Why standard adventurering is a net gain for Evil. (Pathfinder Campaign Setting)

[Naomi Li]

I present a claim that might seem ridiculous: that the heroes generally played provide a much bigger net gain to Evil than they do to Good.

I will freely admit that preventing an evil plot and saving the would-be-victims is a massive gain for Good and Neutral. This is very useful and heroic. However, if one examines what happens when lethal force is utilized against mortals things get much darker.

First of all, all creatures with an evil alignment that die (and don't have good standing with a non-Evil deity they worship) are sentenced to one of the lower planes. This immediately results in all of their Good traits and potential being utterly annihilated, recoverable only through resurrection. So, the amount of Good decreases on the mortal plane in question, even if Evil decreases there more.

Secondly, that Evil continues to exist and, in fact, is nurtured and increases in strength. Even if, on average, that Evil is then annihilated/tortured for all eternity/locked as an unevolving larvae, the ones that do become fiends are almost always vastly more powerful than the mortal soul that spawned them ever were. And, while this also makes them legitimate targets of Good outsiders, this isn't much help considering Good is losing horrendously and only slowing the loss by Evil being self-destructive in its infighting.

Thirdly, I would predict that the hatred spawned among all of those who loved those slaughtered by the adventurers pushes them towards Evil far more than those actions push others towards Neutral or Good. This is definitely the point I can support the least, but it seems rather likely.

In conclusion, if one really wants Good to regain ground and maybe even claim the advantage against Evil, souls must be prevented from becoming fiends. The options are A) Annihilating their souls (rather deep on the Evil side, I believe), B) imprisoning Evil aligned souls (either within their still living bodies, as undead, in soul-binding weapons/gems/whatever), or C) Redeeming them and changing their alignment to Neutral or Good.

[Jack_Simth]

The first and second also apply in the opposite manner to Good people that die (all their evil gets destroyed when they go to the upper planes, some souls get converted to Angels, et cetera). As long as the heroic acts draw more undecided people to Good than to Evil, this is a (long-term) net gain for good, as (almost) everyone dies eventually regardless.

The third: 'all those who loved those slaughtered' - what about those who love those who were saved by those same acts (or who were saved by those acts)? Remember, here, you're talking net gain/loss, so you're talking back and forth between the two sides (& neutral). In order for the possible spawned hatred in others to have an effect on the net, you also have to show that it overbalances any Good spawned in others as well ... and quite frankly, most of the villians (left unchecked) would likely be doing more damage in that regard anyway.

[Clistenes]

I present a claim that might seem ridiculous: that the heroes generally played provide a much bigger net gain to Evil than they do to Good.

I will freely admit that preventing an evil plot and saving the would-be-victims is a massive gain for Good and Neutral. This is very useful and heroic. However, if one examines what happens when lethal force is utilized against mortals things get much darker.

First of all, all creatures with an evil alignment that die (and don't have good standing with a non-Evil deity they worship) are sentenced to one of the lower planes. This immediately results in all of their Good traits and potential being utterly annihilated, recoverable only through resurrection. So, the amount of Good decreases on the mortal plane in question, even if Evil decreases there more.

Secondly, that Evil continues to exist and, in fact, is nurtured and increases in strength. Even if, on average, that Evil is then annihilated/tortured for all eternity/locked as an unevolving larvae, the ones that do become fiends are almost always vastly more powerful than the mortal soul that spawned them ever were. And, while this also makes them legitimate targets of Good outsiders, this isn't much help considering Good is losing horrendously and only slowing the loss by Evil being self-destructive in its infighting.

Thirdly, I would predict that the hatred spawned among all of those who loved those slaughtered by the adventurers pushes them towards Evil far more than those actions push others towards Neutral or Good. This is definitely the point I can support the least, but it seems rather likely.

In conclusion, if one really wants Good to regain ground and maybe even claim the advantage against Evil, souls must be prevented from becoming fiends. The options are A) Annihilating their souls (rather deep on the Evil side, I believe), B) imprisoning Evil aligned souls (either within their still living bodies, as undead, in soul-binding weapons/gems/whatever), or C) Redeeming them and changing their alignment to Neutral or Good.

Fiends are quite able to reproduce by themselves or to be spawned from the evil planes. Denying them evil souls would probably change the dominant species of fiends in each plane, but it wouldn't end demonkind.

If you are worried about those evil souls that you sent to the Lower Planes and ended becoming fiends, just travel to the Abyss, and slay a few demons to compensate.

Annihilating souls is VERY evil, as you have said yourself, and most evil souls are destroyed (usually devoured) anyway, so, why bother?.

Trapping souls is expensive. I requires very expensive gems or a magical metal called Thinaun; there aren't enough gems and Thinaun in the planet to trap all evil souls. And worse, if those are broken, the souls are released and all is for nothing.

Redeeming evil creatures is easier said than done. I guess that you could travel around with a Helm of Opposite Alignment and force all of them to become Good, but you would have to fight and restraint them one by one. And some people would consider a forced alignment change an Evil Act, even if it's towards Good.

And while the slaying of Evil creatures may push their loved ones towards Evil...what about the loved ones of the victims of said Evil creatures? The can be consumed by hatred and wrath too.

And last but not least: If Evil triumphs in a Prime Material World, they can impose their rules, and while they probably aren't interested in making everybody as evil as themselves, they would be interested in making people subvervient to them and to accept their depredations and abuses and rightful, fair and just, twisting the world's sense of morality and pushing the world away from Good.

[Naomi Li]

To be clear: I am fully supporting evil plots and saving everyone possible. This is excellent and massively useful. However, doing it nonlethally while still removing the capacity for the Evil aligned creatures to hurt others is a much bigger gain. Doesn't push others towards Evil to nearly the same extent, there's a chance they can be convinced to change alignment, and their actions while in prison (where they're well treated, so as not to counteract the first two goals) can help Good out significantly.

And I am not saying that doing this would somehow come even remotely close to stopping the creation of fiends; there are probably well over 10^18 souls entering the lower planes every single day. Any one mortal team, or even planet full of mortals, provides relatively limited effect on the scope of the overall war.

However, every little bit helps, and condemning hundreds, if not thousands, of goblinoids, kobolds, various bandits, etc during an adventuring career can provide a nice boon for the cause of Evil, on top of condemning them to exceedingly unpleasant fates.

Anyway, how much do adventurers tend to motivate people "up" on the alignment scale? The vast majority of the things I have read strongly indicate that it's rather rare, and that an alignment north of Neutral is generally rather undeserved.

As for "everyone dies regardless", there's actually the fairly easy and moderately inexpensive reincarnate trick to keep them around (and living) for a long period of time, time which gives more opportunity for them to shift alignment and to help the cause of Good. Yes, they're going to die eventually, and even their soul being obliterated is essentially guaranteed at some point, what happens along the way matters.

[Coidzor]

Either Pathfinder greatly ramped up the number of souls that go on to become outsiders or you're greatly inflating the number of souls that go on to become outsiders instead of simply merging with the plane. Also, it fails to take into account the role of patron deities, unless that has also been greatly changed, since generally patron deities absorb their worshipers or keep them around as petitioners in their divine realms, it's been a while since I looked into the PF version of things there, but it looked basically identical to 3.5's set up.

Further, by preventing Evil creatures from breeding by eliminating sexually immature creatures as well as breeding adults, one prevents them from creating more evil creatures who would then become evil souls/petitioners that would produce evil outsiders, whereas if they were left to die from old age/their societies, they would still be going to the lower planes, only in this case they'd have more evil progeny following them and making more baby evil creatures.

Sort of like that figure tossed around of how many offspring an unspayed female cat and her progeny can produce before you take into account attrition. If a kobold warren of 100 produces 50 new individuals a year and loses 30 to accidents, old age, conflict with other creatures, etc. and they're a 50-50 split between LN and LE, then destroying that warren effectively prevents 30 new fiends every year from forming that otherwise would form at the cost of making 50 fiends and 50 non-fiend outsiders now, meaning that in 2 years you're ahead of where the multiverse would be otherwise.

Indeed, under this sort of view, butchering goblins and kobolds and the like, weak, high reproductive-rate creatures with strongly evil cultures and/or natures is of more good than killing off creatures such as drow or aboleth, which are individually capable of more harm to the world around them, due to the lower rate of birth for the latter types, or even creatures such as manticores which don't have societies and don't have many progeny. Or even other general villains unless their schemes involve turning populations and population centers towards evil or a similar genocide of good-and-neutral creatures.


First of all, all creatures with an evil alignment that die (and don't have good standing with a non-Evil deity they worship) are sentenced to one of the lower planes. This immediately results in all of their Good traits and potential being utterly annihilated, recoverable only through resurrection. So, the amount of Good decreases on the mortal plane in question, even if Evil decreases there more.

If they had an evil alignment then they are evil. They may have had the potential to become good, but that is not the same as the amount of good decreasing when they die.


Secondly, that Evil continues to exist and, in fact, is nurtured and increases in strength. Even if, on average, that Evil is then annihilated/tortured for all eternity/locked as an unevolving larvae, the ones that do become fiends are almost always vastly more powerful than the mortal soul that spawned them ever were. And, while this also makes them legitimate targets of Good outsiders, this isn't much help considering Good is losing horrendously and only slowing the loss by Evil being self-destructive in its infighting.

I'd have to doublecheck how PF altered the Blood War to be clear on what's the case here.


Thirdly, I would predict that the hatred spawned among all of those who loved those slaughtered by the adventurers pushes them towards Evil far more than those actions push others towards Neutral or Good. This is definitely the point I can support the least, but it seems rather likely.

That's why when you do a job, you don't leave it half done.


In conclusion, if one really wants Good to regain ground and maybe even claim the advantage against Evil, souls must be prevented from becoming fiends. The options are A) Annihilating their souls (rather deep on the Evil side, I believe), B) imprisoning Evil aligned souls (either within their still living bodies, as undead, in soul-binding weapons/gems/whatever), or C) Redeeming them and changing their alignment to Neutral or Good.

Certainly redemption is preferable when it can be applied, I don't believe there's the same suite of tools in PF to forcibly alter evil creatures into being good creatures though, unless one wanted to just spam helms of opposite alignment.

