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russdm
2013-10-07, 11:02 PM
So this may fit better in another area, so if it gets moved thats fine.

Something that has always bugged me about FR is the Wall of the Faithless. It constantly tugs at my mind about how much It completely wrecks the gods of Faerun. It turns every good god evil and makes Ao into some enormous douche-bag.

The Wall was made by Myrkul, an evil god. The Wall takes souls of people that didn't worship any gods, which is understandable. It then slowly destroys those souls though, which I don't get. Those who don't worship include: Those choosing not to worship, those dying unable to pick any god to worship, and those who lived places where knowledge of the gods were suppressed or are only based around allowed ones, like places where Bane or Cyric rule. So, it punishes pretty much everybody, both the guilty and innocent alike.

The problem though: The Wall is essentially an injustice which strikes completely agaisnt Tyr, the so-called god of Justice (or the other one that Ao appointed as justice god). There is no way based on how it works that can fit with any kind of justice. Its essentially divine disporportiate retribution. The other good gods apparently accept it because Ao does, but how can Ao really accept this thing, with the whole "gods need worshippers, and gods have to earn that worship" that Ao set up? One can see the Wall as being essentially producing Tyranny, since despite what is supposedly how things happen, people need to worship to avoid any kind of suffering.

Children who die from plagues without picking a deity end up in the wall. Slaves in thay or elsewhere that chose not to worship the deity of their overseers end up in the wall if they die without a god to worship. Literally, anybody that is still trying to decide who to worship when they die gets a free trip to the Wall.

The most glaring bit of it at all: The Wall never releases any souls in it, so if you pick a deity to worship, you still stay in the wall. Also, not even the gods or demons/devils can remove souls from the Wall. So its a permanent prison and one that never has any escaping. Despite what it does, it appears that only Kelemvor, god of the dead, has any issues with it and yet he can't change things.

So based on all this, then Ao must be evil, he is allowing the injustice to continue and the good gods are completely stupid and Tyr, god of justice?, is allowing injustice in violation of his divine charge.

A side note: did they keep the Wall for post 3.5 editions?

One Step Two
2013-10-07, 11:26 PM
First up, Ao is an Over-diety in the Divine Rank 21+ range, meaning he literally gives not a single care thought or otherwise in the affairs of mortals, alive or dead, I don't think he ever came with stats in any edition, but I am prepared to be wrong on this account.

Just so we're clear on the process, here's what happens to the dead.
To paraphrase the Forgotten Realms Campaign setting, the following occurs:

The dead Wait in the Fugue Plane, where they await for the representatives of their respective Deties to guide them to serve their gods in their Realm. Baatezu have a deal with Kelemvor to tempt souls into the service of hell.

The Faithless and the False remain. The Faithless go in the wall.
The False, though fit into the categories those who betray their respective god, and are judged by Kelemvor and are forced to work for him as punishment.
Occasionally Demons will attack to steal the punished souls or from the Wall of the Faithless to re-enforce the armies of the Abyss.

There's plot holes, but one would think, for childrens who don't have gods, the prayers of their parents would suffice. For the Slave who rails against their master, they should pick their own. But at the end of the day, none of that matters.

Death is harsh, but it's (mostly) neutral, it happens. Once the body is dead, the soul is the soul, regardless of it's past. For the good gods, like Tyr, such things would weigh heavy on his heart, but because of the Laws of Troils Pantheon, he is unable to intercede.

I'm not saying it isn't fair, but to most mortals, alive or not, the affairs of gods often arent.

The Oni
2013-10-07, 11:30 PM
Sounds like the Wall is a stab at Abrahamic religion TBH. Discussing that any further on these boards is probably asking for trouble, though.

If Myrkul built the wall and Myrkul's station passed to Kelemvor, then logically isn't Kelemvor the one god who's MOST likely to be able to do something about it?

Alleran
2013-10-08, 12:01 AM
If Myrkul built the wall and Myrkul's station passed to Kelemvor, then logically isn't Kelemvor the one god who's MOST likely to be able to do something about it?
He did. At the conclusion of the Avatar cycle, he rewrote his realm and made it so that Faithless and False simply exist alongside one another in his city (prior to this he almost broke reality because he wasn't doing his job properly, and the change to fix this shifted him from LG to LN). They don't know pain or fear or sorrow, but neither do they know joy or happiness.

The Wall reappeared in the 3rd edition FRCS with no explanation for where it had been or why it was back. Other sourcebooks and novels ignored it, as far as I know offhand. Then it went away again in the Sellplague and hasn't come back. Now if a soul dies and has no deity to claim it, they waste away on the Fugue Plain until they cease to exist. The only difference is that they're mobile rather than stuck in the Wall.

It's also pretty hard to be declared Faithless or False:

"Almost all beings in Faerun worship many gods; as a rule, only zealots and clergy venerate just one deity. In other words, a farmer could mainly revere Chauntea, but also pray to appease Talos to keep crop-damaging storms away, Malar to keep beasts from attacking him or his folk in the fields and to send vermin elsewhere, Talona to keep disease and blight at bay, and so on."

"The average Faerunian lives long enough to worship (or serve through one's actions) one deity above all others - though in many cases, which deity a given person has served most might not be clear to a dying mortal or anyone else. If a mortal dies before finishing a mission or a task for a particular deity and it's a matter he felt strongly about in life, he could be sent back by that deity, reborn as another mortal, to try to complete that task. Otherwise, he ends up in the afterlife serving the deity most appropriate to his moral and ethical outlook. Only those who repudiate the gods (or who as a result of their actions are renounced by their gods), despoil altars and frustrate the clerical aims of any deity, or never pray or engage in any form of deliberate worship will qualify as either Faithless or False."

Do note the "serve through actions" bit. You might not even be sure just which god you're serving until you're actually on the Fugue Plain or in the City being judged by Kelemvor (and if he rules that you died in service to a particular god, even if it wasn't clear to you personally at the time, then that god will by and large be happy to take you).

russdm
2013-10-08, 12:28 AM
The Wall reappeared in the 3rd edition FRCS with no explanation for where it had been or why it was back. Other sourcebooks and novels ignored it, as far as I know offhand. Then it went away again in the Sellplague and hasn't come back. Now if a soul dies and has no deity to claim it, they waste away on the Fugue Plain until they cease to exist. The only difference is that they're mobile rather than stuck in the Wall.

It was not ignored from my understanding in 3.5 and it was used in the Neverwinter Nights 2 expansion, Mask of the Betrayer.

I also would point out that it should not have come back for 3rd edition or 3.5 as it makes no sense being there after being removed by Kelemvor.

Also, AO has shown himself being involved in mortals affairs. He usually punishes people for trying to worship him.

Its good the Wall is gone, because it seemed to me a major weapon to be used by the evil gods to get worshippers since they could spread knowledge around and claim to be the only ones who could free people from the wall.

hamishspence
2013-10-08, 01:25 AM
Deities and Demigods (3.0) paints it as only those that "actively oppose the worship of the gods" in Faerun, that are counted among the Faithless.

Scots Dragon
2013-10-08, 01:42 AM
I completely ignore its existence. It was a retconned-in part of 2nd edition, and something that was introduced whole-cloth in the novel Prince of Lies, I think.

No source prior to that even mentions the Wall of the Faithless. It also has the unfortunate side-effect that any several characters in those previous sources were decent and moral individuals who just so happened to not worship gods. Zaknafein Do'Urden, for instance. Are we to really believe that Zaknafein is part of the Wall of the Faithless, especially when his spirit is actually called back to the mortal plane several times after his death?

As an atheist myself, I feel the best solution would be to simply use the idea that souls wind up on whatever plane is most suited to their alignment. The chaotic neutral and good leaning Zaknafein would probably therefore wind up on the plane of Ysgard.

There is no need for the Wall of the Faithless in Forgotten Realms.

The Oni
2013-10-08, 01:47 AM
Similarly in Pathfinder, atheists just hang out in the Boneyard and don't progress to an afterlife. It's actually not that bad, except for Groetus, who's some kind of malevolent, sentient moon looming over it, and the resident death goddess feeds it atheist souls to get it go away. Really, you'd think she could just find three or four giants to get rid of it...

Alleran
2013-10-08, 02:26 AM
It was not ignored from my understanding in 3.5 and it was used in the Neverwinter Nights 2 expansion, Mask of the Betrayer.
No video game (or events in it) is considered canon to the setting, to the extent of my knowledge. Some games have tie-in novels which are (e.g. Baldur's Gate and Planescape Torment), but the novels are what's canon, not the games. Unfortunate, given how the BG novel turned out (I have a bucket of brain bleach handy if anybody would like to erase their memories of it), but that's the way it is.


Also, AO has shown himself being involved in mortals affairs. He usually punishes people for trying to worship him.
He does not grant spells to anybody who worships him, but he doesn't smite them from the world to my knowledge. No person professing to worship Ao has ever received spells. On the other hand, supposedly none of them have died either.

Ao has interfered directly with mortals on one occasion, when he answered a prayer during the Time of Troubles. It was made to a deity who couldn't hear it (owing to the ToT), and in that deity's absence he decided, because the mortal impressed him, that he would step in.

mucat
2013-10-08, 01:14 PM
I always liked the Wall as a campaign element, precisely because it is monstrously unfair, and implies that even the good deities have a huge moral blind spot. In a fictional context -- the only context we can discuss it in here -- this is great story fuel, and leaves one final challenge for even the most epic of characters to strive for (and likely never achieve): set right something that is canonically impossible to fix.

Reminds me of a line from a Terry Pratchett novel:

[Evil] is built in to the very nature of the universe. Every world spins in pain. If there is any kind of supreme being, I told myself, it is up to all of us to become his moral superior.

EDIT: But then, to leave it at that would leave the deities looking like moral lightweights, and all those mortals who aren't involved in that final epic rebellion as patsies...so if I were GM of such a campaign, I would shake things up one last time. Give the players a hint of a whisper of a chance at success, let them run with it for all they're worth...and then uncover some Horrible Truth that explains (but may not quite excuse) why the gods let such a dismal situation exist in the first place. The well-meaning PCs have just set in motion a Lovecraftian multidimensional apocalypse even worse than the Wall.

So one last choice: do they rejoin forces with the former patrons they rebelled against, and struggle to put things back like they were...or bet all of Reality on their ability to improvise a third way that avoids both injustice and Squishy Non-Euclidian Tentacled Oblivion?

Like I said, great story fuel. :smallbiggrin:


EDIT AGAIN: I would also be sorely tempted, if I could find a way to do it without turning the whole thing into a farce, to eventually have a (possibly Gnomish, and possibly insane) tinker/engineer type deity say of the souls that had dissolved into the Wall over the eons: "What? You actually thought I had neglected to make backup copies?"

hamishspence
2013-10-08, 01:20 PM
Ao has interfered directly with mortals on one occasion, when he answered a prayer during the Time of Troubles. It was made to a deity who couldn't hear it (owing to the ToT), and in that deity's absence he decided, because the mortal impressed him, that he would step in.
If you're thinking of his answering the prayer of the orog paladin Shield of Innocence, in the novel War in Tethyr, that was in 1367 DR, whereas the Time of Troubles took place in 1358 DR, nearly 10 years earlier.

Part of what provoked him to intervene was that the bad guys were a group claiming to be Ao cultists.

Ao does talk to at least one mortal a lot during the Time of Troubles, even moving him from one end of Faerun to the other to keep him busy and stop him interfering with Ao's plans for Midnight, the mortal who's to replace Mystra. That was Elminster, in the Shadow of the Avatar trilogy (book 2).

JoshuaZ
2013-10-08, 01:53 PM
Yes, it is monstrously immoral and disgusting. Authors frequently have massive moral blindspots to the universes they create.

hamishspence
2013-10-08, 02:00 PM
I completely ignore its existence. It was a retconned-in part of 2nd edition, and something that was introduced whole-cloth in the novel Prince of Lies, I think.

Not book 3 in the Avatar Crisis trilogy (Waterdeep)?

AuraTwilight
2013-10-08, 03:22 PM
The biggest disappointment with Mask of the Betrayer was that you couldn't atleast try to tear down the wall after the final conversation with Kelemvor.

