.
D&D is more black and white for sure, but there are extremes of those not covered in game mechanics.

[atomicwaffle]

why is a 14th level paladin concerned about the antics of a lvl 1 commoner when he could be fighting a lich or something?

[Trinoya]

The lich wasn't a drinker clearly :smallbiggrin:

[navar100]

why is a 14th level paladin concerned about the antics of a lvl 1 commoner when he could be fighting a lich or something?

Because he's a paladin. A paladin's compassion or concern is not based on his estimation of the number of HD of the person he is to have compassion for or be concerned about.

[JusticeZero]

I'd prefer a curse like "Any alcohol to touch your lips will be transformed to pure water".

[Erik Vale]

I'd prefer a curse like "Any alcohol to touch your lips will be transformed to pure water".

ROFL.
In Russia, Jesus turns wine into water.

Edit: Not sure why I found that thought so funny, but I did.

[Slipperychicken]

I'd prefer a curse like "Any alcohol to touch your lips will be transformed to pure water".

Make that "any acohol to enter your mouth". "touch your lips" can be avoided with a straw, bottle, or good aim.

Also... if chemistry works the same in D&D, aren't there a bunch of alcohols present in normal living matter?

[Alaris]

Make that "any acohol to enter your mouth". "touch your lips" can be avoided with a straw, bottle, or good aim.

Also... if chemistry works the same in D&D, aren't there a bunch of alcohols present in normal living matter?

Well now you're just allowing for the interpretation of him injecting alcohol directly into his blood. >.>

<.<

Lol!

[Slipperychicken]

Well now you're just allowing for the interpretation of him injecting alcohol directly into his blood. >.>

<.<

Lol!

Ehh... if he's that determined, I would just cast Remove Addiction on him.

[Deophaun]

Well now you're just allowing for the interpretation of him injecting alcohol directly into his blood.
Depends on if he has ranks in Perform. If he starts playing Girls, Girls, Girls, it's time for an intervention.

[Pickford]

Last session my paladin arranged for a mark of justice to be put onto the village miller. That guy was a heavy drinker and endangered himself and his family while drunk. The trigger for the mark was the miller starting to drink again, and he was told of this and of the consequences. An hour later, the curse kicked in...

The paladin is a paladin of St. Cuthbert, so he is heavy into "if you break the rules, accept the consequences so that you can learn not to do it again".

Now, the consequence is that the miller is unable to work while the mark is in effect. The village cleric was horrified, and then we got in a OOC discussion about substance addiction which I found terribly misplaced. I had the mark removed in the end because the miller was no good to the village under the curse either. But I refused to concede the point that a quasi-medieval champion of the god of the cudgel had the necessary psychological understanding of how addiction works and that it can't just be stopped by telling someone not to do it again. I was even told that it might be interpreted as an evil act!

Was I wrong in playing the character this way? Mind that I don't condone the character's actions myself, merely tried to think like he would.

I realize this is a group-specific question, and this will be no problem in the future because it was a one-shot adventure. Would you as players (not characters) have been shocked by this?

I would have tied the activation of the mark to the actual behavior that endangers the Miller/His family. i.e. If he tries to beat his wife, he collapses.

edit: Alaris that isn't true, Paladins don't have Bestow Curse. (They get Mark of Justice instead)