[Feint's End]

I strongely disagree for one simple reason. "Good" has often a stronger reason to conquer and defeat "Evil" than the other way around leading to something quite interesting ... more "Evil" leaders and adventurers die than good ones.

Why? Simply because an evil person doesn't care for the needs of others and only for his own improvement. Why should an evil adventurer even if oh so powerful put any effort into going and defeating the great good wizard of sweets and sugar land? Exactly. .. there is no good reason (he might want an artifact from him but he won't do it to kill the person and spread evil).
On the other hand good adventurers and organizations tend to focus on actively going after evil casters, thiefs, BBEG etc etc. Why? Because they have a reason.

That's also the reason why you will always find more organizations and groups (not only in the D&D btw) dedicated to spreading love, piece and bringing down the responsible "bad" guys than organizations which actively spread cancer, steal sweets just because or do things just because they want to make the world a worse place (those ppl exist but just a marginal small amount of "Evil" ppl in D&D fall under this category)

In other words. Most evil ppl don't have anything to get from being all avatarish and walking around the land bringing destruction and bad behaviour to anyone because they are often just selffocused. Oh and also ... evil organizations tend to weaken themselfes way more than good ones.
Good ppl on the other hand have very good reasons to go out and actively spread Light, Harmony and Goodness.
Neutral ppl on the other hand will support causes that help them and don't cause to much commotion so in general they will always support "Good" when it comes to worldshattering war or the paladins of light who want everyone to live in peace versus the dark necromancers of the Shadow Forest.

The whole point of this is? Good will probably always be stronger than Evil in a large scale. I know a lot of ppl have a very pesimistic view there but I'm just talking about the average D&D world mind!

[Clistenes]

To be clear: I am fully supporting evil plots and saving everyone possible. This is excellent and massively useful. However, doing it nonlethally while still removing the capacity for the Evil aligned creatures to hurt others is a much bigger gain. Doesn't push others towards Evil to nearly the same extent, there's a chance they can be convinced to change alignment, and their actions while in prison (where they're well treated, so as not to counteract the first two goals) can help Good out significantly.

And I am not saying that doing this would somehow come even remotely close to stopping the creation of fiends; there are probably well over 10^18 souls entering the lower planes every single day. Any one mortal team, or even planet full of mortals, provides relatively limited effect on the scope of the overall war.

However, every little bit helps, and condemning hundreds, if not thousands, of goblinoids, kobolds, various bandits, etc during an adventuring career can provide a nice boon for the cause of Evil, on top of condemning them to exceedingly unpleasant fates.

Anyway, how much do adventurers tend to motivate people "up" on the alignment scale? The vast majority of the things I have read strongly indicate that it's rather rare, and that an alignment north of Neutral is generally rather undeserved.

As for "everyone dies regardless", there's actually the fairly easy and moderately inexpensive reincarnate trick to keep them around (and living) for a long period of time, time which gives more opportunity for them to shift alignment and to help the cause of Good. Yes, they're going to die eventually, and even their soul being obliterated is essentially guaranteed at some point, what happens along the way matters.

That's all fine if you are playing a God, Demigod or similar creature, and are so powerful that you can protect the innocent and restrain and redeem the evil ones without killing anybody, but if you are roleplaying a 4th level fighter who is trying to protect a village from an horde of cannibalistic gnolls, how do you do it without resorting to violence?

You can try to redeem some evil individuals but the world of D&D, as is portrayed in sourcebooks, doesn't make easy to apply that behaviour to collectives: The world is usually a primitive, medieval-like one, without a strong centralized government or a fair or at leas efficient justice system, there are dozens or hundred of humanoid and non-humanoid species that don't regard each other as "people" and often eat each other, there are evil religions that teach people that doing horrible things is OK, and reward them for being evil, and there are fiends who try to corrupt people all the time.

If you go visit those gnolls I mentioned earlier and try to preach Good and find a diplomatic solution, you probably will get eaten. The best you can hope is that you will scare them enough that they will run and you won't have to kill ALL of them.

I'm all for redemption, but very often it isn't viable even in our modern world, where civilized countries spend billions trying to form responsible, law abiding sensitive citizens, where there are a quite efficient police, judicial system and prisions, where prision is focused on redemtion rather than punishment...if we don't manage to stop crime and make everybody be nice to each other, how could a medieval warrior with a chunk of iron hope to do it?

[Spore]

This is why an good party destroys VARIOUS plots of evil masterminds in their career. The counter isn't 1 on 1 here. That's the only solution to balance out the cosmology of roleplaying. Or you could just use some kind of cleansing rebirth cycle resetting alignments as they die.

[shadow_archmagi]

Thirdly, I would predict that the hatred spawned among all of those who loved those slaughtered by the adventurers pushes them towards Evil far more than those actions push others towards Neutral or Good. This is definitely the point I can support the least, but it seems rather likely.

Seems unlikely to me. If they're Evil, that makes them awful people, and therefore much less likely to be beloved members of a community.

Meanwhile, tales of heroism very often inspire heroism.

[Naomi Li]

My numbers for the souls comes from an estimate of the number of deaths per planet, the number of inhabited planets per galaxy, and the number of galaxies. The numbers could easily be off by several orders of magnitude in either direction, but no matter what the numbers are staggering. (Also, just about every single deity exists on one of the outer planes, and every mortal that dies with an intact soul ends up becoming a petitioner)

I'm not saying that there are 10^18 new fiends every day. Just that whatever proportion of them transform into fiends are from that pool. (And it is highly likely that there are far more evil aligned souls, given that the more prolific breeders also tend to have evil alignments)

And sure, genociding every evil species could theoretically work... if it wasn't essentially impossible to accomplish, going to free up more space for other evil aligned creatures to move into that have even more reason to hate and fear "good" aligned ones, and almost certainly backfire horribly in every single way. A much better option? Shatter their culture with relatively minimal force and encourage them to live peacefully. If you REALLY have to, take a page from a certain Eberron camp and slaughter all of the adults and raise the prolific children in a manner that will produce far more good aligned creatures than evil aligned ones.

Also, the "if you have an alignment, you are a personification of that alignment" is absolutely absurd. Essentially no mortal is even remotely capable of becoming pure good, evil, chaotic, or lawful. Their alignment might be firmly in one area, but they still have traits of the opposing alignments. Every good mortal has some degree of evil, all evil some measure of good, etc. And when they die those opposing traits are destroyed.

As for the "Blood War", it doesn't exist. The fiends still fight amongst each other, but a great deal of their energy is focused on (succesfully) destroying planets, invading the Celestial planes, corrupting mortals, etc. There are at least three separate Abyssal footholds on Golarion right now, as well as a very notable bastion of Hell. Holding the line and losing is about the best that the mortals (and those aligned against the fiends) have going for them.

Why in the world would you think I meant forcible redemption? Beyond being absolutely reprehensible and would rightly turn huge numbers against you, it is impractical to the extreme from an economics standpoint. Given sufficient time and a proper environment I think most people WOULD choose neutral or good, for the simple reason that evil is unfulfilling, self-destructive, and all around stupid way to go. (Many would absolutely refuse, of course, but even then a case could be made that keeping them alive for as long as possible is beneficial to your cause)

Feint, you're think of neutral there, not evil. Evil is about fulfilling one's own desires, yes, and many of them are fairly non-destructive about it, but having an evil nature does mean that those desires come about at the expense of others. Thus, they tend to be rather dangerous to those around them, if often in fairly petty ways that can be recovered with little effort. (Though, yes, card-carrying villainy is obviously generally absurd and most of them aren't in it for the cause of Evil)

And "evil hurts itself" is certainly true... which is the only reason the exceedingly outnumbered celestials haven't already lost. It doesn't help that far fewer good aligned petitioners spawn celestials than evil aligned petitioners spawn fiends. (Especially demons. The number of demons that can be spawned from even a single petitioner is disturbingly large)


And yes, adventurers can't do it on their own. They're more powerful than average, but at least until very high levels even a small town has vastly greater power than they do. And I never said "without resorting to violence". Given how durable creatures are in this universe, nonlethal combat is actually relatively easy given proper equipment. As for "who can help"? Followers of Shelyn, some followers of Sarenrae, and some other good-aligned individuals. Neutral and even evil aligned ones might be useful if the society is structured well.

As for the effectiveness in the modern world... I would point out that the conditions of prisons, how criminals are treated (before, during, and after their stays) and any efforts to make them law abiding citizens are heavily sabotaged before those who actually desire it are allowed to try. I wouldn't hold "how things are done" up very highly as an effective way of doing anything even remotely good.


Being evil doesn't mean people don't still care about them. Even evil has loved ones, remember? Evil lives right alongside good and neutral in every single city, often being relatively productive and non-destructive citizens. This is true among the "non-civilized" races as well, unless you actually accept the blatant speceism of many of the writers.

[Demonic_Spoon]

To be clear: I am fully supporting evil plots and saving everyone possible. This is excellent and massively useful.

Best typo.

But yes, resetting traps of Imprisonment and Sanctify the Wicked. Captured Evil people can choose between the two.

[Jade_Tarem]

There's a quantity vs. quality issue going on here. A single damned soul can produce "hundreds"... of the weakest demon types, many of which can be beat up by low level fighters and barbarians. Meanwhile, the weakest Angel is a 12th level cleric with amazing special abilities. The highest level Angel is an epic creature, challengeable only by Balor... which requires many souls "of the foulest nature" to create.

Good may be outnumbered by a considerable margin, but outgunned is much more shaky claim. A Solar can basically hose infinity low and mid-level demons, which are most of what gets spawned by the souls dispatched by roving adventuring parties. High level evil outsiders are approximately as as rare as high level good outsiders. The blood war makes up the difference.

Edit: Nor are good outsiders all that rare. They have entire celestial cities lit by lantern archons. That's right - they have so many lantern archons that they're being used as a public utilities service (and surprise defense grid). This is not the choice of a cosmic faction on the ropes.

[Naomi Li]

Note: Pathfinder Campaign Setting, no Blood War.