Scow2
2013-10-08, 11:07 PM
He did. At the conclusion of the Avatar cycle, he rewrote his realm and made it so that Faithless and False simply exist alongside one another in his city (prior to this he almost broke reality because he wasn't doing his job properly, and the change to fix this shifted him from LG to LN). They don't know pain or fear or sorrow, but neither do they know joy or happiness.
From what I understand of Kelemvor, he first destroyed the wall, and made his city a place where the Good faithless/false end up in paradise, and the Evil end up in torment. Then he realized that was messing up the balance of the world... so he toned things down but effectively kept his way anyway: People go to 'neutral' communities filled with people of similar morals and values.

Kelemvor's the coolest God of Death ever.

Deaxsa
2013-10-08, 11:51 PM
Kelemvor's the coolest God of Death ever.

Agreed. fillertext

Alleran
2013-10-09, 12:50 AM
If you're thinking of his answering the prayer of the orog paladin Shield of Innocence, in the novel War in Tethyr, that was in 1367 DR, whereas the Time of Troubles took place in 1358 DR, nearly 10 years earlier.
I was just going off memory, so thanks for the reminder/correction.


From what I understand of Kelemvor, he first destroyed the wall, and made his city a place where the Good faithless/false end up in paradise, and the Evil end up in torment. Then he realized that was messing up the balance of the world... so he toned things down but effectively kept his way anyway: People go to 'neutral' communities filled with people of similar morals and values.
Essentially. A big chunk of it can probably be boiled down to: what happens when mortals lose their fear of death?

He rewarded the brave and punished the cowardly. That isn't his job. His job is to judge if they were Faithless or if they were False, nothing more.

Omegonthesane
2013-10-09, 04:16 AM
Essentially. A big chunk of it can probably be boiled down to: what happens when mortals lose their fear of death?
This misses a more profound point, and a point which was missed by the novels from what I know of them - why would a provable afterlife make mortals lose their inborn, biologically motivated fear of death? Would you not want to cling to life as long as possible, terrified that you might not have built up enough kilosaints* to appease Kelemvor and avoid eternal torment?

* A speculated unit of Good in the line of the kilonazi.

Alleran
2013-10-09, 04:36 AM
Would you not want to cling to life as long as possible, terrified that you might not have built up enough kilosaints to appease Kelemvor and avoid eternal torment?
I did say it was only a chunk. After all, what you say here is what the cowardly were doing. Hiding out, avoiding any dangers, scared of doing anything and clinging to life because if they were killed (even just accidentally) Kelemvor might judge them harshly.

Omegonthesane
2013-10-09, 04:40 AM
I did say it was only a chunk. After all, what you say here is what the cowardly were doing. Hiding out, avoiding any dangers, scared of doing anything and clinging to life because if they were killed (even just accidentally) Kelemvor might judge them harshly.

While the brave... what, got rewarded just for that? It's entirely possible to be wicked and brave, just ask the SS. Or the Spartans by any present-day standard.

'Course, in Kelemvor's position I'd have decided that destroying existence is a small price to pay to prevent even the most horrible being being eternally punished, so I may be a little biased.

Scots Dragon
2013-10-09, 05:34 AM
Not book 3 in the Avatar Crisis trilogy (Waterdeep)?

My mistake on that front. It's still a retconned in part of the Time of Troubles that should never have happened, and the Realms would greatly benefit if it were removed.

Brookshw
2013-10-09, 05:45 AM
No video game (or events in it) is considered canon to the setting, to the extent of my knowledge. Some games have tie-in novels which are (e.g. Baldur's Gate and Planescape Torment), but the novels are what's canon, not the games. Unfortunate, given how the BG novel turned out (I have a bucket of brain bleach handy if anybody would like to erase their memories of it), but that's the way it is.


Do you mean canon to the setting (FR) or canon in general? Just thinking about Die Vecna Die and a crop of Dragonlance.....

Alleran
2013-10-09, 06:50 AM
While the brave... what, got rewarded just for that?
I'll quote some chunks of it:


"Zale Protelyus!"

The flame spun on Kelemvor's sword, then stopped wailing and kneeled on the steaming blade.

"Lord Death."

"Zale Protelyus, why did you allow your foe to drag you into this fissure? Why did you cling to your sword when you could have let go and saved yourself?"

"To... stop... the... murderer!" Zale's words seemed to come with great effort and pain.

"But when you saw that you would die and fail anyway, still you held on. Why?"

"Nothing to fear... in death." Zale kept his blazing head bowed toward the sword. "Brave man in life... sure to receive reward in death."

"But you are Faithless! Who will reward you?"

For the first time, Zale raised his fiery head. "You... Lord Kelemvor! Trust your justice... before any god... who demands flattery... and offerings."

It was then that Kelemvor perceived the infinite cunning of the One and All. To win Faerun for himself, Cyric had only to step aside and do nothing. Lady Magic would do half his work, denying the Weave to any force that harmed her beloved mortals, and Talos the Destroyer and the Battle Lord Tempus and Shar the Nightbringer would grow weak and start losing worshipers. Kelemvor would do the rest, treating the spirits of the noble and compassionate with such kindness that many would turn from their gods and trust to his justice instead.

But most critical was this: the brave and courageous would lose their fear of death and sacrifice themselves in foolish causes, as Zale had done. Faerun would be left to the cowardly and the corrupt. And when this was so-when all the other gods had grown weak through the compassion of Kelemvor and Mystra-then would the One rouse himself from his "madness" and call the wicked to his worship, and then would he drive all the other gods from his world.

All this Kelemvor perceived, and he saw that it was happening just as Cyric had planned. Still, he refused to think he had been doing the One's work. In his folly, he believed that every man strove for bravery and nobility, and he failed to understand that shielding the helpless encouraged laziness and dependence, and that treating the dead with compassion only made life all the more unbearable.
It's given from the bias of a Cyricist (hence "the One"), but one who can only speak the unvarnished truth.


Do you mean canon to the setting (FR) or canon in general?
I mean that the Baldur's Gate games are not canon. Neither are the games Icewind Dale, Neverwinter Nights, NWN2 and so on. If they have tie-in novels, then those novels are canon (e.g. there was a reference to the Baldur's Gate novel in the Grand History of the Realms book). The games are not.

hamishspence
2013-10-09, 06:54 AM
Besides those, Planescape Torment got a novel as well- though I'm not sure if it counts as overlapping with the Realms-verse.

The "Pools of Radiance" game from way way back got tie-in novels as well.

Omegonthesane
2013-10-09, 07:22 AM
I'll quote some chunks of it:

["All good people are motivated by the selfish desire for a good afterlife, and thus will become death seekers if guaranteed that, in obvious and deeply offensive contradiction to actual evidence!"]

It's given from the bias of a Cyricist (hence "the One"), but one who can only speak the unvarnished truth.

That proves one of two things - all sapient beings in FR are deeply disturbed, or the author is an utter hack. Neither of these implies the Wall is justified.

hamishspence
2013-10-09, 07:54 AM
The author is Troy Denning - who is much disliked by a subset of Star Wars fans for his part in making the SW EU vastly "darker and edgier".

Frozen_Feet
2013-10-09, 07:56 AM
Neither justifies the Wall, but they do justify why it's not Kelemvor's job to reward or punish the dead.

Rhynn
2013-10-09, 08:30 AM
The author is Troy Denning - who is much disliked by a subset of Star Wars fans for his part in making the SW EU vastly "darker and edgier".

He also ruined Dark Sun.

Basically, anything from Troy Denning should be ignored.

Brookshw
2013-10-09, 08:43 AM
He also ruined Dark Sun.

Basically, anything from Troy Denning should be ignored.

I could get behind that.

Alleran
2013-10-09, 08:53 AM
...all sapient beings in FR are deeply disturbed, or the author is an utter hack.
Well, if you deliberately renounced all the other gods and became Faithless/False, because you died bravely Kelemvor will give you an eternity of happiness and reward in the afterlife regardless of you betraying your deity. Score!

(Note that Elminster's Forgotten Realms, which I copied an excerpt or two from further up, explicitly states that you can serve a god through your actions without ever realising it and still get the "good end" in the afterlife of a good god. I prefer that to what Denning wrote in the Avatar series, although of course the situation in said series came to an end anyway when Kelemvor started actually doing his job.)

Omegonthesane
2013-10-09, 10:06 AM
Well, if you deliberately renounced all the other gods and became Faithless/False, because you died bravely Kelemvor will give you an eternity of happiness and reward in the afterlife regardless of you betraying your deity. Score!
So, the whole storm is caused by Kelemvor being a retard?

More seriously, I was under the impression that Kelemvor rewarded you for living a Good life while rejecting all gods, rather than merely for dying bravely. Are there examples of him, say, rewarding the leader of a rampaging horde of orcs who stood and fought when he had the chance to run, bravely risking death before retreat?


(Note that Elminster's Forgotten Realms, which I copied an excerpt or two from further up, explicitly states that you can serve a god through your actions without ever realising it and still get the "good end" in the afterlife of a good god. I prefer that to what Denning wrote in the Avatar series, although of course the situation in said series came to an end anyway when Kelemvor started actually doing his job.)

This is something that confuses me - according to Manual of the Planes and basic common sense, wouldn't the Evil gods give you an eternal reward - as in an afterlife that you want to live forever in - if you serve them well? True, torturing other less committed or successful souls would be a horrible afterlife for a Good person but Evil charaters are often all over that nonsense.

Alleran
2013-10-09, 10:50 AM
So, the whole storm is caused by Kelemvor being a retard?
More or less. Mystra is also at fault at the same time (for restricting the Weave to those who wouldn't use it to hurt others), as was Cyric for being insane. They all started actually doing their jobs by the end of the book.


More seriously, I was under the impression that Kelemvor rewarded you for living a Good life while rejecting all gods, rather than merely for dying bravely. Are there examples of him, say, rewarding the leader of a rampaging horde of orcs who stood and fought when he had the chance to run, bravely risking death before retreat?
Honestly not sure. It's mentioned that he had Avner (his Seraph of Death) monitor a thousand deaths or something to that effect, to check and see if the guy in the quote was the only one (he wasn't - it was apparently becoming an endemic problem).


This is something that confuses me - according to Manual of the Planes and basic common sense, wouldn't the Evil gods give you an eternal reward - as in an afterlife that you want to live forever in - if you serve them well?
Presumably. The only afterlives I can recall offhand are: Tempus' followers get to fight eternally in his divine realm and rise each day, a bit like Valhalla; Kelemvor's guard his city against demonic soul-raids, preserving the sanctity of death; Cyric's dead faithful roam around the Supreme Throne (his divine realm) in bands, all nuttier than a bag of screws... so to speak. Talos' followers tag along with him when he creates and sends thunderstorms.

They're all petitioners at that point.

Craft (Cheese)
2013-10-09, 03:19 PM
Similarly in Pathfinder, atheists just hang out in the Boneyard and don't progress to an afterlife. It's actually not that bad, except for Groetus, who's some kind of malevolent, sentient moon looming over it, and the resident death goddess feeds it atheist souls to get it go away. Really, you'd think she could just find three or four giants to get rid of it...

It's not as simple as that, really: Distances are often unreliable on the outer planes, and it should be noted the mere presence of atheists seems to keep Groetus further away. It's not even clear whether this "feeding" of atheists to it actually works to keep it away or not.

That said, whatever happens to the souls inside Groetus is certainly more interesting and pleasant than hanging out with Pharasma for eternity.

Trickquestion
2013-10-09, 03:56 PM
This is something that confuses me - according to Manual of the Planes and basic common sense, wouldn't the Evil gods give you an eternal reward - as in an afterlife that you want to live forever in - if you serve them well? True, torturing other less committed or successful souls would be a horrible afterlife for a Good person but Evil charaters are often all over that nonsense.

This is something that's always confused me as well, with the existence of Hells complicating things. When an evil person dies, do they go to some version of hell, or to they end up in the realm of an evil god? If both can happen, what makes the difference?

hamishspence
2013-10-09, 04:01 PM
In Fiendish Codex 2, it mentions that the souls of LE mortals who aren't part of a LE deity's church, end up being tortured "till the last shred of individuality is extracted" - then the soul is destroyed and reborn as a Lemure- the lowest rank of devil.

By contrast, the souls of worshippers of LE gods, in at least some examples given, become Fiendish versions of whatever they were in life.

So the domain of Kurtulmak, god of kobolds, is full of fiendish kobolds, and that of Sekolah, god of sahuagin, is full of fiendish sahaugin.

Kalmageddon
2013-10-09, 04:33 PM
It is incredibly offensive and unfair and I'm glad they got rid of it in later editions.
There's really not much to say about it, except that I find the idea of having to worship a deity in any setting to be inherently bad. I much prefer the idea of mortal souls going "beyond" the gods to a destination unknown to them, like in the Silmarillon, only without an overdeity.

Beige Dragon
2013-10-09, 07:13 PM
While I find it evil, I don't find it very...offensive. Atheists would have proof of different gods existences, so I think they are being a bit stubborn if they can't decide which one they like best before they die.

AuraTwilight
2013-10-09, 08:23 PM
Or are sticking to perfectly valid ideological and ethical principles. For instance, "I refuse to worship any gods because they tolerate the Wall of the Faithless and/or aren't 'true', ineffable gods, and/or aren't worth the trouble, and/or refuse to address the Problem of Evil and are too invested in the status quo to help people, and/or..."

Gavinfoxx
2013-10-09, 09:45 PM
The term is Maltheist, guys. Maltheist. Or on Tvtropes, Naytheist. Look it up!!

Kalmageddon
2013-10-10, 05:15 AM
While I find it evil, I don't find it very...offensive. Atheists would have proof of different gods existences, so I think they are being a bit stubborn if they can't decide which one they like best before they die.

Even if I knew the gods existed I wouldn't see a single reason to pray to them or worship them in any way, I would see them as powerful beings but no more deserving of controlling people's lives then anyone else.
The only god in the forgotten realms that I might like, but certanly not pray to, is Jergal, the only god that doesn't want to be worshipped and in fact gave away his power.

Wanting control over someone, expecially wanting control over his very soul, is an evil act in itself, in my opinion, one I would not submit to no matter the consequences.
The Wall of the Faithless in the forgotten realms is simply an awful and contrived way to force players into making a religious character.

Frozen_Feet
2013-10-10, 05:47 AM
Except, it's not. Nothing stops you from playing an irreligious character in FR. You (the player) just have to accept the consequences in the context of the setting. (Your character, on the other hand, doesn't have to... doesn't mean he can do anything about it though.)

Finding the Wall of Faithless offensive is result of the same sort of myopia that fuels the endless alignment debates: the failure of people to detach themselves from their realworld values and accept that their values can be wrong in the context of a specific fictional world.

In the same way modern science ceases to be applicable when actual, provable magic gets on stage, pretty much all forms of atheism lose validity when a setting has actual gods of any sort. When physics or metaphysics of a setting get defined or redefined in a way that differs from the real world (or more importantly, your specific concept of the "real world"), some philosophies and ideologies inevitably get thrown out of the window. If you find this offensive, how on Earth do you deal with any other sort of hypothetical scenario that runs counter to your expectations? If you never allow yourself to pushed out of your comfort zone, you will miss out a lot of potential of roleplaying games.

The thought of "I refuse to worship good gods because they're doing nothing about the Wall!" is especially intellectually dishonest. Because it's rather apparent from the very concept that the easiest way for good gods, evil gods, or even mere mortals to "do something" regarding the Wall is to preach their faith! By asking for your nominal worship, a good god is trying to save your soul from the machinations of an evil god! What exactly is so horrible about that?

Kalmageddon
2013-10-10, 05:56 AM
@ Frozen Feet:
You don't get it and I'm not going to explain it to you, partly because that would be against forum rules.

hamishspence
2013-10-10, 06:04 AM
In the same way modern science ceases to be applicable when actual, provable magic gets on stage, pretty much all forms of atheism lose validity when a setting has actual gods of any sort. When physics or metaphysics of a setting get defined or redefined in a way that differs from the real world (or more importantly, your specific concept of the "real world"), some philosophies and ideologies inevitably get thrown out of the window.

Planescape's approach, with the Athar faction, makes plenty of sense:

"They are just very, very powerful Outsiders"

Rhynn
2013-10-10, 06:47 AM
Finding the Wall of Faithless offensive is result of the same sort of myopia that fuels the endless alignment debates: the failure of people to detach themselves from their realworld values and accept that their values can be wrong in the context of a specific fictional world.

This exactly. Myopia is a great word for it. There's nothing spectacular about the FR set-up even with the Wall, in the context of religions (many of which include/have included pretty definitive "if you don't do it our way you'll suffer forever" clauses). Moreover, "Good" and "Evil" in D&D have cosmological/metaphysical definitions pretty well removed from most real-world ones, and even in the real world those words mean wildly different things to different people.

Craft (Cheese)
2013-10-10, 07:14 AM
This exactly. Myopia is a great word for it. There's nothing spectacular about the FR set-up even with the Wall, in the context of religions (many of which include/have included pretty definitive "if you don't do it our way you'll suffer forever" clauses). Moreover, "Good" and "Evil" in D&D have cosmological/metaphysical definitions pretty well removed from most real-world ones, and even in the real world those words mean wildly different things to different people.

And it's exactly this that makes alignment worse than useless.

Frozen_Feet
2013-10-10, 07:33 AM
Planescape's approach, with the Athar faction, makes plenty of sense:

"They are just very, very powerful Outsiders"

True. On the other hand, Planescape also brings in additional context that makes this work. Because the outer planes are shaped by belief, belief (or disbelief) is its own validator; if you believe hard enough that black is really white and moon is just the sun at night, by gods will it be made so!

In most other settings, the Atharian worldview would be semantical at best, and pure sophistry at its worst.

hamishspence
2013-10-10, 10:51 AM
Planar Handbook goes into a bit more detail on the Athar as of 3.5ed.


The "gods" are liars, every single one of them - liars and frauds. They aren't deities. They're mortals - extremely powerful mortals, to be sure, but nothing more. They are given to petty emotions, they require sustenance in the form of prayers and the belief of their followers, and when denied that, they die. Think about it: if the deities really are the source of all creation, why is it that many clerics can cast divine magic without devoting themselves to any deity? There may indeed be an omnipotent entity (or collection of entities) responsible for making and tending reality, but if so, that power must be utterly incomprehensible to the minds of mere mortals. Members of the organization known as the Athar refer to this theoretical true god as "the Great Unknown".

The Athar are sometimes called "defiers" or "the lost" because their beliefs bring them into direct philosophical (and occasionally physical) conflict with just about every religion ever established in the multiverse. They try to convince worshippers of various deities that they are being duped by a cosmic confidence scam. The Athar rarely take their accusations to the "gods" themselves. After all, even if they are only mortals playing at divinity, they are extraordinarily powerful mortals playing at divinity, and it is unwise to incur their wrath unnecessarily.

The Athar spend a great deal of their time on the Astral Plane. They have established a many-windowed observatory from which viewers can view the bodies of dead and dying "gods". This sight fills faction members with righteous glee, since they consider it absolute, irrefutable proof that their tenets are correct.

LibraryOgre
2013-10-10, 11:54 AM
The thing about the Athar is that they are simultaneously not wrong and very wrong.

They have set a definition of a god; none of the Powers match that definition, so, by their definition, the Powers are not gods. However, the rest of the multiverse has likewise set a definition of a god, which the powers match in pretty much every way (Partially because the multiverse's definition of a god is "That guy over there.") To be an Athar means clinging to a definition that no one else does.

The Gods are powerful mortals, in that they can be killed. But they only die if starved or murdered, and starving a god involves a LOT of death, while murdering them pretty much takes another god (anomalies like the Avatar situation notwithstanding).

An interesting comparison is between a Dragon King (from Dark Sun) and the normal gods. An Athasian dragon is a very powerful mortal... at least 20th level as both a wizard and a psion, on top of a magical transformation that makes them unaging and other. The Dragon Kings themselves go a step farther, being linked to an elemental vortex which allows them to grant spells to their worshipers. But they are not, in a conventional sense, Gods. Because while Gods may be similarly powerful, their power to grant spells does not come from a link to an external being, but from their own connection to the multiverse, forged through their worshipers. Kill the elemental vortex, and you don't get to step into their place... you're just a powerful mortal.

So, back to the Wall of the Faithless. It makes a heck of a lot of sense that Kelemvor got rid of it, and I've long ignored it. It's a very Mrykul idea, and I don't doubt it was feeding him somehow. My guess is that the other gods let him do it because it was his domain. His job was to take care of the dead, see them to their proper place, and he could do what he liked with those who did not have a proper place. Injustice? Maybe. But it would take a lot of work to live a life in Faerun that endeared you to no god, without actively trying for it. How do you do it? You can't farm, because that's Chauntea. You can't turn to temple robbery, because Mask will love you for it.... even if you're robbing his temple, you're doing his work.

hamishspence
2013-10-10, 11:56 AM
Injustice? Maybe. But it would take a lot of work to live a life in Faerun that endeared you to no god, without actively trying for it. How do you do it? You can't farm, because that's Chauntea. You can't turn to temple robbery, because Mask will love you for it.... even if you're robbing his temple, you're doing his work.

Or, it simply takes "actively opposing the worship of the gods".

An Athar in Faerun, even if a perfect candidate for the realm of one of the gods, is in trouble because of this.

As to those that aren't actively trying- there's some question about what happens to children who die in infancy.

Frozen_Feet
2013-10-10, 01:34 PM
Thing to keep in mind about the wall is that while it was not immediately destroyed, it was eventually destroyed. Theodicy doesn't really apply to a polytheistic setting where there are evil gods and the good ones are not omnipotent. In addition to the point I made about preaching earlier, you have to consider there might have been nothing to do about the situation before Kelemvor's rise to power. (How did that happen by the way?)

Refusing to trust someone because they aren't doing something they couldn't is disingenious. This isn't even a religious dilemma, it's a practical relationship problem.

hamishspence
2013-10-10, 01:41 PM
Kelemvor came to power by leading a bunch of the inhabitants of the Fugue Plane against Cyric in Prince of Lies. After Cyric's flight, Ao offered him the mantle of God of the Dead and he accepted.

I think other factors had weakened Cyric significantly by that point- such as him being driven mad by reading his own propaganda book- a powerful artefact he'd ordered created, and contributed to.

LibraryOgre
2013-10-10, 01:42 PM
Kelemvor came to power by leading a bunch of the inhabitants of the Fugue Plane against Cyric in Prince of Lies. After Cyric's flight, Ao offered him the mantle of God of the Dead and he accepted.

I think other factors had weakened Cyric significantly by that point- such as him being driven mad by reading his own propaganda book- a powerful artefact he'd ordered created, and contributed to.

Cyric is a major reason I don't use the ToT. I didn't like the "consolidation of evil" that they did.

AuraTwilight
2013-10-10, 02:55 PM
The thought of "I refuse to worship good gods because they're doing nothing about the Wall!" is especially intellectually dishonest. Because it's rather apparent from the very concept that the easiest way for good gods, evil gods, or even mere mortals to "do something" regarding the Wall is to preach their faith! By asking for your nominal worship, a good god is trying to save your soul from the machinations of an evil god! What exactly is so horrible about that?

Ever read Those Who Walk Away from Omelas? Your argument is fallacious because you're essentially begging the question. "Look, either accept a god or don't, but the Wall of the Faithless is there, and worshipping a god is the only way around it. The good guys are doing everything they can."

...Except they can. Because the gods made the damn Wall in the first place. And if the rationale for it is to deter mortals from not worshipping any gods, the good gods atleast should be asking themselves if they're justified in doing so.

Does the existence of the good gods in of themselves, and the works they may do, justify such incredible injustice? Is Utopia worth staying in if it requires the suffering of even one person? There are those who would stay. There are those who would walk away. The author of the Omelas fable would concur that those who walk away are more morally justified, but would argue that the most morally just action is to make a Utopia that doesn't have that suffering child at all.

The 'need' for the Wall of the Faithless, and its place in the universe, begs upon itself. It is, atleast in D&D terms, objectively evil (because it necessarily means the absolute destruction of non-evil souls), and abiding its existence in the name of 'Balance' only means that evil has the upper hand at a cosmic level, even if no individual evil gods are benefiting from it personally.

The Wall of the Faithless is simply not morally justifiable.