Evidence that Good is losing: Evil has eradicated all life on several planets and maintain open links between their lower plane and said planets. Golarion (one of the most epicly important planets, ever, due to it housing Rovagug) has at least four Evil footholds that Good is losing against (Cheliax, Tanglebriar, Worldwound, and that one link to Tia Xia), despite dragons, humans, halflings, and probably many outsiders trying to help. Every single crusade Heaven has launched into one of the lower plains has failed miserably. There are open links between the lower plains and the upper plains that are entirely on the defensive for the celestials, instead of being able to close the links or make offensive use of them.

Yes, the celestials have large standing armies. This is evidence that they're at least halfway sane, not that they're not losing. Fighting the war defensively is the only way they stand the slightest chance, and it is the standing armies that they can mobilize to the threats that allows them to hang on. They're still losing ground far faster than they can gain it. I don't mean that they're going to all die within the next fifty million years: merely that, at the rate things are going, they're going to be in even worse shape as time goes on.

Sanctify the wicked is a 3.5 spell that could not be directly ported over to Pathfinder. Also, it is an exceptionally immoral spell to use on somebody, along with impractically expensive. I would much prefer other forms of imprisonment where they have as much freedom as is possible without presenting a notable threat to anybody else and for them to be encouraged towards neutrality and good.


Quantity has a quality all of its own, and you don't send your weakest forces against their strongest except as a delaying tactic. They're used against things like silvanshee agathions, mortals without appropriate magical equipment, and as cannon fodder. The more powerful defenders will probably split up in an effort to protect everyone or just as a natural consequence of chaotic combat. The more powerful fiends are then free to move in and slaughter the separated bastions of resistance.

[Demonic_Spoon]

Also, [Sanctify the wicked] is an exceptionally immoral spell to use on somebody, along with impractically expensive.

But it's a [Good] spell! :smallwink::smalltongue:

Technically you could use one 10kgp diamond as the focus for all sanctify the wicked castings, so not that expensive. Just make sure no one smashes it.


Evidence that Good is losing: Evil has eradicated all life on several planets and maintain open links between their lower plane and said planets. Golarion (one of the most epicly important planets, ever, due to it housing Rovagug) has at least four Evil footholds that Good is losing against (Cheliax, Tanglebriar, Worldwound, and that one link to Tia Xia), despite dragons, humans, halflings, and probably many outsiders trying to help. Every single crusade Heaven has launched into one of the lower plains has failed miserably. There are open links between the lower plains and the upper plains that are entirely on the defensive for the celestials, instead of being able to close the links or make offensive use of them.

Yes, the celestials have large standing armies. This is evidence that they're at least halfway sane, not that they're not losing. Fighting the war defensively is the only way they stand the slightest chance, and it is the standing armies that they can mobilize to the threats that allows them to hang on. They're still losing ground far faster than they can gain it. I don't mean that they're going to all die within the next fifty million years: merely that, at the rate things are going, they're going to be in even worse shape as time goes on.

Sounds like they need portalcrasher or something to give them some breathing room. Heck, forbiddances and whatnot to get those damn evil outsiders of mah lawn. Holy Waterguns maybe? Holy water works against evil outsiders right?

[Naomi Li]

Yes, sanctify the wicked is a good spell. I think almost everyone has noted that there is a fairly substantial disconnect between alignment and morality. For example: One can succesfully argue, alignment wise, that it is perfectly acceptable to genocide a species and condemn every single one of them to eternal torture. Despite this, most people would probably agree that that is horrendously immoral given that they are self-aware and posses free will, especially when there are multitudes of better options available.

Yes, some method of shattering a bridge between planes would be VERY useful. There's an entire group of inevitables dedicated to this task, but they are either exceedingly overworked, their methods take an exceptionally long time, or they're dying before they can finish. I don't think Pathfinder has a spell for casually closing a planar bridge.

Also... those bridges tend to be on the large side. Actually covering one with forbiddance spells is... impractical at best.

And yes, if you could mass produce huge quantities of holy water it could be used as a notable weapon against outsiders. However, every pint? of holy water produced through traditional methods requires 5 lbs of silver (25 gp worth). If you used staves of bless water to produce holy water every single day you could probably catapult barrels of holy water into enemy outsider formations.

[Demonic_Spoon]

And yes, if you could mass produce huge quantities of holy water it could be used as a notable weapon against outsiders. However, every pint? of holy water produced through traditional methods requires 5 lbs of silver (25 gp worth). If you used staves of bless water to produce holy water every single day you could probably catapult barrels of holy water into enemy outsider formations.

Once again 3.5, because I simply don't have much pf knowledge, but just take a Sacred Vessel relic(BoED, 2000 gp), and hook it up to a Decanter of Endless Water(SRD, 9000gp). The Sacred Vessel turns any water in it to holy water. Enjoy your infinite free holy water.

Heck, you don't even need the decanter, just use a river or something. The decanter is just for convenience's sake.

[Clistenes]

Yes, sanctify the wicked is a good spell. I think almost everyone has noted that there is a fairly substantial disconnect between alignment and morality. For example: One can succesfully argue, alignment wise, that it is perfectly acceptable to genocide a species and condemn every single one of them to eternal torture. Despite this, most people would probably agree that that is horrendously immoral given that they are self-aware and posses free will, especially when there are multitudes of better options available.

Assuming that Good people were able to try a genocide against Evil and be able to remain Good while at it (which I doubt), that would be possible only if Good were stronger than Evil. And you have said that Good is weaker.

If a tribe of gnolls or an army or orcs or a flight of dragons attack a village, town or kingdom, and you drive them away, you aren't committing genocide, you are defending your own and avoiding a genocide.

If Good were triumphant, and evil creatures were cornered, yes, attacking and killing them would be considered a genocide, but in almost every campaign and module the heroes are called to stop the plot of a fiend or evil mage, or to stop an invading army or a dragon, that is, they defending, not exterminating...I have never read any module about hunting orcs and taking their children to death camps.

[Equinox]

First of all, all creatures with an evil alignment that die (and don't have good standing with a non-Evil deity they worship) are sentenced to one of the lower planes. This immediately results in all of their Good traits and potential being utterly annihilated, recoverable only through resurrection. So, the amount of Good decreases on the mortal plane in question, even if Evil decreases there more. There's a logical fallacy here. On one hand, you're saying "destroying an Evil creature makes the amount of Good on the mortal plain decrease", on the other hand, you're not considering the result of not destroying said Evil creature. It is reasonable to assume that by allowing it to live and thrive, the Evil creature will destroy Good creatures, thus reducing the amount of Good on the mortal plain even more.



Secondly, that Evil continues to exist and, in fact, is nurtured and increases in strength. Even if, on average, that Evil is then annihilated/tortured for all eternity/locked as an unevolving larvae, the ones that do become fiends are almost always vastly more powerful than the mortal soul that spawned them ever were. And, while this also makes them legitimate targets of Good outsiders, this isn't much help considering Good is losing horrendously and only slowing the loss by Evil being self-destructive in its infighting.Again, same logical fallacy. You're saying "the adventurers slay some Evil creatures, but they become stronger on the outer plains". And again, you're not considering the consequences of not slaying those Evil creatures. It is possible and reasonable to assume that by not slaying any Evil creature at all, the surviving Evil creatures (= all Evil creatures) will become even stronger, and later evolve into even more powerful Outsiders.


Thirdly, I would predict that the hatred spawned among all of those who loved those slaughtered by the adventurers pushes them towards Evil far more than those actions push others towards Neutral or Good. This is definitely the point I can support the least, but it seems rather likely.Wow. The point you support the least is the only one that actually has some validity. Smooth.

[AgentofHellfire]

I would say that whether it's a net gain for evil or good would actually depend on the nature of the action and the quest--although you may yet be granting the fiends a modicum of power (and, more importantly, inspiring retaliation against you), you may also be preventing whatever evil the group is doing, which may be worse than what's to come with them--especially if they're looking for or in the process of activating some evil artifact.

Moreover, killing some of them doesn't preclude helping others of them--you can negotiate to kill the hardliners, for example.

[Naomi Li]

Demonic Spoon, highly dependant upon DM permission given that I have seen no evidence that "relics" even exist in Pathfinder.

Clistenes, the book "Champions of Purity" argued that slaughtering every single goblin in the area, including children and other noncombatants, could be considered a "good" action with the reasoning that "they're evil, nothing is going to change it, best get it over with". The fact that these arguments aren't immediately laughed down says to me that one can remain a paragon of Good while being a horrible person.

Many deities with a good alignment disagree significantly on how moral certain things are, and many of said deities have distressing beliefs. Torag, for example, believes that mercy and forgiveness are foolish and that JUSTICE must prevail every time.

... Equinox, if you're being serious your logic relies on false dichotomies. There's a HUGE number of options between "kill the evil creatures" and "let them run free with no effort done to stop their actions". It is these non-lethal but effective counters to evil actions that I advocate, not suicidal pacifism.

[Equinox]

... Equinox, if you're being serious your logic relies on false dichotomies. There's a HUGE number of options between "kill the evil creatures" and "let them run free with no effort done to stop their actions". It is these non-lethal but effective counters to evil actions that I advocate, not suicidal pacifism.You may want to read your own post there, bub. You presented "killing evil creatures" as a negative option, proving it has negative consequences. You never posited a different option. Since YOU never posed an alternative to "killing evil creatures", that was left as an exercise to the reader. Since I have proven that "killing evil creatures" is in fact better than "leaving evil creatures unmolested", you are now basically shifting the goalposts, while being snarky at the same time. Fine. I can do snark too.

[Clistenes]

Clistenes, the book "Champions of Purity" argued that slaughtering every single goblin in the area, including children and other noncombatants, could be considered a "good" action with the reasoning that "they're evil, nothing is going to change it, best get it over with". The fact that these arguments aren't immediately laughed down says to me that one can remain a paragon of Good while being a horrible person.

That's one book. Anybody can write a book about D&D. Any crazy psycho can write a book about D&D. So it stands to logic that some of them will say crazy things. Most other books don't support the genocide of children as something good.