The Oni
2013-10-10, 03:01 PM
But the way I understand it, *A* God made the wall. Perhaps the other gods can't destroy what he made. Or perhaps it would require an alliance of most or all of the gods to destroy it, and some of the evil gods won't pitch in because the presence of the Wall encourages people to follow them. Or perhaps the good and evil gods can't agree for long enough to destroy the wall.

Frozen_Feet
2013-10-10, 03:41 PM
AuraTwilight: you are building a strawman. I didn't say worshipping gods was the only way, or that it counted as doing "everything"; I said it was the easiest way, and thus counts as doing something.

In contrast, your counter-argument hinges on the assumption that "everything they can" includes tearing down the wall. But like I pointed out, it's not necessarily something that could be done (before Kelemvor). In a polytheistic setting where gods are not omnipotent, omniscient or equal, "a god did X so gods can undo it" is not a very good argument.

More to the point, if a god didn't help build the wall and can't trivially destroy it, then moral burden of the Wall's existence doesn't fall on them. It is a heinous thing, I agree, but its existence is Myrkul's fault, not of every god everywhere. A good god doesn't need to justify or condone the Wall; Myrkul made it because Myrkul is a prick, end of story. It's the same way in which I don't need to condone or justify starving children in Africa. Even doing everything I can, I can only save some, not all; it is not a moral failure on my part, it is a physical one.

AuraTwilight
2013-10-10, 03:56 PM
AuraTwilight: you are building a strawman. I didn't say worshipping gods was the only way, or that it counted as doing "everything"; I said it was the easiest way, and thus counts as doing something.


Ah, my eyes missed that wording, my apologies.

That aside, doing the right thing and doing the easiest thing aren't as synonymous as we'd like them to be.


In contrast, your counter-argument hinges on the assumption that "everything they can" includes tearing down the wall. But like I pointed out, it's not necessarily something that could be done (before Kelemvor). In a polytheistic setting where gods are not omnipotent, omniscient or equal, "a god did X so gods can undo it" is not a very good argument.

Yes, but all of the good gods working together can probably physically do it. There'd be horrible reprecussions, and other gods might oppose them, sure. I'm not denying that. But that's no reason to accept the status quo. Sometimes being Good requires doing things that aren't in your own best interests. Mortals are expected to try all the time, why aren't Gods obligated to do the same?

At the very least you'd think the good gods would petition Ao that they cannot act in their proper duty with such a horribly evil thing being a job requirement. Or atleast argue that if the gods cannot gain worship without threats and fear, that they don't deserve that worship. Let the gods be dwindled, before a soul is sacrificed on the pyre of apathy.


More to the point, if a god didn't help build the wall and can't trivially destroy it, then moral burden of the Wall's existence doesn't fall on them. It is a heinous thing, I agree, but its existence is Myrkul's fault, not of every god everywhere. A good god doesn't need to justify or condone the Wall; Myrkul made it because Myrkul is a prick, end of story. It's the same way in which I don't need to condone or justify starving children in Africa. Even doing everything I can, I can only save some, not all; it is not a moral failure on my part, it is a physical one.

The Ought Implies Can principle gets kinda messy when we apply it to transcendent beings, but you're right. That doesn't change that a good god probably shouldn't and wouldn't tolerate it under any circumstances.

Even if they can't really do anything about it, that the gods don't TRY to their utmost is what I take moral qualms with, not their inability to fix the problem utterly.

russdm
2013-10-10, 04:33 PM
At any point after its creation, Ao could have gotten rid of it. And he is supposed to be more powerful than the other gods. Also, AO as been unconcerned with mortal affairs doesn't jive though. He lets three mortals, Bane, Myrkul, and Bhaal replace Jergal. And then enacts the whole avatar thing while also making the gods having to rely more of faith for their power. But, he made the tablets of fate and the whole God job, so shouldn't he have been able to make the changes whenever he wanted? Why did it take the theft of the tablets for him to intervene? Because he is a lazy bastard? or because he is bound by some kind of rules meaning he couldn't do anything until the gods pissed him off, so he allowed the situation to occur so that the tablets could be stolen.

If it was because he was a lazy bastard, it says one thing about him. If its because of rules, it says something else. And if Ao can't get rid of the wall which was made by Myrkul it also says something about him.

From my experience, only gods actually from mortals seem to give any kind of thought to mortals whereas most of the other gods simply don't care. They view them solely as resources nothing more.

We have former mortal turned god according to lore: Bane, Myrkul, Bhaal, Cyric, Midnight(became mystra), Kelemvor. and I think that covers it. I don't think any others used to be mortals first. It really says something that of this only Midnight and Kelemvor actually care about mortals, while most gods in Faerun, irregardless of alignment, think that mortals can just piss off. Its what Ao yelled at them about, the gods not really caring about their worshippers and it doesn't appear that they changed either.

hamishspence
2013-10-10, 04:36 PM
There's a few others, but they tend to play minor roles.

Frozen_Feet
2013-10-11, 01:07 AM
Well, Ao did get rid of the Wall eventually, by appointing Kelemvor as death god. But yes, Ao itself is something of a problematic figure. While theodicy doesn't apply to lesser gods (because they are not a hegemonic whole), it does apply to Ao.

Rhynn
2013-10-11, 01:12 AM
Well, Ao did get rid of the Wall eventually, by appointing Kelemvor as death god. But yes, Ao itself is something of a problematic figure. While theodicy doesn't apply to lesser gods (because they are not a hegemonic whole), it does apply to Ao.

Well, not really. He may be omniscient and omnipotent, but I don't think there's any claim (out-of-character, as it were) that he's omnibenevolent. Problem of evil solved... (Also, Ao's role as the creator of the universe is, to put it mildly, in question; he may have created Toril, even all of Realmspace, but he almost certainly did not create the Planes, and thus did not create cosmic concepts like Good and Evil, which exist necessarily and irrespective of Ao, gods, and probably mortals.)

TuggyNE
2013-10-11, 02:16 AM
Well, Ao did get rid of the Wall eventually, by appointing Kelemvor as death god. But yes, Ao itself is something of a problematic figure. While theodicy doesn't apply to lesser gods (because they are not a hegemonic whole), it does apply to Ao.

Yeah, Ao is enough of a jerk that were I actually invested in FR I would probably put a good bit of thought into ways and means of deposing/replacing him. :smalltongue:

Alleran
2013-10-12, 01:50 AM
But, he made the tablets of fate and the whole God job, so shouldn't he have been able to make the changes whenever he wanted? Why did it take the theft of the tablets for him to intervene?
Because two of those gods (notably mortals who had been raised to divinity) went and stole a pair of tablets that had the rules and regulations of the deities written on them, basically flouting completely the Balance that they were supposed to uphold. So he decided that as an object lesson he was going to make the gods reliant on mortals for their well-being instead.

Think of it as the straw that broke the camel's back.

Some gods seemed to learn their lesson (e.g. Torm chose to die in pursuit of his portfolio and the protection of mortals, so he was restored to life). Some, like Myrkul, did not.

Scow2
2013-10-12, 07:47 PM
The thing about the Wall is that the other gods don't really have a say on the soul of those who belong to the God of Death, who's willing to take anyone, no matter how much they blaspheme against him. They die? They please him enough to come to his realm and be his. But, in life, they pissed him off enough that they go to the Wall he made for them.

Ao can't say "No," because Myrkul's doing his job properly, and exercising his rights nonconfrontationally: If he were throwing souls that DIDN'T belong to him... such as those that were faithful to other gods, THEN he'd be stepping out of line. And if the Good gods were to oppose the God of Death (Who's job involves ensuring everyone goes to their proper afterlife), they'd be severing their own connection to the souls of their followers, and forcing the faithful to suffer needlessly while they are separated from the afterlife they deserved. While the Good deities are Good, it is not reasonable for them to cast aside the lives of those who have also lived by and spread their forms of Good through the world for the sake of a few people with an overdeveloped sense of entitlement who insult and reject the very ones who gave them their lives and everything in it.

Mal/Naythiests in D&D settings remind me of the "What have the Romans ever done for us?" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ExWfh6sGyso) Monty Python sketch. Just replace "Romans" with "Gods", and add "Given us life/food/lovers/a world" to that. The Forgotten Realms wouldn't be a better place without the deities. It wouldn't be a place at all. Even the voice the Faithless use to renounce the deities is a gift from at least one of them.

Rhynn
2013-10-12, 07:56 PM
Mal/Naythiests in D&D settings remind me of the "What have the Romans ever done for us?" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ExWfh6sGyso) Monty Python sketch. Just replace "Romans" with "Gods", and add "Given us life/food/lovers/a world" to that. The Forgotten Realms wouldn't be a better place without the deities. It wouldn't be a place at all. Even the voice the Faithless use to renounce the deities is a gift from at least one of them.

I think that's accurate for many settings, but not necessarily the Forgotten Realms; in Toril (and I guess much of the Great Wheel cosmology), the deities (largely) post-date the things they are deities of: they didn't create them, they just govern them and (possibly; D&D lacking real mechanics for this, outside of clerics) lend fortune to related endeavors if prayed to.

... D&D religion is unfortunately bland, mechanically.

Your post has planted seeds in my mind, incidentally: my ACKS Forgotten Realms (Waterdeep/the North) setting is pre-Time of Troubles (using only the first few 1E sourcebooks), so Myrkul is going to be the god of death and the dead... going to be interesting thinking up the implications. (Although currently, I'm going with "there is no objective proof of the gods' existence," but that may change if I start feeling like the other alternative will be more fun.)

Scow2
2013-10-12, 08:17 PM
Yeah, Ao is enough of a jerk that were I actually invested in FR I would probably put a good bit of thought into ways and means of deposing/replacing him. :smalltongue:Deposing AO would be a lot like blowing up the Palace of the Gods in Discworld - Sure, you get rid of a Jerk, but you also get rid of everything else as well. He set up the system that gives you all the Bad in life... but he's also responsible for the system that gives you all the Good in life as well.

TuggyNE
2013-10-12, 09:27 PM
Deposing AO would be a lot like blowing up the Palace of the Gods in Discworld - Sure, you get rid of a Jerk, but you also get rid of everything else as well. He set up the system that gives you all the Bad in life... but he's also responsible for the system that gives you all the Good in life as well.

Since other crystal spheres exist with other overdeities, I don't see why it's impossible in principle to swap Ao out for a better version.

Libertad
2013-10-12, 10:53 PM
My main problem with the Wall is that it's a very recent invention by an evil deity which Ao uses to reinforce his ideology: that the power of the Gods is all that matters, more so than all the lives and welfare of all the mortals out there.

It really clashes with players' ideals of Good, so much so that they ask "what are the deities of Good doing about this?" and there wasn't really an answer.

Rhynn
2013-10-12, 11:10 PM
My main problem with the Wall is that it's a very recent invention by an evil deity which Ao uses to reinforce his ideology: that the power of the Gods is all that matters, more so than all the lives and welfare of all the mortals out there.

I got the impression so far from this thread that it was the status quo for some indeterminate amount of time PRIOR to the ToT (1358 DR) and was then removed, until it was brought back apparently simply because somebody's editor didn't catch the fact it shouldn't exist anymore...

What do you base "very recent invention" on?

Also, you only go in the wall once your life is over. You can't really have "welfare" at that point, either, since the Great Wheel afterlife is, in fact, "you lose all personality and individuality and become part of a plane's energy, manifested as a petitioner (until or unless you're sucked up and spit back out as a more impressive outsider)" ...

Really, the fundamental problem here is applying human morals and judgments to a creature that is literally ineffable and playing by rules that are completely unknown to the people making the judgments.

Libertad
2013-10-12, 11:18 PM
By my recollection Myrkul invented the Wall within the last thousand years of FR's 30,000+ year history. I looked up Myrkul and the Wall's entries on the Forgotten Realms wiki, and I can't find a date signifying its creation.


Really, the fundamental problem here is applying human morals and judgments to a creature that is literally ineffable and playing by rules that are completely unknown to the people making the judgments.

But alignment exists independently of human morals and judgments: it's a cosmic force which is very loosely based upon real-world morals and judgments. So when the Wall's maintained by Ao, it's reasonable for many gamers to read that as promoting evil through widespread suffering and fear.

The Wall's main purpose is to encourage divine worship. It's not proven that the majority of Faerunians will abandon worship without it, but Ao keeps it up nonetheless.

russdm
2013-10-12, 11:42 PM
When that cosmic force is an established concept made by the designers and used to govern the actions of NPCs, then I expect those NPCs to follow through on this otherwise why have the cosmic force system at all. If the Gods are supposed to be "playing by rules that are unknown to the people making the judgment", then don't give them alignments. But the system is supposed to work in all cases it applies and the DM is supposed to be able to understand how the gods think to make them work. Giving a god an alignment drawn from the same system used by mortals, means that that god needs to act within that alignment. Player characters are immune from this by the virtue of being player characters. Everything else should act in line with their alignment otherwise, then don't give them one and by extension, don't use the system at all if you are not going to be true to it.

Libertad
2013-10-13, 12:11 AM
When that cosmic force is an established concept made by the designers and used to govern the actions of NPCs, then I expect those NPCs to follow through on this otherwise why have the cosmic force system at all. If the Gods are supposed to be "playing by rules that are unknown to the people making the judgment", then don't give them alignments. But the system is supposed to work in all cases it applies and the DM is supposed to be able to understand how the gods think to make them work. Giving a god an alignment drawn from the same system used by mortals, means that that god needs to act within that alignment. Player characters are immune from this by the virtue of being player characters. Everything else should act in line with their alignment otherwise, then don't give them one and by extension, don't use the system at all if you are not going to be true to it.

I'm not disagreeing with you, I was responding to Rhynn's post.

russdm
2013-10-13, 12:13 AM
I was responding to yours and Rhynn's posts.

NichG
2013-10-13, 12:34 AM
Mal/Naythiests in D&D settings remind me of the "What have the Romans ever done for us?" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ExWfh6sGyso) Monty Python sketch. Just replace "Romans" with "Gods", and add "Given us life/food/lovers/a world" to that. The Forgotten Realms wouldn't be a better place without the deities. It wouldn't be a place at all. Even the voice the Faithless use to renounce the deities is a gift from at least one of them.

The thing is, when you're a(n ethical) deity, sometimes you have to consider 'perhaps some things are better off not existing'. Is it better for Toril to exist, flawed in its particular ways, or better for 'something else' to exist in its place? Given an infinity of 'what could be's', the chooser of a particular possibility has a moral responsibility for what they in particular choose. To say 'you should be grateful because you could have just not existed at all' absolves the deity of their choices and pretends that things 'could not have been different'. The same argument could as easily be used to justify the creation of a prime world that is basically Baator for the living, where everyone is tormented for the entirety of their existence (because the alternative is not existing at all, right?).

Now, at the same time, perhaps its just that Ao isn't perfect and things may have gotten out of control or turned out differently than expected. At that point the choice between destroying an already-formed creation or letting it continue in a flawed state is much less trivial to make. There is also something to be said for the strictures that power must place on itself so that things of lesser power can still be meaningful (and why create a prime world unless you want it to be meaningful?) - at some point you have to let the mortals (and lesser gods) solve their own problems, or you're just puppeting your creation.



When that cosmic force is an established concept made by the designers and used to govern the actions of NPCs, then I expect those NPCs to follow through on this otherwise why have the cosmic force system at all. If the Gods are supposed to be "playing by rules that are unknown to the people making the judgment", then don't give them alignments. But the system is supposed to work in all cases it applies and the DM is supposed to be able to understand how the gods think to make them work. Giving a god an alignment drawn from the same system used by mortals, means that that god needs to act within that alignment. Player characters are immune from this by the virtue of being player characters. Everything else should act in line with their alignment otherwise, then don't give them one and by extension, don't use the system at all if you are not going to be true to it.

Well, alignment is descriptive, not prescriptive. That allows for leeway to have actions that are not 100% aligned with someone's alignment, while still having them maintain it. The real question is, do entities whose every choice causes huge reprecussions get a pass on 'the little stuff'? Does Pelor become evil if he kills a single good-aligned undead without cause? Ten? A thousand?

russdm
2013-10-13, 12:50 AM
Well, alignment is descriptive, not prescriptive. That allows for leeway to have actions that are not 100% aligned with someone's alignment, while still having them maintain it. The real question is, do entities whose every choice causes huge reprecussions get a pass on 'the little stuff'? Does Pelor become evil if he kills a single good-aligned undead without cause? Ten? A thousand?

I expect Pelor to act according to the alignment he is and how he has been described by the source, The PHB/DMG. Killing one is a single act, killing ten is ten acts, and killing a thousand is a thousand acts. Each separate act adds up though. A wizards that continues committing evil acts is moving evil, not staying neutral. The more you act a certain way/alignment, the closer your alignment should be to that.

Alignment is also the built-in moral system so I expect it to work unless it doesn't actually exist as a system. And if you aren't intending for that alignment system to be used as it was designed, then why design it to work the way that it does? I expect it to work as a starting point and be applicable for most of an NPC's life. If it doesn't, then clearly either the alignment is wrong, or the system itself is flawed.

NichG
2013-10-13, 02:44 AM
I expect Pelor to act according to the alignment he is and how he has been described by the source, The PHB/DMG. Killing one is a single act, killing ten is ten acts, and killing a thousand is a thousand acts. Each separate act adds up though. A wizards that continues committing evil acts is moving evil, not staying neutral. The more you act a certain way/alignment, the closer your alignment should be to that.


Well the question always comes back to how alignment adds. If I save a thousand people for every one I kill, am I good because the majority of my acts are good, or am I evil because murder is a 'more evil' act than my most good act?

In Pelor's case, if he kills a good undead every year but acts as the source of light, healing, and warmth for a world, where does that balance lie?

That is kind of the issue with judging gods by alignment. Everything they do is so huge that if you have a system in which a single evil act is not redeemed by a single good act of the same magnitude, all the gods will be evil. If on the other hand, you're summing good and evil and seeing what the total is, the gods can get away with all sorts of atrocities on the personal scale because on the cosmic scale they're doing huge acts of good.



Alignment is also the built-in moral system so I expect it to work unless it doesn't actually exist as a system. And if you aren't intending for that alignment system to be used as it was designed, then why design it to work the way that it does? I expect it to work as a starting point and be applicable for most of an NPC's life. If it doesn't, then clearly either the alignment is wrong, or the system itself is flawed.

Well the system is obviously flawed as a prescriptive system, but as a general 'this person is broadly X' its fine. You don't expect 'Str 14' to be a complete description of a character's body, and you shouldn't expect 'LN' to be a complete description of their personality, motivations, and decision-making process either.

TuggyNE
2013-10-13, 03:23 AM
Well the question always comes back to how alignment adds. If I save a thousand people for every one I kill, am I good because the majority of my acts are good, or am I evil because murder is a 'more evil' act than my most good act?

In Pelor's case, if he kills a good undead every year but acts as the source of light, healing, and warmth for a world, where does that balance lie?

That is kind of the issue with judging gods by alignment. Everything they do is so huge that if you have a system in which a single evil act is not redeemed by a single good act of the same magnitude, all the gods will be evil. If on the other hand, you're summing good and evil and seeing what the total is, the gods can get away with all sorts of atrocities on the personal scale because on the cosmic scale they're doing huge acts of good.

Hmm. Now I'm thinking a somewhat pH-style dual-logarithm scale might be interesting. Every number up is another two or three or ten times as many Good actions (or ten times the scope, or whatever) per Evil action, and vice versa.

Call it the pGE scale. :smallwink:

Kalmageddon
2013-10-13, 06:56 AM
The way I see it is quite simple:
Good = does not commit any evil act intentionally, commits good acts.
Neutral= does not commit any good or evil act intentionally.
Evil= commits evil acts intentionally.

If you are good and then you commit a single intentional evil act then you are evil, it's simple common sense. There might be redemption further down the line but it's not common.

hamishspence
2013-10-13, 11:06 AM
4E Faerun seems to take the same approach as 4E Points of Light- the Primordials made the world, and the gods just took it from them in a fight.

NichG
2013-10-13, 12:41 PM
Hmm. Now I'm thinking a somewhat pH-style dual-logarithm scale might be interesting. Every number up is another two or three or ten times as many Good actions (or ten times the scope, or whatever) per Evil action, and vice versa.

Call it the pGE scale. :smallwink:

Yeah I think maybe this is a way to go if you want an alignment system that handles both 'nobodies' and 'people whose breakfast choices set the destiny of thousands'.

Alternately, we just say 'Okay, gods can't be judged according to the morality of mortals. Here's the morality that they should be judged on instead.' and come up with a 'code of conduct' for 'good' vs 'evil' vs 'law' vs 'chaos' divines that is intent based rather than results based (since butterfly effect guarantees that the results will always have some bad mixed in with the good). We can stick on a code of professional divine ethics as well (don't create things whose only purpose is to make other people look good; don't create things whose only purpose is to suffer; etc).


The way I see it is quite simple:
Good = does not commit any evil act intentionally, commits good acts.
Neutral= does not commit any good or evil act intentionally.
Evil= commits evil acts intentionally.

If you are good and then you commit a single intentional evil act then you are evil, it's simple common sense. There might be redemption further down the line but it's not common.

Ok, so I think in this system most if not all the gods are going to end up with an evil alignment.

Maybe the answer, albeit also giving gods a pass, is that gods are composite beings. When a good god performs an evil act the part of them that planned and decided to go through with the act breaks off and becomes mortal again. Kind of makes gods into beings run by committee, with souls that don't tow the party line getting booted out.

Scow2
2013-10-13, 01:04 PM
By my recollection Myrkul invented the Wall within the last thousand years of FR's 30,000+ year history. I looked up Myrkul and the Wall's entries on the Forgotten Realms wiki, and I can't find a date signifying its creation.



But alignment exists independently of human morals and judgments: it's a cosmic force which is very loosely based upon real-world morals and judgments. So when the Wall's maintained by Ao, it's reasonable for many gamers to read that as promoting evil through widespread suffering and fear.

The Wall's main purpose is to encourage divine worship. It's not proven that the majority of Faerunians will abandon worship without it, but Ao keeps it up nonetheless.It's not maintained by Ao. It's maintained by the God of Death. Everyone who dies belongs to a God. Those who are Faithless default to the God of Death. It's why, under Myrkul and Cyric, they went to the Wall, and under Kelemvor, they go to his city. Ao doesn't maintain the Wall any more than he maintains the City of the Dead.

The truth of the matter is that the welfare of the Gods is more important than the welfare of mortals, because the welfare of mortals comes from the welfare of Gods. Without Deities exerting their subtle power to maintain the Prime Material, it will unmake itself. There is no such thing as a "Self-made, independent man" in the Forgotten Realms.

If you truly want to be Good, you will align yourself with the portfolio of one of the good deities. Failure to do so impedes the spread of that portfolio. Rejection of Ilmater is a rejection of mercy. Rejection of Chauntea and Lathander is rejection of prosperity and growth. Rejection of Torm and Tyr is rejection of Justice and Loyalty. Rejection of Sune is rejection of Love and Beauty.

The way I see it is quite simple:
Good = does not commit any evil act intentionally, commits good acts.
Neutral= does not commit any good or evil act intentionally.
Evil= commits evil acts intentionally.

If you are good and then you commit a single intentional evil act then you are evil, it's simple common sense. There might be redemption further down the line but it's not common.Nope. Someone who commits good and evil equally is Neutral, and someone who commits far more Good than Evil is Good. Otherwise, everyone would be Evil. People just tend to fail to actually account for the value of Good and Evil. Saving something is at best 1/10th the value of Destroying something.

hamishspence
2013-10-13, 04:19 PM
So, a lifeguard (or a doctor) who was also a serial killer, would be Good as long as the ratio of "people saved" to "people murdered" was sufficiently high?

Say- 1/100? Or 1/1000?

At what point, can being a "lifesaver" make up for wanton, unrepentant murder?

Personally I'd say it should never be this kind of calculus- that a person who murders for their own personal gratification is Evil even if they save the lives of a million people for every one they murder.

Frozen_Feet
2013-10-13, 04:34 PM
At large enough scale, even morality turns into statistics. I don't consider it a flaw, as in the context of a game, math is acceptable. Playing zero-sum games with black and white stones is at least humanly possible.