Of the adventures that I have played, none supports genocide of evil races. They were about stopping and drive away an army from ravaging a kingdom, stopping an interdimensional invasion, stopping a demon lord from entering the Prime Material Plane, rescuing people captured by evil creatures, stopping an evil priest from stealing the souls of every person who died in a country, destroying an evil artifact...etc. It was never about committing genocide.

Could you please tell me about a single adventure that is about good adventurers committing genocide against an evil race?

[Jade_Tarem]

Note: Pathfinder Campaign Setting, no Blood War.

Evidence that Good is losing: Evil has eradicated all life on several planets and maintain open links between their lower plane and said planets. Golarion (one of the most epicly important planets, ever, due to it housing Rovagug) has at least four Evil footholds that Good is losing against (Cheliax, Tanglebriar, Worldwound, and that one link to Tia Xia), despite dragons, humans, halflings, and probably many outsiders trying to help. Every single crusade Heaven has launched into one of the lower plains has failed miserably. There are open links between the lower plains and the upper plains that are entirely on the defensive for the celestials, instead of being able to close the links or make offensive use of them.

Yes, the celestials have large standing armies. This is evidence that they're at least halfway sane, not that they're not losing. Fighting the war defensively is the only way they stand the slightest chance, and it is the standing armies that they can mobilize to the threats that allows them to hang on. They're still losing ground far faster than they can gain it. I don't mean that they're going to all die within the next fifty million years: merely that, at the rate things are going, they're going to be in even worse shape as time goes on.

Quantity has a quality all of its own, and you don't send your weakest forces against their strongest except as a delaying tactic. They're used against things like silvanshee agathions, mortals without appropriate magical equipment, and as cannon fodder. The more powerful defenders will probably split up in an effort to protect everyone or just as a natural consequence of chaotic combat. The more powerful fiends are then free to move in and slaughter the separated bastions of resistance.

"Evil is currently winning" - or at least "bigger" - is a staple of pretty much everything forever. Most adventuring groups are comprised of heroes (good/neutral alignment), unless this is PFS, in which case you replace "most" with "all." If everything is going great without you, there's no point to you being here. If Team Evil never accomplished anything (the destruction of worlds, etc.) then they can't be taken seriously. The good guys being the underdog is nothing new. I was just pointing out that even if the rate of good outsider generation is lower, the gulf in power isn't as great as you're making it out to be, especially as it relates to the creation of fiends.

Also, I sincerely doubt that the forces of Team Good are going to split up just because Team Evil wants them too. Team Good is quite familiar with "divide and conquer," thank you very much, and also understands the purpose of cat's paws, pawns, and mortal alliances.

Also, Golarion is a world where crazy, game-changing stuff happens aaallll the time, at least by cosmic standards. At least three mortals have ascended to godhood since Earthfall, and two of them were good aligned. What's to stop a mortal master plan from making more good gods and unbalancing the pantheon? Or restoring the rule of something like King Xin, but with Virtue Magic back in action instead of the Sin Magic that the Runelords turned it into?

There are lots of ways that standard adventuring can thwomp evil, is what I'm saying.

Edit: the lack of an 'official' blood war I'll give you, but Evil isn't much more cooperative than when it was in full swing. I mean, Asmodeus himself helped imprison Rovagug. It's not like Evil suddenly became one big monolithic thing that devotes all of its energy to gobbling up good guys.

[Naomi Li]

Equinox, last paragraph of the first post gives a brief overview of the options available. Want the ones I prefer to be elaborated upon?

Attackers are defeated nonlethally (spells to disable, or just beaten unconscious with nonlethal damage) and those that are accidentally killed attempted to be raised from the dead (probably with a reincarnate spell, given that it is the cheapest, though raise dead and resurrection are certainly options). As enemy combatants, they're prisoners and untrustworthy. As such, not allowed to carry weapons, possibly confined away from other people (unless they come to visit), and possibly cursed with marks of justice or whatever to prevent them from harming anyone. They're encouraged to be productive citizens (if they're not, they're still treated pleasantly but given very low cost things, like foods created with create food and water and flavoured with prestidigitation) and interact with volunteers/workers who encourage them towards Good (or possibly worship of a good/neutral deity that will accept them while they retain their evil alignments).

For non-combatants, if they're threats to others (eating their children or otherwise mistreating them, for example) imprison them like the combatants were. If they're not threats, give them assitance in living peacefully and with a higher standard of living and establish positive relations with them if possible. Let them become citizens if they desire it.



Jade Tarem, I suppose I explained myself poorly. What I meant was this: Despite Evil fighting amongst themselves to a MUCH greater extent than Good and Neutral do, they're still winning in essentially every arena.

And by "split up" I meant "move physically apart to protect what the fiends are attacking". If they stay extremely tightly together it increases the odds of them surviving the battle by a large amount, but it also dramatically decreases the life expectancy of those they're trying to protect. Not only that, but battles are inherently chaotic. People getting separated happens unless everyone has exceptionally good discipline and observation of the overall battle.

I didn't mean that the war was hopeless, either. It's simply not going well, as is standard.

[Jade_Tarem]

Equinox, last paragraph of the first post gives a brief overview of the options available. Want the ones I prefer to be elaborated upon?

Attackers are defeated nonlethally (spells to disable, or just beaten unconscious with nonlethal damage) and those that are accidentally killed attempted to be raised from the dead (probably with a reincarnate spell, given that it is the cheapest, though raise dead and resurrection are certainly options). As enemy combatants, they're prisoners and untrustworthy. As such, not allowed to carry weapons, possibly confined away from other people (unless they come to visit), and possibly cursed with marks of justice or whatever to prevent them from harming anyone. They're encouraged to be productive citizens (if they're not, they're still treated pleasantly but given very low cost things, like foods created with create food and water and flavoured with prestidigitation) and interact with volunteers/workers who encourage them towards Good (or possibly worship of a good/neutral deity that will accept them while they retain their evil alignments).

For non-combatants, if they're threats to others (eating their children or otherwise mistreating them, for example) imprison them like the combatants were. If they're not threats, give them assitance in living peacefully and with a higher standard of living and establish positive relations with them if possible. Let them become citizens if they desire it.

Not every evil being can be contained nonlethally forever. I'd prefer a slight imbalance in the cosmos to a Gotham situation where I have to keep recapturing the same bad guys over and over again.

[Naomi Li]

If they cannot be contained living, then bound in a gem for as long as possible is an option. (And, depending on the method, might give the opportunity to continue trying to convert them)

Or you could skip to "destroy their soul", either before or after Pharasma's judgement is rendered. (There's probably some spell that can track down a petitioner using the knowledge of who they were while mortal)

[Keneth]

I, for one, do not care which side ends up in the lead. Seeing as Asmodeus (and his brother) created this silly existence, and it falls on him to recreate it as he pleases once it has run its course (his brother being dead), it's not like there's any chance that "good" will somehow "win". In the absence of evil, good becomes meaningless anyway. :smalltongue:

[Naomi Li]

I think the only actual endgame that is possible is "Rovagug gets loose again, kills everyone, and destroys everything, including itself", unless somebody manages to come up with a method of actually killing/depowering the god-slaying abomination.

Also, good has PLENTY of purpose without evil. It can live happily helping people and generally enjoy life. (Granted, there's very little, if any, point in playing Dungeons and Dragons without evil, but that's an out-of-universe consideration only)

[Jade_Tarem]

Jade Tarem, I suppose I explained myself poorly. What I meant was this: Despite Evil fighting amongst themselves to a MUCH greater extent than Good and Neutral do, they're still winning in essentially every arena.

And by "split up" I meant "move physically apart to protect what the fiends are attacking". If they stay extremely tightly together it increases the odds of them surviving the battle by a large amount, but it also dramatically decreases the life expectancy of those they're trying to protect. Not only that, but battles are inherently chaotic. People getting separated happens unless everyone has exceptionally good discipline and observation of the overall battle.

I didn't mean that the war was hopeless, either. It's simply not going well, as is standard.

Certainly, but I don't see how that relates to your point that standard adventuring is evil.

Look at it this way - I can name three Runelords that get nixed in the course of PFS adventure paths: Krune, Karzoug, and Sorsha (there might be more). Three is about the smallest number that can comprise the term "several." Together, their souls can equal one Balor.

But! The three of them together were absolutely more powerful than one Balor in life (all of them being casters with access to 9th level spell slots and artifacts). They might have even been greater than 1:1 in terms of how much of a force of Evil they were. And I guarantee that none of them had what you would consider "loved ones," or could be contained in any real fashion by the groups that took them down. How does destroying them in the course of standard adventuring increase the net Evil in the universe? Especially when you consider that their goods fell into the hands of good and neutral aligned characters?

That's sort of the point. Perhaps icing one goblin makes a tiny +Evil in the grand scheme of things, but by the time a good aligned adventuring group is really rocking out, they're seriously short-selling the lower planes with every Big Bad guy they take down, and making Team Good stronger in the process.

[Naomi Li]

I wouldn't really call level 12+ adventuring "standard". And yes, at that scale if you focus all of your lethal firepower on non-good outsiders and high-power mortal evils the raw power of evil could quite easily decrease. Most adventurers, though, live and die entirely below 10th level, I believe, where the scale is significantly lower in scope. (And yes, I am including NPC adventurers here)

And even for the ones making a net-dent in evil through their personal actions, will they do so long enough to make up for the evil-creation-debt they accumulated in their earlier adventures? And will they refrain from slaughtering any hordes of weak evils, like kobold mining camps? Finally, will the people they inspire to do the same kind of adventuring that they did cause a net gain or a net loss in evil?

Being a murderhobo can result in Good gaining relative ground. However, it isn't particularly efficient, and there are almost certainly many better methods available.

[Clistenes]

Equinox, last paragraph of the first post gives a brief overview of the options available. Want the ones I prefer to be elaborated upon?

Attackers are defeated nonlethally (spells to disable, or just beaten unconscious with nonlethal damage) and those that are accidentally killed attempted to be raised from the dead (probably with a reincarnate spell, given that it is the cheapest, though raise dead and resurrection are certainly options). As enemy combatants, they're prisoners and untrustworthy. As such, not allowed to carry weapons, possibly confined away from other people (unless they come to visit), and possibly cursed with marks of justice or whatever to prevent them from harming anyone. They're encouraged to be productive citizens (if they're not, they're still treated pleasantly but given very low cost things, like foods created with create food and water and flavoured with prestidigitation) and interact with volunteers/workers who encourage them towards Good (or possibly worship of a good/neutral deity that will accept them while they retain their evil alignments).