Though I think more important than the exact ratio of life-saving, is how and why invidual transgressions are atoned for. I feel people are looking at it at a bit too abstract level. Think of how regret and the god's personal relation to those it has wronged against would change the situation. View it through the lens of an Atonement quest. I think a good god would feel a great deal of pain if forced to cause suffering or causing it by accident.

NichG
2013-10-13, 04:47 PM
It's not maintained by Ao. It's maintained by the God of Death. Everyone who dies belongs to a God. Those who are Faithless default to the God of Death. It's why, under Myrkul and Cyric, they went to the Wall, and under Kelemvor, they go to his city. Ao doesn't maintain the Wall any more than he maintains the City of the Dead.

The truth of the matter is that the welfare of the Gods is more important than the welfare of mortals, because the welfare of mortals comes from the welfare of Gods. Without Deities exerting their subtle power to maintain the Prime Material, it will unmake itself. There is no such thing as a "Self-made, independent man" in the Forgotten Realms.


This would work, except that the Forgotten Realms has been shown to be in at least some form of contact with other planes of existence in which this is not the case. The real answer is perhaps 'you should run the Forgotten Realms as isolated from other settings' because at least some of that was stuff that amounted to Ed Greenwood wanting to let Elminster hang out with Mordenkainen, but if you accept that Toril is not 'the only way things can be' then Ao becomes responsible for setting up a system in which reality is so dependent on the presence of the gods and the power of the gods - it was a choice that could have been made in a different way.

Choosing to make the power of the gods so important and so dependent on mortals can be thought of as a sort of enslavement: 'Worship us, follow us, fight our ideological conflicts for us, or the world will disintegrate around you'.

If thats the only way that life can exist, thats one thing, but if its a conscious choice to create a system that perpetuate evils, then it becomes an evil in its own right.

Scow2
2013-10-13, 05:00 PM
This would work, except that the Forgotten Realms has been shown to be in at least some form of contact with other planes of existence in which this is not the case. The real answer is perhaps 'you should run the Forgotten Realms as isolated from other settings' because at least some of that was stuff that amounted to Ed Greenwood wanting to let Elminster hang out with Mordenkainen, but if you accept that Toril is not 'the only way things can be' then Ao becomes responsible for setting up a system in which reality is so dependent on the presence of the gods and the power of the gods - it was a choice that could have been made in a different way.

Choosing to make the power of the gods so important and so dependent on mortals can be thought of as a sort of enslavement: 'Worship us, follow us, fight our ideological conflicts for us, or the world will disintegrate around you'.

If thats the only way that life can exist, thats one thing, but if its a conscious choice to create a system that perpetuate evils, then it becomes an evil in its own right. Eh... I see this argument as "Putting the cows/chickens before the Farmer", I guess.

navar100
2013-10-13, 05:05 PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpxd3pZAVHI

hamishspence
2013-10-13, 05:06 PM
Using that logic, beings that are smarter than humans, that prey on them (mind-flayers, dragons, etc) should be the ones the readers are siding with.

Or, if you take it up a notch, a dragon powerful enough to create humans with epic magic, to empower him even more than he already is - should be sympathised with rather than opposed.

TuggyNE
2013-10-13, 06:28 PM
So, a lifeguard (or a doctor) who was also a serial killer, would be Good as long as the ratio of "people saved" to "people murdered" was sufficiently high?

Say- 1/100? Or 1/1000?

At what point, can being a "lifesaver" make up for wanton, unrepentant murder?

Personally I'd say it should never be this kind of calculus- that a person who murders for their own personal gratification is Evil even if they save the lives of a million people for every one they murder.

People are notoriously bad at working out the exact ethical principles to use in cases where killing or other heinous evils are tied to saving lives or other great goods. So I'm not sure that's a very good test case for any possible alignment system at all. (Also, it's difficult to imagine any sane person doing any such diametrically opposed set of actions, which further reduces the utility of the example; alignment is not about sanity vs insanity, but about largely-sane choices.)

Still, though, if you want, you can consider "unrepentant murder" to be a very great evil with a continuing slow trickle of continuing evil every time an opportunity arises to repent that isn't taken — since each such choice is affirming again the original choice. This makes it remarkably difficult to outweigh, since it just keeps coming.


At large enough scale, even morality turns into statistics. I don't consider it a flaw, as in the context of a game, math is acceptable. Playing zero-sum games with black and white stones is at least humanly possible.

I thought of some examples but they're too tied to the real world, so those won't work. Suffice it to say I agree.


Though I think more important than the exact ratio of life-saving, is how and why invidual transgressions are atoned for. I feel people are looking at it at a bit too abstract level. Think of how regret and the god's personal relation to those it has wronged against would change the situation. View it through the lens of an Atonement quest. I think a good god would feel a great deal of pain if forced to cause suffering or causing it by accident.

Yeah.


Eh... I see this argument as "Putting the cows/chickens before the Farmer", I guess.

Suppose one farmer keeps his chickens in dark, dirty, cramped, strawless coops, feeding them the minimum needed to keep them alive, and occasionally stakes one out alive to serve as bait so he can hunt wolves. Suppose another farmer right nearby has light-filled, expansive, straw-covered, frequently-cleaned coops, ample food of different varieties, and protects his chickens with good fences and solid doors. Would you consider that the first farmer is entirely justified in everything they do, when it is obvious by counter-example that none of it is necessary?

Just because lesser creatures are of lesser importance does not make them of no importance; cruelty to one usually indicates a heart willing to be cruel to others.

NichG
2013-10-13, 06:58 PM
People are notoriously bad at working out the exact ethical principles to use in cases where killing or other heinous evils are tied to saving lives or other great goods. So I'm not sure that's a very good test case for any possible alignment system at all. (Also, it's difficult to imagine any sane person doing any such diametrically opposed set of actions, which further reduces the utility of the example; alignment is not about sanity vs insanity, but about largely-sane choices.)


I think though that when you consider the kinds of choices deities are 'supposed' to be making, this kind of discussion becomes inevitable. If Pelor increases the radiant output of the sun by a bit, it will help end famine in one land, but cause drought in another, and someone in the desert may die of heat stroke who would have otherwise survived to make it to the oasis.

So despite people being very bad at it, its an interesting discussion to have, especially when we want to portray deities in our campaigns and try to give them a unique point of view on things. Its also relevant if you're a PC thinking to make the decision of which deities to try to cast down or work against, and which deities if any to support. While one might say its 'hubris' for a mortal to think of judging the gods, in settings where there's a lot of revolving door divinity like the Forgotten Realms, or anywhere where PCs can become epic-level in power, it becomes sort of an important part of the job.

That's also the practical element that makes this more than just 'the cows/chickens before the farmer'. The 'cattle' in this case are capable of creating things that can threaten the farmer greatly, or can even become farmers themselves (especially in FR where ascended mortals are pretty common as holders of divine positions). If the farmer gets too out of line you get a Finder Wyvernspur or a Karsus or a Raistlin.

TuggyNE
2013-10-13, 07:25 PM
I think though that when you consider the kinds of choices deities are 'supposed' to be making, this kind of discussion becomes inevitable. If Pelor increases the radiant output of the sun by a bit, it will help end famine in one land, but cause drought in another, and someone in the desert may die of heat stroke who would have otherwise survived to make it to the oasis.

So despite people being very bad at it, its an interesting discussion to have, especially when we want to portray deities in our campaigns and try to give them a unique point of view on things.

Fair enough. I'd prefer to start with a set of more readily-understandable comparisons to get the baseline down, though, and then extend from there once it seems like most of the obvious test cases are giving sensible results.

In fact, I might think about this for a while and then start a new thread to explore the pGE idea in more depth.


Its also relevant if you're a PC thinking to make the decision of which deities to try to cast down or work against, and which deities if any to support. While one might say its 'hubris' for a mortal to think of judging the gods, in settings where there's a lot of revolving door divinity like the Forgotten Realms, or anywhere where PCs can become epic-level in power, it becomes sort of an important part of the job.

That's also the practical element that makes this more than just 'the cows/chickens before the farmer'. The 'cattle' in this case are capable of creating things that can threaten the farmer greatly, or can even become farmers themselves (especially in FR where ascended mortals are pretty common as holders of divine positions). If the farmer gets too out of line you get a Finder Wyvernspur or a Karsus or a Raistlin.

Indeed.

Scow2
2013-10-13, 07:37 PM
Using that logic, beings that are smarter than humans, that prey on them (mind-flayers, dragons, etc) should be the ones the readers are siding with.Those are more like Wolves in the chicken/farmer analogy. The humans owe them nothing... but they owe Gods everything they have.


Or, if you take it up a notch, a dragon powerful enough to create humans with epic magic, to empower him even more than he already is - should be sympathised with rather than opposed.
The moral problem here is creating a servant species with inherent 'genetic programming' inimical to its primary purpose... but going Skynet on the dragon is still a form of "Biting the hand that feeds." Is life under the dragon's command better than never living at all?


People are notoriously bad at working out the exact ethical principles to use in cases where killing or other heinous evils are tied to saving lives or other great goods. So I'm not sure that's a very good test case for any possible alignment system at all. (Also, it's difficult to imagine any sane person doing any such diametrically opposed set of actions, which further reduces the utility of the example; alignment is not about sanity vs insanity, but about largely-sane choices.)

Still, though, if you want, you can consider "unrepentant murder" to be a very great evil with a continuing slow trickle of continuing evil every time an opportunity arises to repent that isn't taken — since each such choice is affirming again the original choice. This makes it remarkably difficult to outweigh, since it just keeps coming.What alignment is Sir Lancelot (He likes to dance a lot! And is prone to doing things he really aught to not!)?

Suppose one farmer keeps his chickens in dark, dirty, cramped, strawless coops, feeding them the minimum needed to keep them alive, and occasionally stakes one out alive to serve as bait so he can hunt wolves. Suppose another farmer right nearby has light-filled, expansive, straw-covered, frequently-cleaned coops, ample food of different varieties, and protects his chickens with good fences and solid doors. Would you consider that the first farmer is entirely justified in everything they do, when it is obvious by counter-example that none of it is necessary?

Just because lesser creatures are of lesser importance does not make them of no importance; cruelty to one usually indicates a heart willing to be cruel to others.But at the end of the day, both sets of chickens are going to be butchered for meat (Stewpot for hens, and Hot Wings and Fried Chicken for the cockerels) and eggs taken from them... and that is the very reason they are alive in the first place. Misery is relative.

It all depends on perspective in life, really. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHPOzQzk9Qo)

AuraTwilight
2013-10-13, 09:23 PM
But at the end of the day, both sets of chickens are going to be butchered for meat (Stewpot for hens, and Hot Wings and Fried Chicken for the cockerels) and eggs taken from them... and that is the very reason they are alive in the first place. Misery is relative.

The second farmer keeps them as pets and has no intention of eating them. What now?

TuggyNE
2013-10-13, 09:32 PM
But at the end of the day, both sets of chickens are going to be butchered for meat (Stewpot for hens, and Hot Wings and Fried Chicken for the cockerels) and eggs taken from them... and that is the very reason they are alive in the first place. Misery is relative.

"In the end, you'll die, so none of your suffering before then counts for anything" is a terribly fallacious argument. There's also the question of how the butchering is performed; from personal experience*, I know it makes a difference how you kill something, when you choose to kill it, and so on. (Even leaving aside the possibility of raising them as pets, or only for eggs, or whatever.)

Note, too, that chickens lay far more eggs than they could ever actually raise, and many of them are sterile, so those cost them little.

*Rabbits, chickens, ducks.

NichG
2013-10-13, 09:49 PM
Those are more like Wolves in the chicken/farmer analogy. The humans owe them nothing... but they owe Gods everything they have.


The moral problem here is creating a servant species with inherent 'genetic programming' inimical to its primary purpose... but going Skynet on the dragon is still a form of "Biting the hand that feeds." Is life under the dragon's command better than never living at all?

But at the end of the day, both sets of chickens are going to be butchered for meat (Stewpot for hens, and Hot Wings and Fried Chicken for the cockerels) and eggs taken from them... and that is the very reason they are alive in the first place. Misery is relative.


As a chicken, if you're going to get butchered either way it makes sense to go slaughter the farmer in his sleep and escape into the wild (inasmuch as an epic-level chicken would be able to do so). Whether or not the farmer can justify keeping chickens for food within his own morality, from the chicken point of view its pretty obvious that the farmer is a predator.