For non-combatants, if they're threats to others (eating their children or otherwise mistreating them, for example) imprison them like the combatants were. If they're not threats, give them assitance in living peacefully and with a higher standard of living and establish positive relations with them if possible. Let them become citizens if they desire it.

Again, you are assuming that the "good side" in general and the adventurers in particular are overwhelmingly more powerful and rich than the "evil side". You are assuming that the "good side" is like USA and the "evil side" is, I dunno, like San Marino or Sierra Leone or some other small and/or poor country...

What if the "bad side" is Hitler's Germany and the "good side" is Czechoslovakia? Could the small army of Czechoslovakia have defeated Hitler's army using only their fists? Could Czechoslovakia have conquered Germany and educated the nazis with love?

You are assuming that the adventurers are very powerful and can slap around the "bad side" as if they were bad little children, and can lock them away and keep them under control. You are assuming that the "good side" is a powerful, wealthy empire who can catch the "evil" creatures with nets and lassos, as if they were fluffy rabbits, and send them all to school.

And that contradicts what you say about Good being weaker that Evil.

You are saying "Good is a lot weaker than evil, so good people should use only non-lethal weapons and spells against those much powerful, numerous and menacing evil creatures, and once they have subdued those creatures, take them prisioners (despite being much more numerous an powerful) and take care of and educate them to be good".

Your idea about what Good should do only could work in a setting in which Good is inmensely powerful and Evil is very weak.

[Keneth]

I think the only actual endgame that is possible is "Rovagug gets loose again, kills everyone, and destroys everything, including itself", unless somebody manages to come up with a method of actually killing/depowering the god-slaying abomination.

Arguably, both Asmodeus and Sarenrae are capable of destroying Rovagug, but Sarenrae is unwilling, and Asmodeus doesn't really care.


Also, good has PLENTY of purpose without evil. It can live happily helping people and generally enjoy life.

Purpose, maybe, but not meaning. Without anything to contrast the concept, it bears no meaning.

[Naomi Li]

Ah. Thing is, you can easily make the argument that nonlethal tactics can dramatically increase the power of the ones doing it, more than enough that the moderate increase in danger from nonlethal combat can be completely overcome and surprassed. This is because live prisoners are useful, even if they never do change alignments, and there is far less chance of sparking a cycle of revenge. Using nonlethal tactics is also likely to result in more people being willing to fight and them being willing to stick around longer, as it's notably less traumatic/soul damaging.

Anyway, against mortal threats, Good typically DOES have a fair advantage. When outsiders are involved, though, it is significantly less forgiving. Belkzen is probably one of the trickier mortal forces to defeat, as orc psychology is hard to live alongside (but hardly impossible), they're militarily powerful, and their culture is aggressive. (Though not nearly so much when they don't have food/water shortages)


I don't know of any lore that says that either Sarenrae or Asmodeus are capable of killing Rovagug. Or that Sarenrae is unwilling to kill it, given how much she hates it. Rovagug killed a LOT of deities before they finally imprisoned it, and at least some lore suggests that Rovagug cannot die until everything else in the universe is dead.

[AMFV]

Ah. Thing is, you can easily make the argument that nonlethal tactics can dramatically increase the power of the ones doing it, more than enough that the moderate increase in danger from nonlethal combat can be completely overcome and surprassed. This is because live prisoners are useful, even if they never do change alignments, and there is far less chance of sparking a cycle of revenge. Using nonlethal tactics is also likely to result in more people being willing to fight and them being willing to stick around longer, as it's notably less traumatic/soul damaging.

Firstly, I can't make that argument. I've been to war in real life and I can tell you that if I was told I could not use lethal force to defend myself I would probably have deserted. Sometimes lethal force is the only way to defend yourself.

Secondly, how on earth would that increase the power of those participating? Nonlethal tactics even in D&D (Pathfinder as well) as significantly higher risk. The least risk tactics are the whole scry and fry type tactics, which are lethal, killing your enemy before he has a chance to hurt you is infinitely more effective than trying to disable him, especially in a non-permanent fashion.

Anyway, against mortal threats, Good typically DOES have a fair advantage. When outsiders are involved, though, it is significantly less forgiving. Belkzen is probably one of the trickier mortal forces to defeat, as orc psychology is hard to live alongside (but hardly impossible), they're militarily powerful, and their culture is aggressive. (Though not nearly so much when they don't have food/water shortages)

I'm not sure if the first statement is true. According to most random character generators good and evil are roughly equal segments of the population. Or at least most that I've seen. Orcs are a good standard mook, but they aren't the real problem of evil. Grand mastermind wizards, organized Hobgoblins, Clerics of evil gods, dragons, all of these are mortal threats that can easily overwhelm many parties, particularly the sub-optimal ones. I don't see why you believe that there is an advantage to the side of good here.

[Clistenes]

Ah. Thing is, you can easily make the argument that nonlethal tactics can dramatically increase the power of the ones doing it, more than enough that the moderate increase in danger from nonlethal combat can be completely overcome and surprassed.

No offense, but no. That's not true. Try to fight a war, either in real life or in a game using only your fists, saps, nets and lassos, subdue your enemies one by one, tie them and drag them to a pen in the middle of a battle.

And better not to speak of the effect that watching you use non-lethal tactics will have on the morale of the enemy. They won't feel any fear, they will never retreat and will never stop attacking.

About magic? The enemy has it too. And most disabling spells that don't permanently maim the target have a relatively short duration. After a few minutes of combat your party would have depleted their spells, and the enemy would have already shaken off the effect of your magic.


This is because live prisoners are useful, even if they never do change alignments,

Nope. You need a lot of soldiers to control the enemy prisioners, soldiers that won't be in the field of battle. And since you refuse to use lethal weapons, you would need ten wardens per every prisioner, or you would never be able to stop them from escaping.


and there is far less chance of sparking a cycle of revenge.

That's irrelevant. You are meat, and you aren't dangerous, why would they stop trying to eat you? Do humans kill pigs and cows for revenge? Or do they kill them because they are harmless and easy to control, kill and eat?


Using nonlethal tactics is also likely to result in more people being willing to fight and them being willing to stick around longer, as it's notably less traumatic/soul damaging.

Yes, telling people to go fight an horde of axe and sword wielding foes, using only saps and fists against them will do wonders to improve their morale...

Or maybe will rather terrorize them and make them escape before the battle even start?


Anyway, against mortal threats, Good typically DOES have a fair advantage. When outsiders are involved, though, it is significantly less forgiving. Belkzen is probably one of the trickier mortal forces to defeat, as orc psychology is hard to live alongside (but hardly impossible), they're militarily powerful, and their culture is aggressive. (Though not nearly so much when they don't have food/water shortages)

And you want their neighbours to fight them using only nets and fists...

[Coidzor]

Could you please tell me about a single adventure that is about good adventurers committing genocide against an evil race?

Well there is that one semi-infamous part of Rise of the Runelords where DMs are encouraged to confront players with a bunch of feral goblin children in cages and decide what to do with the already traumatized and murderous progeny of the goblin camp they're slaughtering their way through.

[Keneth]

I don't know of any lore that says that either Sarenrae or Asmodeus are capable of killing Rovagug. Or that Sarenrae is unwilling to kill it, given how much she hates it. Rovagug killed a LOT of deities before they finally imprisoned it, and at least some lore suggests that Rovagug cannot die until everything else in the universe is dead.

True, it doesn't say that Sarenrae is capable of killing Rovagug, but I do consider that an imprisonment with the fire of a sun burning the beast for eternity was her idea of a more appropriate punishment than a quick death. Even if she was unable to kill it, Asmodeus is infinitely more powerful than Sarenrae, so much so that he considers her insignificant at best. He could obliterate all of the other gods at his whim, but he willingly decided to leave them to their own devices after destroying Ihys.

[Clistenes]

Well there is that one semi-infamous part of Rise of the Runelords where DMs are encouraged to confront players with a bunch of feral goblin children in cages and decide what to do with the already traumatized and murderous progeny of the goblin camp they're slaughtering their way through.

There are no babies kept here currently—the Thistletop goblins have had other things (such as planning the raid on Sandpoint) on their mind lately.GMs seeking to confront their players with awkward social situations might want to put a few sharp-toothed feral goblin children and babies in these cages for the unsuspecting adventurers to discover.

The default option is to avoid putting the players with the moral dilemma of what to do with the children. Letting them find a few goblin children and deciding what to do with them is presented as an option for the DM, if he likes that sort of thing.

It's never said that killing the children is the best and only option.

[Jade_Tarem]

Being a murderhobo can result in Good gaining relative ground. However, it isn't particularly efficient, and there are almost certainly many better methods available.

I see that and raise you top-level spellcasting. If I'm a good wizard who's hit 9th level spell slots, I can undo every bad consequence of the stuff I did throughout my career in an afternoon, nevermind what I can do in a year, ten years, a couple of centuries (elf wizards are people too!).

Given enough time and effort, I can theoretically take the test of the Starstone and become a god. I'm having a hard time of thinking of a more efficient way to spread goodness than becoming nigh-omnipotent.

[Naomi Li]

Two more examples where the killing of noncombatants, including children, is portrayed as non-evil: dwarves attempting to destroy all orcs during their Quest for the Sky. The "must be good" Lightbringers faction, which has the explicit goal of killing all drow. (An elven trait that breeds true) I haven't read very many adventure paths, so I cannot really give you any of those.

Merciful-augmented siege weapons and longbows, slings with softstones, saps, any bludgeoning weapon combined with the bludgeoner trait... beating somebody unconscious instead of killing them is SLIGHTLY more difficult due to decreased weapon choices, but it requires the exact same number of hit points of damage inflicted. The increased danger is mostly from them being more readily healed than they would be if they were killed instead. They don't need to be dealt with until after the battle ends (or during a lull in the fighting) because natural healing doesn't kick in except on the hour scale, and even a full hour's rest probably won't bring many of them to consciousness. (And of those that do, how many would actually be willing to rejoin the fight?)