Now you can grey out that scenario a lot - the farmer only takes those close to death, provides for the chickens' well-being in a way that goes beyond what they could do for themselves, etc. And in that case, the chicken of legend probably shouldn't go slaughter the farmer. But if this supposed Cuchulain-of-chicken-kind could somehow make his kin independent, find a farmer who just wants the sterile eggs and doesn't eat meat to support them, etc, then again it becomes a no-brainer from the chicken point of view.

Scow2
2013-10-14, 12:55 AM
The second farmer keeps them as pets and has no intention of eating them. What now?The second farmer is not a farmer, and not using the chickens as they are meant.

"In the end, you'll die, so none of your suffering before then counts for anything" is a terribly fallacious argument. There's also the question of how the butchering is performed; from personal experience*, I know it makes a difference how you kill something, when you choose to kill it, and so on. (Even leaving aside the possibility of raising them as pets, or only for eggs, or whatever.)

Note, too, that chickens lay far more eggs than they could ever actually raise, and many of them are sterile, so those cost them little.

*Rabbits, chickens, ducks.But he is judged by the other Farmers, not the chickens... and ultimately, the harvest doesn't affect the moral alignment of the farmers, because that harvest is the Duty and Purpose of Living of the chickens. How he treats them, though, does matter to the Cosmic Forces that judge him. The first farmer is Evil (Though I'd consider the "use chickens as bait to hunt wolves" as neutral at best, since it merely changes the divinely-called purpose of the chicken from "Provide Wealth" to "Destroy Predators"), the second is Good, though they both must still harvest the chickens.


As a chicken, if you're going to get butchered either way it makes sense to go slaughter the farmer in his sleep and escape into the wild (inasmuch as an epic-level chicken would be able to do so). Whether or not the farmer can justify keeping chickens for food within his own morality, from the chicken point of view its pretty obvious that the farmer is a predator.

Now you can grey out that scenario a lot - the farmer only takes those close to death, provides for the chickens' well-being in a way that goes beyond what they could do for themselves, etc. And in that case, the chicken of legend probably shouldn't go slaughter the farmer. But if this supposed Cuchulain-of-chicken-kind could somehow make his kin independent, find a farmer who just wants the sterile eggs and doesn't eat meat to support them, etc, then again it becomes a no-brainer from the chicken point of view.And that Cuchulain chicken, by slaying the provider and protector of the chicken flock because of the harvest he demands of them as duty, has condemned his entire flock and family to death at the jaws of the wolves and foxes and possums and other vermin that populate the world as their home falls into disrepair and the water they drink dries up and the food they eat runs out, and their eggs rot away (And stink everything up) and their bodies go to waste... and the few survivors realize what they had lost, and wish the Farmer had not been killed, because although he was the one who ended their lives and took their eggs, he did it for a purpose greater than their lives would otherwise amount to, and provided them security, comfort, luxury, and purpose in their short lives.

Or, the Homicidal chicken kills the farmer, and inherits his essence and knowledge... and realizes the flesh of young chickens and flow of eggs are needed to make the world run, breeds the guard dogs, and sharpens the cleaver, and takes the Farmer's place.

hamishspence
2013-10-14, 01:09 AM
A person created by an epic wizard using the Origin of Species spell owes that wizard everything they have- this doesn't mean they can't recognize actions by the wizard that are highly dubious- or even seek to grow powerful enough to overthrow the wizard and put a better one in charge.

NichG
2013-10-14, 02:17 AM
But he is judged by the other Farmers, not the chickens... and ultimately, the harvest doesn't affect the moral alignment of the farmers, because that harvest is the Duty and Purpose of Living of the chickens. How he treats them, though, does matter to the Cosmic Forces that judge him. The first farmer is Evil (Though I'd consider the "use chickens as bait to hunt wolves" as neutral at best, since it merely changes the divinely-called purpose of the chicken from "Provide Wealth" to "Destroy Predators"), the second is Good, though they both must still harvest the chickens.


I think we're losing the analogy here a bit. The farmers are the gods, they are the ones who have defined by fiat what 'the Duty and Purpose of Living' is for the chickens. As such, if they choose a Duty and Purpose that is somehow negative for the chickens, they have culpability for that - they can't hide behind 'thats just the way things are' because they're among the ones who decided what 'the way things are' was.

If a god creates a species whose entire purpose is to suffer constantly and produce Liquid Pain to create items for heroes, that god is clearly evil from the mortal point of view at least. The trick is to recognize that a system that uses the souls of mortals to make the brick and mortar of the cosmic realms (both things like the Wall and also planes that absorb petitioners to form their firmament) is no different, just less Snidely Whiplash and more Soylent Green.



And that Cuchulain chicken, by slaying the provider and protector of the chicken flock because of the harvest he demands of them as duty, has condemned his entire flock and family to death at the jaws of the wolves and foxes and possums and other vermin that populate the world as their home falls into disrepair and the water they drink dries up and the food they eat runs out, and their eggs rot away (And stink everything up) and their bodies go to waste... and the few survivors realize what they had lost, and wish the Farmer had not been killed, because although he was the one who ended their lives and took their eggs, he did it for a purpose greater than their lives would otherwise amount to, and provided them security, comfort, luxury, and purpose in their short lives.

Or, the Homicidal chicken kills the farmer, and inherits his essence and knowledge... and realizes the flesh of young chickens and flow of eggs are needed to make the world run, breeds the guard dogs, and sharpens the cleaver, and takes the Farmer's place.

Or rather than being a convenient aesop, the Cuchulain chicken uses this power of his to find another path. In the FR analogy, he planeshifts his flock to Greyhawk or Krynn or some place where the farmers just want the sterile eggs and don't care about the meat so much. Or Sigil, a barn where the farmers are kept out by the mysterious threshing-machine-on-the-fritz that is the Lady of Pain.

TuggyNE
2013-10-14, 02:26 AM
But he is judged by the other Farmers, not the chickens...

Hmm. Only really true insofar as chickens are not known to judge much of anything. Here, the analogy is not helpful.


How he treats them, though, does matter to the Cosmic Forces that judge him.

Agreed.


The first farmer is Evil (Though I'd consider the "use chickens as bait to hunt wolves" as neutral at best, since it merely changes the divinely-called purpose of the chicken from "Provide Wealth" to "Destroy Predators"), the second is Good, though they both must still harvest the chickens.

Well, to some extent; as previously mentioned, raising chickens only for eggs (and possibly eating those that die of old age) is perfectly workable. I'd peg the first as evil, yes, but the second as merely neutral without some further acts.

However, given how sloppily Ao seems to treat things, I'm not at all convinced he'd even make it to Neutral.


Or, the Homicidal chicken kills the farmer, and inherits his essence and knowledge... and realizes the flesh of young chickens and flow of eggs are needed to make the world run, breeds the guard dogs, and sharpens the cleaver, and takes the Farmer's place.

Animal Farm II: Electric Boogaloo.

Rhynn
2013-10-14, 03:27 AM
I don't follow the thread for a few hours, and now it's about chickens? :smalleek:

Just as a general observation, if you drag a metaphor on for more than one post, it didn't work as a metaphor.

Omegonthesane
2013-10-14, 03:55 AM
If a god creates a species whose entire purpose is to suffer constantly and produce Liquid Pain to create items for heroes, that god is clearly evil from the mortal point of view at least. The trick is to recognize that a system that uses the souls of mortals to make the brick and mortar of the cosmic realms (both things like the Wall and also planes that absorb petitioners to form their firmament) is no different, just less Snidely Whiplash and more Soylent Green.
Nitpick - if the Liquid Pain Dispenser species are all extreme masochists it doesn't matter as much. :smalltongue:


Or rather than being a convenient aesop, the Cuchulain chicken uses this power of his to find another path. In the FR analogy, he planeshifts his flock to Greyhawk or Krynn or some place where the farmers just want the sterile eggs and don't care about the meat so much. Or Sigil, a barn where the farmers are kept out by the mysterious threshing-machine-on-the-fritz that is the Lady of Pain.

Now I want to write sapient chickens led by Cuckoolain into a setting...

TuggyNE
2013-10-14, 04:16 AM
I don't follow the thread for a few hours, and now it's about chickens? :smalleek:

Everything is about chickens. *pulls flapping chicken from pouch, tosses it to the side*


Just as a general observation, if you drag a metaphor on for more than one post, it didn't work as a metaphor.

Hmm, useful to keep in mind, along with "if you resort to dictionary definitions of all but the most uncommon words, the thread has been lost" and other bits of homely wisdom.

Rhynn
2013-10-14, 05:44 AM
Hmm, useful to keep in mind, along with "if you resort to dictionary definitions of all but the most uncommon words, the thread has been lost" and other bits of homely wisdom.

That is a good one. (Arguing about the definitions of those words is an even worse sign.) Basically, both are types of "secondary" or "second-order" argument - the discussion isn't even about the topic anymore, it's about definitions or finding a more precise metaphor, neither of which is of any real value...

Kalmageddon
2013-10-14, 06:24 AM
Nope. Someone who commits good and evil equally is Neutral, and someone who commits far more Good than Evil is Good. Otherwise, everyone would be Evil. People just tend to fail to actually account for the value of Good and Evil. Saving something is at best 1/10th the value of Destroying something.

I disagree.:smallsmile:
If you are truly good then you should never commit an evil act, period. Otherwise you are at best neutral, because you've shown that you don't shy away from doing evil when it suits your purpose.
Good and evil are not on a scale, they are not two sides that balance out.

Basically, I fail to see how you can justify something or someone from doing something evil on purpose when other solutions were possibile, which in the case of gods it should always be the case since, you know, they are gods.
And even then I would suggest that a truly good god would rather cease to exist then taint itself with an evil act, after all they are personifications of concepts, if you can't stand up to your ideals then you have no reason for existing as a god and you are just as flawed and unworthy as any mortal.

123456789blaaa
2013-10-14, 06:29 AM
I disagree.:smallsmile:
If you are truly good then you should never commit an evil act, period. Otherwise you are at best neutral, because you've shown that you don't shy away from doing evil when it suits your purpose.
Good and evil are not on a scale, they are not two sides that balance out.

Basically, I fail to see how you can justify something or someone from doing something evil on purpose when other solutions were possibile, which in the case of gods it should always be the case since, you know, they are gods.
And even then I would suggest that a truly good god would rather cease to exist then taint itself with an evil act, after all they are personifications of concepts, if you can't stand up to your ideals then you have no reason for existing as a god and you are just as flawed and unworthy as any mortal.

Well...technically, in dnd they are and they do. The alignment chart gives equal importance to all the alignments. They planes that represent the alignments are equal and balance each other. There are good and evil counterparts to each other (the bless weapon and corrupt weapon spells to name one example). In dnd, choosing to be Evil is a completely valid life decision.

Of course, this is dnd (which can never be completely consistent), so the designers go with your view sometimes as well. I think you can at least make a solid argument for Good and Evil being equal in dndland though.

TuggyNE
2013-10-14, 06:31 AM
I disagree.:smallsmile:
If you are truly good then you should never commit an evil act, period. Otherwise you are at best neutral, because you've shown that you don't shy away from doing evil when it suits your purpose.
Good and evil are not on a scale, they are not two sides that balance out.

Basically, I fail to see how you can justify something or someone from doing something evil on purpose when other solutions were possibile, which in the case of gods it should always be the case since, you know, they are gods.
And even then I would suggest that a truly good god would rather cease to exist then taint itself with an evil act, after all they are personifications of concepts, if you can't stand up to your ideals then you have no reason for existing as a god and you are just as flawed and unworthy as any mortal.

Didn't we already have this discussion, coming to the tentative conclusion that if such was in fact the case no good gods could exist at all by the D&D descriptions?

Well, unless you assume they merely avoid intentional evil, but even that isn't enough to qualify as "not an evil act".

hamishspence
2013-10-14, 06:58 AM
We know at least that the Wall didn't exist in Jergal's time (from Crucible) - it was Myrkul that introduced it under the name "Wall of Bones".

I occasionally wonder if Faerun is like the Harryhausen version of the Jason & The Argonauts world- one in which the gods know that mortals don't actually need them- and do their best to keep mortals unaware of this fact.