I don't think there's a single sane prison design that requires either lethal force to keep its prisoners in line or more guards than prisoners, especially if they have cells. Add in magical curses applied to them and it can become easier still.

Most evil-aligned creatures aren't of animal level intelligence and aren't trying to kill people because they're food, or because they're incapable of doing anything other than killing. They're people who happen to be evil (either due to genetic predisposition, culture, or circumstances).


Four ninth level arcane spells can bring to life every single creature you've ever killed, restore all property to those that had it before, heal all emotional trauma inflicted, and correct every misunderstanding you gave another person? Really? And the odds of your character becoming a deity are rather pathetically low, given the huge number of people attempting it and the abysmal success rate. Besides, deities aren't even close to nigh-omnipotent in this setting. Vastly more powerful than any mortal? Sure. But with notable limitations on power, rules that must be followed to avoid disaster (see what's-her-name that almost united all of the demons in a crusade against the celestials because she murdered an evil deity right back), and peers that probably outpower you.

[Jade_Tarem]

Merciful weapons *are* weaker because that enchantment is eating up money that could have been spent on a better enchantment. Healing of every variety works twice as fast if you're mixing lethal and nonlethal damage, and that's not counting the laundry list of creature types that are immune to nonlethal.

[AMFV]

Two more examples where the killing of noncombatants, including children, is portrayed as non-evil: dwarves attempting to destroy all orcs during their Quest for the Sky. The "must be good" Lightbringers faction, which has the explicit goal of killing all drow. (An elven trait that breeds true) I haven't read very many adventure paths, so I cannot really give you any of those.

Merciful-augmented siege weapons and longbows, slings with softstones, saps, any bludgeoning weapon combined with the bludgeoner trait... beating somebody unconscious instead of killing them is SLIGHTLY more difficult due to decreased weapon choices, but it requires the exact same number of hit points of damage inflicted. The increased danger is mostly from them being more readily healed than they would be if they were killed instead. They don't need to be dealt with until after the battle ends (or during a lull in the fighting) because natural healing doesn't kick in except on the hour scale, and even a full hour's rest probably won't bring many of them to consciousness. (And of those that do, how many would actually be willing to rejoin the fight?)

I don't think there's a single sane prison design that requires either lethal force to keep its prisoners in line or more guards than prisoners, especially if they have cells. Add in magical curses applied to them and it can become easier still.

Most evil-aligned creatures aren't of animal level intelligence and aren't trying to kill people because they're food, or because they're incapable of doing anything other than killing. They're people who happen to be evil (either due to genetic predisposition, culture, or circumstances).

Escaping prisoners is one of the justifications for the application of lethal force. If an escaping dangerous prisoner cannot be subdued he can be killed. I don't see any ways beyond this without getting into very dangerous mind-rape type territory.

Merciful weapons are one way to deal with the problem, but how do you deal with intelligent undead? Or with constructs? Or with the myriad forces of evil that are able to resist nonlethal damage? And what do you do with them when they're unconscious, how do you permanently imprison them. It is possible to play a non-violent game, but arguing that non-violence is always a net gain for good is probably not a winnable debate.

If they are above animal intelligence they happen to be evil because of their choices. Regardless of circumstance or predisposition, it is our choices not our circumstances that define us.

[Jade_Tarem]

Four ninth level arcane spells can bring to life every single creature you've ever killed, restore all property to those that had it before, heal all emotional trauma inflicted, and correct every misunderstanding you gave another person? Really? And the odds of your character becoming a deity are rather pathetically low, given the huge number of people attempting it and the abysmal success rate.

I shouldn't have said "undo." Compensation would be a better word.

"I wish that the consequences of my adventuring career up until this point will ultimately result in a net gain for the forces of goodness throughout the cosmos." Six seconds. One spell. Problem solved. Like many things, your argument breaks down when 9th level spells enter the picture, even if we assume that all of your other assertions are correct.

As for the Starstone... even an abysmal success rate has resulted in the creation of twice as many good deities as evil ones. Also, Cayden Cailean succeeded while blacked-out drunk, so it's clearly more of a test of the heart (or liver) than one of skills. Either way, adventuring as long as you can and doing as much good as possible seems to be where good is making most of its gains, rather than losses.

[Naomi Li]

Indeed, escaping prisoners is a common reason to apply lethal force, and I cannot say it is wrong. Unfortunate, certainly, and arguably better to bring them in nonlethally (if not for its own sake, then because they're stress testing your prison for security flaws), but entirely wrong? Not really. Capturing them and then maiming them might be considered a better solution.

If a creature is impossible/notably more difficult to disable than to kill, killing them and resurrecting them, if possible, might be the only option available.

My argument is less "it is always easier in the long run to apply non-lethal force" than it is "under most circumstances, it is easier in the long run to apply non-lethal force against enemies as long as you account for the effort required of all people involved".

And yes, it is ultimately about choice. However, when circumstances are stacked against you evil options can seem a LOT more reasonable. A starving person is far more likely to steal food than somebody who has plenty, for example. Somebody who has been horribly abused is more likely to be evil than somebody who was not. And people who have chosen one way can change their minds later on, especially if the circumstances surrounding that choice have changed.


And on the off chance anyone is interested: I believe that it is worth using nonlethal force and trying to save as many people as possible (preferably everyone) because I believe that every self-aware creature inherently has infinite value, and that very large amounts of effort are worth being applied towards peaceful interactions with them and, hopefully, getting them a better fate in the afterlife (postponed as long as possible because they're all worse than life).

[AMFV]

And on the off chance anyone is interested: I believe that it is worth using nonlethal force and trying to save as many people as possible (preferably everyone) because I believe that every self-aware creature inherently has infinite value, and that very large amounts of effort are worth being applied towards peaceful interactions with them and, hopefully, getting them a better fate in the afterlife (postponed as long as possible because they're all worse than life).

Here is the problem... This is a fine belief to have, even for your characters to have. But it is a bad belief to impose on all other characters and/or people. I'm a firm believer in the concept of Just War, and necessary violence. So my perspective is inherently different.

Even the good deities in PF can't always agree on methodology or things like War, there is certainly room for both viewpoints. But we can definitely present enough counter arguments to show that it isn't a sure thing.

[Angelalex242]

It sounds like Naomi should somehow convert the Book of Exalted Deeds to Pathfinder, then require her PCs take Vow of Nonviolence and Vow of Peace.

The arguments make little sense without those two feats in the world. Otherwise, as a Paladin (and particularly as a Fist of Raziel), if I see evil, it's smitin' time, not capturing 'em time.

By the way, if you don't like redeeming people with Helms of Opposite Alignment, Emmisary of Bachariel can do it with words, given enough time.

And Sanctify the Wicked is kosher as a means of redeeming evil. Because characters with exalted feats (far holier then even Paladins) can cast that spell and not lose any feats. So you'd kind of have to rule 0 Sanctify the Wicked with an 'evil' tag before you can call it evil to use it. Cause otherwise, even a Lawful Good Apostle of Peace with the Saint Template can cast Sanctify the Wicked and be a-ok.

[AMFV]

It sounds like Naomi should somehow convert the Book of Exalted Deeds to Pathfinder, then require her PCs take Vow of Nonviolence and Vow of Peace.

The arguments make little sense without those two feats in the world. Otherwise, as a Paladin (and particularly as a Fist of Raziel), if I see evil, it's smitin' time, not capturing 'em time.

By the way, if you don't like redeeming people with Helms of Opposite Alignment, Emmisary of Bachariel can do it with words, given enough time.

And Sanctify the Wicked is kosher as a means of redeeming evil. Because characters with exalted feats (far holier then even Paladins) can cast that spell and not lose any feats. So you'd kind of have to rule 0 Sanctify the Wicked with an 'evil' tag before you can call it evil to use it. Cause otherwise, even a Lawful Good Apostle of Peace with the Saint Template can cast Sanctify the Wicked and be a-ok.

You can still have moral issues with something that is "good" in game, particularly something that involves removing choice. A chaotic character, and certain lawful characters and certain neutral characters would have huge issues with it. It just depends on your character.

It also is questionable as to whether evil is actually redeemed through this method, the Emissary of Barachiel is more logical in this respect actually.

[Coidzor]

There are no babies kept here currently—the Thistletop goblins have had other things (such as planning the raid on Sandpoint) on their mind lately.GMs seeking to confront their players with awkward social situations might want to put a few sharp-toothed feral goblin children and babies in these cages for the unsuspecting adventurers to discover.

The default option is to avoid putting the players with the moral dilemma of what to do with the children. Letting them find a few goblin children and deciding what to do with them is presented as an option for the DM, if he likes that sort of thing.

It's never said that killing the children is the best and only option.

Tomayto, tomahto, they bring up the idea of the pens regardless of whether they're filled and then provide ye olde mentioning it as an option is enough to encourage some DMs to ill-advisedly do the damn fool thing...


It sounds like Naomi should somehow convert the Book of Exalted Deeds to Pathfinder, then require her PCs take Vow of Nonviolence and Vow of Peace.

The arguments make little sense without those two feats in the world. Otherwise, as a Paladin (and particularly as a Fist of Raziel), if I see evil, it's smitin' time, not capturing 'em time.

By the way, if you don't like redeeming people with Helms of Opposite Alignment, Emmisary of Bachariel can do it with words, given enough time.

And Sanctify the Wicked is kosher as a means of redeeming evil. Because characters with exalted feats (far holier then even Paladins) can cast that spell and not lose any feats. So you'd kind of have to rule 0 Sanctify the Wicked with an 'evil' tag before you can call it evil to use it. Cause otherwise, even a Lawful Good Apostle of Peace with the Saint Template can cast Sanctify the Wicked and be a-ok.

One of the ways of explaining Sanctify the Wicked is that it's basically the Perfect Argument to fall into line with the caster's alignment without the caster actually having to spend a year delivering it personally.

[Angelalex242]

As for the kids in the cage, you gotta let 'em go, I think, and then pray they have Androcles' Lion tendencies later in life.

But yes, our topic creator should definitely play an Apostle of Peace Prestige Class before attempting to say whether giving peace a chance is a great idea or not.