Kalmageddon
2013-10-14, 06:59 AM
Well...technically, in dnd they are and they do. The alignment chart gives equal importance to all the alignments. They planes that represent the alignments are equal and balance each other. There are good and evil counterparts to each other (the bless weapon and corrupt weapon spells to name one example). In dnd, choosing to be Evil is a completely valid life decision.

Of course, this is dnd (which can never be completely consistent), so the designers go with your view sometimes as well. I think you can at least make a solid argument for Good and Evil being equal in dndland though.

I wasn't talking D&D, but common sense.
If a hero saves the day constantly but then there is a passing mention of him stealing from some guy for no reason, or beating the crap out of someone just because, he wouldn't be good anymore and we would go "wtf did you do that for, you freak?".
Meanwhile in D&D that would be perfectly acceptable even for a god because he then goes on to do more good acts so the scale is alway tipped towards "good".

I'm aware that D&D is designed with another concept in mind, I was just manifesting my dislike for its flaws.

Omegonthesane
2013-10-14, 07:37 AM
I wasn't talking D&D, but common sense.
If a hero saves the day constantly but then there is a passing mention of him stealing from some guy for no reason, or beating the crap out of someone just because, he wouldn't be good anymore and we would go "wtf did you do that for, you freak?".

Because everyone knows you are instantly condemned and all your good deeds forgotten the instant you do a single thing wrong, right?

No. Because that's obviously retarded. I'd be confused by that sort of action certainly but if he had that good a track record before, Occam's Razor implies that he actually had a reason to steal that car or beat up that person - or at absolute worst that these are infinitely less bad than what we'd have without him.

Not helped by how you picked quite weak examples - theft and assault are daily activities for player characters.

Kalmageddon
2013-10-14, 07:52 AM
Because everyone knows you are instantly condemned and all your good deeds forgotten the instant you do a single thing wrong, right?

No. Because that's obviously retarded. I'd be confused by that sort of action certainly but if he had that good a track record before, Occam's Razor implies that he actually had a reason to steal that car or beat up that person - or at absolute worst that these are infinitely less bad than what we'd have without him.

Not helped by how you picked quite weak examples - theft and assault are daily activities for player characters.

It's not about doing something wrong, it's about doing it knowingly and intentionally. As I said before.
And if your player characters always steal and assault people I can only deduce that you have a pretty narrow mind when it comes to roleplaying.

Omegonthesane
2013-10-14, 08:04 AM
It's not about doing something wrong, it's about doing it knowingly and intentionally. As I said before.
I got that and was disagreeing with your premise completely - one dark deed, even a completely intentional one, does not undo a lifetime of good, any more than the reverse. (Nor does any amount of one undo any amount of the other, if you ask Stannis Baratheon, but I'm not quite that extreme.)


And if your player characters always steal and assault people I can only deduce that you have a pretty narrow mind when it comes to roleplaying.
No, more a recognition that most scenarios exciting enough to be RPGs are also frightening and extreme enough for even a straight-laced Boy Scout to violate his own moral code in extremes, combined with a refusal on my part to rationalise the act of attacking your enemies as anything less evil than assault. So, yes, the only reason every PC ever played by everyone ever doesn't steal is because often you don't find a chance to advance your objectives by way of theft, and any PC who is not ready to at least actively condone at least some cases of assault committed by their friends on their enemies is no true PC.

Kalmageddon
2013-10-14, 08:34 AM
I got that and was disagreeing with your premise completely - one dark deed, even a completely intentional one, does not undo a lifetime of good, any more than the reverse. (Nor does any amount of one undo any amount of the other, if you ask Stannis Baratheon, but I'm not quite that extreme.)


No, more a recognition that most scenarios exciting enough to be RPGs are also frightening and extreme enough for even a straight-laced Boy Scout to violate his own moral code in extremes, combined with a refusal on my part to rationalise the act of attacking your enemies as anything less evil than assault. So, yes, the only reason every PC ever played by everyone ever doesn't steal is because often you don't find a chance to advance your objectives by way of theft, and any PC who is not ready to at least actively condone at least some cases of assault committed by their friends on their enemies is no true PC.

And this is entirely your opinion, except that last part about what a PC is, whic simply doesn't make sense.
"any PC who is not ready to at least actively condone some cases of assault committed by their friends is no true PC". What. So what is it then? An NPC?
The only thing that makes a player character is the fact that it's, well, the character of one of the players. Unless he stops playing it and gives it to the Gm to become an NPC.

Anyway, it's your right to think that an evil act doesn't cancel good deeds but I think it's pretty much a horribile assumption. It's saying that as long as you do more good then evil it's your right to be evil from time to time and no one can condemn you because of it.
But discussing this subject further would be off-topic and against forum rules because of at least some exemples that comes to mind.

So let's just finish this here.

Omegonthesane
2013-10-14, 08:49 AM
Anyway, it's your right to think that an evil act doesn't cancel good deeds but I think it's pretty much a horribile assumption. It's saying that as long as you do more good then evil it's your right to be evil from time to time and no one can condemn you because of it.
But discussing this subject further would be off-topic and against forum rules because of at least some exemples that comes to mind.

So let's just finish this here.
No, let's not, because you just tried to strawman me and that is not a thing I will put up with.

You are trying to equivocate what I actually said with the idea that you can expense some of your accrued Good to pay off any evil action. What I in fact said was

one dark deed, even a completely intentional one, does not undo a lifetime of good, any more than the reverse.
Which actually implies the opposite - that there is not an amount of Good that will negate any given amount of Evil, or the reverse. If a person volunteers at a soup kitchen, donates half their income to Oxfam, then goes home and beats their spuse, they are both a charity worker and a domestic abuser, neither deed diminishes the intensity of the other. Or for the seminal fictional example, Davos' salvation of Storm's End did not negate his years of smuggling, nor did his years of smuggling negate his salvation of Storm's End.

Scow2
2013-10-14, 10:00 AM
Well... the problem with the Chicken Farmer analogy is that chickens aren't made by humans, at least not originally. They're on lease from a higher power.

Destroying something that makes you is nothing less than "Biting the Hand that feeds."

Cuckoolain's alter-ego is Skynet.

Omegonthesane
2013-10-14, 11:23 AM
Well... the problem with the Chicken Farmer analogy is that chickens aren't made by humans, at least not originally. They're on lease from a higher power.
What, evolutionary biology? :smalltongue: Religious arguments aside all important factors of the chickens are made by the humans even if they are not themselves literally conjured into existence.


Destroying something that makes you is nothing less than "Biting the Hand that feeds."

Cuckoolain's alter-ego is Skynet.
There's a Nine Inch Nails song I wanna link, about musings on the sense of biting the hand that feeds you to escape tyranny.

But, basically, the fact that you are biting the hand that feeds you merely makes it more likely that you are in the wrong; if the situation is stacked sufficiently, you can still be morally justified in doing it.

AuraTwilight
2013-10-14, 04:51 PM
The second farmer is not a farmer, and not using the chickens as they are meant.

Bull. He's a farmer, just not a chicken farmer. And no one decides what chickens are 'meant' for except the owner (if we must concede that living creatures are 'meant' for anything at all). Your entire argument just showed itself to be fallacious and self-supposing.

"The argument is right because X situation happens, and those who don't perpetuate X are doing it wrong."


Well... the problem with the Chicken Farmer analogy is that chickens aren't made by humans, at least not originally. They're on lease from a higher power.

Destroying something that makes you is nothing less than "Biting the Hand that feeds."

So, let's change the analogy abit. Dogs. Dogs are raised by humans the same as chickens for personal use, and some cultures even eat them, so the chicken thing still works on pretty much all levels.

The dog can sustain itself. It doesn't NEED a human handler, it's just a mutual ideal if done properly. But if the human is abusive, and the dog bites the human and escapes, it can reasonably live on its own without needing to crawl back to the human abuser.

The chicken analogy only works because you're already assuming that humans are helpless without the gods, which is demonstrably not true in the D&D Multiverse outside of Faerun, and is thus not an inarguable premise you can presuppose.

russdm
2013-10-14, 05:01 PM
The chicken analogy only works because you're already assuming that humans are helpless without the gods, which is demonstrably not true in the D&D Multiverse outside of Faerun, and is thus not an inarguable premise you can presuppose.

It has been demonstrated that humans/etc. are not helpless without the gods in Faerun either. Clerics can use divine magic to help those who may worship the same god. But there is no actual requirement to worship to have any kind of divine power. In Dragonlance, to use any kind of divine magic you need to worship or you end up a mystic usually, yet dragonlance doesn't have the Wall, and it really doesn't say what happens to mystics or others. That's a pretty big difference or something curious.

Also, because Faerun is supposedly connected to all other planes, you can come from Dark Sun or elsewhere you didn't worship a god or they didn't exist and survive in Faerun. Also, even more stupidly, the wall takes those souls and destroys them too. Its not taking just those who reject the gods completely but everyone that doesn't worship, that's the point from the quote mentioned.

@ Scow2: You are analogy fails because people can farmer in many different ways and can treat their animals however they choose. A farmer can neglect his chickens and still be a farmer. Another farmer can take really good of the chickens and still be a farmer. There is nothing that prevents this except one actually not farming at all and instead being a banker for their career job. So unless farmer 2 spends all his time in a bank, he is still considered a farmer. Claiming otherwise doesn't make your analogy true.

Alleran
2013-10-14, 06:27 PM
But there is no actual requirement to worship to have any kind of divine power.
You need a patron deity in FR's sphere if you are a cleric and want to get spells. It's not Eberron. Sometimes one of the deities already there will be willing to empower you temporarily, sometimes you're the vanguard for a new god seeking to make inroads into the sphere. Planescape talks/talked about it a bit with regard to clerics and spells and Powers.

Also, Krynn's good deities were among those who brought down the Cataclysm which Ruined Everything Forever for centuries. The reason they did it? The world had shifted too far towards good, so by laying waste to it, they freed the pendulum to swing back and forth freely again. And it was Paladine who personally came down and told the main characters so at the end of the Spring Dawning.

Scow2
2013-10-14, 06:32 PM
Also, Krynn's good deities were among those who brought down the Cataclysm which Ruined Everything Forever for centuries. The reason they did it? The world had shifted too far towards good, so by laying waste to it, they freed the pendulum to swing back and forth freely again. And it was Paladine who personally came down and told the main characters so at the end of the Spring Dawning.Well... Dragonlance is pretty infamous for not having the brightest take on the "Balance of Good and Evil". They tend to balance by having one be unattainable (Attempts for Good to triumph either give Evil tremendous openings to capitalize on, or requiring Good to drop and concede to Evil through ruthless and immoral action), and the other so horrific that everything is collectively trying to "NopeNopeNopeNopeNope" away from it.

hamishspence
2013-10-14, 06:35 PM
You need a patron deity in FR's sphere if you are a cleric and want to get spells. It's not Eberron.

I'm wondering how the Sertruous plotline (obyrith demon, taught mortals how to draw on divine power without patrons) in Elder Evils works in the Faerun version of the backstory.

I know at least one druid (in Champions of Ruin, a lich) believes he draws on "nature" rather than a deity, and has been teaching others to do so- though it is possible their patron is simply hiding his or her identity, and conning them into believing they're doing it all themselves.

123456789blaaa
2013-10-14, 07:16 PM
I'm wondering how the Sertruous plotline (obyrith demon, taught mortals how to draw on divine power without patrons) in Elder Evils works in the Faerun version of the backstory.

I know at least one druid (in Champions of Ruin, a lich) believes he draws on "nature" rather than a deity, and has been teaching others to do so- though it is possible their patron is simply hiding his or her identity, and conning them into believing they're doing it all themselves.

The section on adapting Sertrous the Faerun doesn't really mention the issue. I assume that they get their divine power from him when they worship ideals (and that he can grant it despite not being a god because he's an exception). There is another interesting thing in the section though:


<snip>
those who worship Sertrous and do not venerate the gods do not travel to the Fugue Plane when they die. Although technically these souls are counted among the False, they escape punishment in the City of Judgment and pass directly into Sertrous’s realm in the Abyss to await his return. Worshipers of Kelemvor who know of this hold a special hatred for the Vanguard as a result.
<snip>