[Naomi Li]

Note: The reason I have for deeply wanting people to be converted is that belief in their inherent value. However, I do believe that it is also a more effective means of helping good win the war, and despite their... many moral failings, good aligned forces are far easier to live with than evil aligned ones, and at least some of them are very close to moral paragons.

If somebody invented an "incarnate outsider as mortal", you could even redeem fiends. (Who, I am convinced, are created out of the energy released from the destruction of a petitioner's soul)

How difficult this is made in-game depends entirely on the DMs attitude. Some will go out of their way to punish people for not using lethal methods beyond what makes any degree of sense, some will throw the exact same level challenges, some will decide that smaller forces will be thrown at them, etc. (Also, I am a player, not a DM; and the message is less "you have to do this" and more "if you're being a standard adventurer, you're making Good's job more difficult")

(Also, if you want to make taking prisoners easier... make a deal with a useful church and the local town/city, and hire some NPCs to follow along with you and then escort the prisoners back home when captures are made)

[Psyren]

Tomayto, tomahto, they bring up the idea of the pens regardless of whether they're filled and then provide ye olde mentioning it as an option is enough to encourage some DMs to ill-advisedly do the damn fool thing...

That sounds like a problem with the DM then if they choose to go down that road.



One of the ways of explaining Sanctify the Wicked is that it's basically the Perfect Argument to fall into line with the caster's alignment without the caster actually having to spend a year delivering it personally.

BoED is basically written around Rousseau philosophy (i.e. people are inherently good, and evil is a perversion or corruption of their true nature.) StW is just another expression of that outlook. You're not "brainwashing them," you're "curing them."

How well this sits with you depends on how much stock you put in Rousseau.

[Frozen_Feet]

... it only now occurred to you lot that a bunch of antisocial murder hobos going around killing things & taking their stuff might not be the way to a better world? :smalltongue:

[Clistenes]

Merciful-augmented siege weapons and longbows, slings with softstones, saps, any bludgeoning weapon combined with the bludgeoner trait... beating somebody unconscious instead of killing them is SLIGHTLY more difficult due to decreased weapon choices, but it requires the exact same number of hit points of damage inflicted.

About weapons with the Merciful property. The cheapest Merciful weapon would be a Merciful +1 weapon, that is, it has an enhancement +2 and it's worth more than, 8,000 gp, which is more than 160 pounds/72 kilograms of pure gold, the third-fourth part of the price of a small keep or castle, money enough to hire a hundred 10-level knights for forty days or a thousand light footmen for the same time. Merciful weapons just aren't an option for most people; small parties of dirty rich adventurers are the exception, but you can't arm your army with Merciful weapons, it just isn't an option.

[Captnq]

I present a claim that might seem ridiculous: that the heroes generally played provide a much bigger net gain to Evil than they do to Good.


I agree. Your claim is ridiculous.



I will freely admit that preventing an evil plot and saving the would-be-victims is a massive gain for Good and Neutral. This is very useful and heroic. However, if one examines what happens when lethal force is utilized against mortals things get much darker.


I will not.

Good and Evil are qualities that exist inside creatures of a minimum intelligence of 3. If your goal is to increase "good" and decrease "evil" then your fight has to do with creatures. "An Evil Plot" does not exist. There are no evil plots. There are plots. Plots that may result in evil actions that build up the quality of evil in people. Plots that will hamper the progress of the build up of the quality of good in people. But there are no "Evil Plots".

For example, recently a PC in my game basically has flipped out. He has begun "The Reign of the Dawn Elf" and is basically performing random acts of kindness. He is doing area effect healing and Mass Heal and Chain Reach Regenerate. He just created enough food to feed every refuge in High Walls for the day.

He's also ticked off everyone in charge and broken about a half dozen laws. So, He's doing Chaotic Good. Which is okay. But the forces of Sharn want to lock him up or at least get him to calm down. There are two Dragonmarked Houses who would like him killed.

Is this good? Is this evil? On the surface? Sure, it's good. In the long term? If the PC doesn't follow through (Which he is known to do when ge gets bored), this could end very VERY poorly. It's just a plot. The scale of good or evil will be determined when it ends, and how it ends.

Player interference is just trying to CHANGE the outcome of a plot.



First of all, all creatures with an evil alignment that die (and don't have good standing with a non-Evil deity they worship) are sentenced to one of the lower planes. This immediately results in all of their Good traits and potential being utterly annihilated, recoverable only through resurrection. So, the amount of Good decreases on the mortal plane in question, even if Evil decreases there more.

And all Evil traits are destroyed as well. They start over as lemurs. Or, if you are playing really evil people start over at higher level, then you must conceed that the same thing happens when good people die. Therefore, zero sum game.

First Point is nullified by it's logical reversal.



Secondly, that Evil continues to exist and, in fact, is nurtured and increases in strength. Even if, on average, that Evil is then annihilated/tortured for all eternity/locked as an unevolving larvae, the ones that do become fiends are almost always vastly more powerful than the mortal soul that spawned them ever were. And, while this also makes them legitimate targets of Good outsiders, this isn't much help considering Good is losing horrendously and only slowing the loss by Evil being self-destructive in its infighting.


Evil continues to exist. Good continues to exist. Again, the reverse of your argument nullifies it.

However, Evil CAN die. You CAN do to Hell, find a demon, and kill it. Just like you can kill an elemental, an angel, or any other spirit creature. They may not age, but they are not eternal.

Now, as for your "Good is losing horrendously" is a campaign specific statement. So, for the purpose of your original hypothesis, "that the heroes generally played provide a much bigger net gain to Evil than they do to Good." it has no bearing.

I assure you, in my campaign, despite my best efforts, evil is not only losing, but lost, on the run, turned tail, raised the white flag, surrendered, and in the case of several evil gods, accepted terms of surrender, turned on their allies, and become advocates of neutrality and in the case of one major god, been totally and in whole redeeded.

Now, that said, MY campaign has nothing to do with this argument, but only to serve proof that good is not losing in all cases.



Thirdly, I would predict that the hatred spawned among all of those who loved those slaughtered by the adventurers pushes them towards Evil far more than those actions push others towards Neutral or Good. This is definitely the point I can support the least, but it seems rather likely.


Evil is selfish. I would counter with the argument that Evil is unlikely to inspire feelings of love. Therefore, the percentage of dead evil people inspiring feelings of revenge in their associates shall be small.

Now, that said, I would agree that killing a beloved Good person would inspire MANY people to feelings of revenge which might push them down a road of evil. However, since your Thesis is about Killing Evil, not killing Good, that is merely a side note.

The percentage of Evil Spawned by killing an Evil Person is most likely less then the percentage of evil spawned by killing a good person.




In conclusion, if one really wants Good to regain ground and maybe even claim the advantage against Evil, souls must be prevented from becoming fiends. The options are A) Annihilating their souls (rather deep on the Evil side, I believe), B) imprisoning Evil aligned souls (either within their still living bodies, as undead, in soul-binding weapons/gems/whatever), or C) Redeeming them and changing their alignment to Neutral or Good.


1. The claim of stopping souls from going to lower planes is a good point in and of itself. However, I do not follow your logic from the above points to your final conclusion.

A) Destroying souls is an evil act.
B) Imprisoning souls is very expensive.
C) Redeeming is a good idea, but there comes a point where the gain of attempting to redeem someone is outweighed by the cost of letting them live.

Example:

In my campaign it was recently discovered that The Cranky old man in the original village was actually a tiefling with a low con. That's why he was living forever and was such a bastard. His grandson was displaying a tendancy towards evil. The players did not kill them, but brought in acolytes to watch over them and try to get them to come around to a good way of thinking.

It failed.

So, in a final bid to correct the problem and after much debate, they applied a helm of opposite alignment on the kid. The old man was considered to be "too far gone." But the local church cleric of Ilmater was going to continue to try.

In another example, A group of CE Skum were found trying to sell a shipment of illegal Aboleth Muscus to the town of Luskin. The players said, "Stop Evil Do-er!" The Skum did not stop. They were killed.

True, the skum were most likely humans who were corrupted by aboleth, but at the time, the costs of the Shipment getting away was far worse then the cost of losing more souls to the lower planes. And truth told, the Skum were too far gone. As a DM, I would agree. Aboleth Mucus is deadly stuff.

Also, I would like to point out, one of my players spent TONS of money creating the unique power to "Sense Suffering." Which is the ability to sense how much suffering you have caused, and how much you are suffering. It makes evaluating these sorts of moral quandries MUCH easier.


Now then, I WOULD counter with THIS Hypothesis:

I define ROLL-Player as "The Standard Hack and Slasher"/"Open Door, Kill Monster, Take Treasurer"/"In it for the Lulz"

So a standard party of ROLL-players actually hurts the cause of good more then helps because they typically do not consider the consequences of their actions. Therefore, it is easy for evil to manipulate said individuals into performing actions that benefit evil.

If your experience has been with ROLL-players, and not Role-players, then I can see why you are so cynical. I happen to have a group of players who revel in being heroes at any cost. I have run for Roll-players, however, and frequently I have observed that such individuals do happen to further the cause of evil, either directly or indirectly, because they pursue greater and greater personal IC power, and care not for the story.

That is the very definition of Evil, after all.

[Angelalex242]

Right. That's why I recommend she play the Apostle of Peace PrC. As an Exalted character of the highest order, she's bound by some VERY strict rules on what she can and can't do, and she gets to be the peaceful person she wants to be.

[Captnq]

... it only now occurred to you lot that a bunch of antisocial murder hobos going around killing things & taking their stuff might not be the way to a better world? :smalltongue:

While an amusing statement, it has little to do with the original Hypothesis.

I would state that is more indicative of my counter Hypothesis that "Parties of ROLL-players (ie a bunch of antisocial murder hobos going around killing things & taking their stuff) do not help the cause of good."

[Naomi Li]

Merciful heavy crossobw (medium size). Cost: 50 gp base +300 gp masterwork + 4000 gp magic materials +4 days labour from a 5th+ level magical enchanter, this labour SHOULD cost far less than 4000 gp in anything resembling a sane economy.

Result: +1 to attack rolls, 1d10 +1d6 +1 nonlethal damage magical piercing bolts fired every round (assuming rapid reload and possibly crossbow mastery, which the operator should have). (Using gravity bow to replace that 1d10 with 2d8 is advisable)

If you want ranged nonlethal firepower on the cheap, mass sling fire with softstones are good choices. Extremely inexpensive, almost everyone is proficient in their use, and they have a decent range increment (50 ft). While D&D has them nerfed far below what they realistically should be, they're still potent weapons.

I'm rather curious as to where you acquired your mercenary hiring prices and keep construction costs. And being dependant upon mercenaries very rarely works out well for people. Besides, you don't need to outfit and army with magical weapons (though if you can, it's probably a good idea): you need to outfit your elites with magical weapons so they can take on the more dangerous threats.

[Captnq]

Note: The reason I have for deeply wanting people to be converted is that belief in their inherent value. However, I do believe that it is also a more effective means of helping good win the war, and despite their... many moral failings, good aligned forces are far easier to live with than evil aligned ones, and at least some of them are very close to moral paragons.


Actually, my players have been having quite the moral quandry in the Eberron game system.

You see, Fiends can become good, and Angels can be evil. Souls do NOT go to heaven or hell, but just go to Dolruum and slowly fade away. Good is not rewarded. Evil not punished. Everyone gets the same crappy ending.

Frankly, it's driving the players insane, considering their Forgotten Realms "Color Coordinated" Morality (ie Red dragons are always CE evil. Gold Dragons always LG). It's part of the reason for the "Reign of the Dawn Elf." They effectively are trying to start a plan to begin to divert Good souls from the Afterlife of Eberron back to Forgotten Realms. It's rather insideous how they are doing it.

Seriously, they consider Eberron to be like Hell, just with better weather. It's a crusade at this point to try and "save" as many good souls as they can. And bolster the power of their respective gods, while they are at it.

[Naomi Li]

I don't think Eberron's afterlife is actually WORSE than the Forgotten Realm's, given that personality death is included in both of them. Petitioners are... vaguely similar to who they were as mortals, but rather strongly warped through the prism of where they end up. Though isn't Eberron the setting where there's a decent chance of resurrection magics having horrible side effects and doing in en masse would spell absolute doom for everyone?

It's definitely a bleak setting, and finding ways for everyone to live longer lives (vampirification + animal blood and purchased blood from self-aware creatures?) seems like an excellent goal.



If people are incapable of empathizing with somebody just because they're evil, that would seem to indicate their capacity for empathy is vastly diminished from our world. Many people have family members that are selfish jerks, at best, and while they often don't like them still want them to do well.


Anyway, I would contend that good and evil exist in all mortal creatures, and each could be considered a battlefield. Killing the creature is akin to nuking the battlefield in such a way that all minority traits are destroyed and all majority ones are disabled until they come back as radioactive zombies.

However, instead of simply giving up on the battle you could reinforce the forces that you like better and help them gain ground. It's a war, so it's hardly easy, but it is much more rewarding.

[hamishspence]

... it only now occurred to you lot that a bunch of antisocial murder hobos going around killing things & taking their stuff might not be the way to a better world? :smalltongue:
Ed Greenwood dropped a few hints that the standard D&D adventurer often does more harm than good- in Faerun at least:

http://www.candlekeep.com/fr_faq.htm#_Toc16090539


Part of my writing goals have been to underscore the following things: "do-gooders" often do more harm than good, for the best of motives (Elaine's also been playing with this one); 'good' to one party is not 'good' to another (the old saying, "for one man to gain freedom, another must lose it"); and the best meddlers are those who can see farthest, not the brute-force-right-now brigade (which is what most PC parties of necessity are, and therefore their punishments/reward are immediate).

[Clistenes]

Merciful heavy crossobw (medium size). Cost: 50 gp base +300 gp masterwork + 4000 gp magic materials +4 days labour from a 5th+ level magical enchanter, this labour SHOULD cost far less than 4000 gp in anything resembling a sane economy.

But the point is, the canon market price of that weapon is 8,000 gp.


I'm rather curious as to where you acquired your mercenary hiring prices and keep construction costs.

The prices come from Arms & Equipment, a 3.5 sourcebook. I think that, until Pathfinder publishes a new guide about the issue, it's still the best source we have at hand.


And being dependant upon mercenaries very rarely works out well for people.

Those are the wages for any kind of 10-level heavy cavalry, they can be mercenaries, soldiers or honourable knights.


Besides, you don't need to outfit and army with magical weapons (though if you can, it's probably a good idea): you need to outfit your elites with magical weapons so they can take on the more dangerous threats.

If you are going to keep a whole nation of drows or gnolls or orcs or hobgoblins or ogres or frost giants or mindflayers or beholders or whatever subdued, you will need a great army. Half a dozen of adventurers won't be able to be everywhere at all times and keep them all under control.

And anyway, while capturing evil creatures one by one and trying to redeem them can be a valid strategy for a a given PC, you can't apply it a whole world. The PCs are an anomaly, most of the characters in the world are low level, low magic, and fight their wars with mundane armies and mundane equipment.


Ed Greenwood dropped a few hints that the standard D&D adventurer often does more harm than good- in Faerun at least:

http://www.candlekeep.com/fr_faq.htm#_Toc16090539

Truth to be told, I don't like Ed Greenwood's style.

Greenwood tends to portray his pet characters, (Mystra, the Chosen and the Harpers) as almost always right and good, and all other forces of Good not aligned with or subservient to Mystra, the Chosen or the Harpers as fools at best and as dangerous fanatics at worst.

His characters appear Chaotic, they do what they feel like to do, and are sexually liberated and mostly without sexual jealously, but if you watch closely, they are rather lawful: They impose their views and their rules, not openly taking control, but using magic and political manipulation to force everybody to do as they say. Mystra controls the Chosen, the Chosen control the Harpers, and the Harpers pull the string of all non-evil kingdoms. And anybody who isn't part of the Chosen of the Harpers is a fool that does more evil than good.

And, at the end of the day, the good of the people of Abeir-Toril don't come first for the Chosen of Mystra: Their absolute first priority is to promote the use of arcane magic. Elminster could have destroyed most of the greatest tyrants of Faerun with some effort, from the Red Wizards to the Zhentarim to the Cult of the Dragon, but he doesn't, because those are largely wizardly organizations, and Mynstra wants them to flourish.

[Naomi Li]

Even without looting anyone or receiving hazard pay, one can still become fairly wealth. If you get your craft/profession checks up to 20 (fairly easy to do, even at level 1) you have a yearly income of about 520 gp. A decent quality of life can be maintained for less than half of that cost per year. Assuming taxes aren't too high, the saved money can be put towards magical equipment, training, reincarnation spells, or other high end expenses that can safely improve one's lot in life.

(+0 ability score +1 skill rank +3 class skill +3 skill focus +2 masterwork artisan's tools +5 crafter's fortune +10.5 rolls = 24.5; 24 if you're crafting something in particular instead of just making money directly)

If the location has a sane amount of spellcasters (retrain all the commoners!) cost of spells for locals should be low enough that they're living rather well, with the biggest drain on resources being to pay the wages of the military and to improve/replace their more expensive equipment. Even if people can't train into sorcerers/oracles for whatever reason, lots of bards and wizards would be very possible. (And, granted, wizardry is fairly expensive, but if they stick to just a small set of utility spells the gains far outweigh the costs)

[Coidzor]

That sounds like a problem with the DM then if they choose to go down that road.

I can't be so completely and utterly forgiving to the scenario writers for setting up the scenario and then effectively saying, or at least very strongly appearing to say, "Less experienced people shouldn't use this. *WINK*"


BoED is basically written around Rousseau philosophy (i.e. people are inherently good, and evil is a perversion or corruption of their true nature.) StW is just another expression of that outlook. You're not "brainwashing them," you're "curing them."

How well this sits with you depends on how much stock you put in Rousseau.

Yes, exactly, thank you.


As for the kids in the cage, you gotta let 'em go, I think, and then pray they have Androcles' Lion tendencies later in life.

Honestly if you're just going to unleash them on their own in the wild as children with no survival training beyond fighting one another and cannibalizing the weak, giving them a swift death would probably be a mercy in comparison and that's the less good/genocidal answer in contrast with the try to fix them/redeem them answer.

[hamishspence]

Greenwood tends to portray his pet characters, (Mystra, the Chosen and the Harpers) as almost always right and good, and all other forces of Good not aligned with or subservient to Mystra, the Chosen or the Harpers as fools at best and as dangerous fanatics at worst.

This may be part of the "rules" he had to work under, with the protagonists having to be the Good Guys.


It's wrong to see the Chosen as necessarily good...it's more accurate to see them as the veteran-killer-American-GI or Wild West gunslinger who does good, or fights for 'good,' but in doing so is twisted far from good him- or herself.

One postscript I almost forgot: with Elminster in particular and all of the Chosen, Steven and I (at least) are delving into "how insane do you go from living so long with godly power and gods messing with your mind?" Everything El and the other Chosen do should be read in this light; they're NOT sane.

[Naomi Li]

Reworking things due to criticisms and having thought it over...

In the standard result (everyone dies and generally stays the same alignment they have had), evil wins. Evil receives more than enough firepower to make up for their teamwork issues and, while they would probably cease to exist soon after good, this just means that nobody wins.

Adventuring doesn't do much to actually improve this. Evil plots are thwarted, people are protected and rescued, and the people they like tend to be stabilized a bit... while those they don't are put into even worse situations to deal with, even if they don't die. Killing a person removes any possiiblity of them switching alignments/religion and thereby decreasing the reinforcements of evil, and only encourages the standard result even more.

Maybe there are many people that most would simply write off as impossible/impractical to redeem. However, even the less idealistic would probably admit that many people with an evil alignment are hardly committed to the concept and could be swayed to neutrality or even good given the right circumstances and time. Short of declaring open season on fiends (and the petitioners that create them) or preemptively destroying their souls (or creating a "good" counterpart to hellfire ray, I suppose) converting those who are evil to neutrality, good, or to a friendly deity of whatever alignment is the only method of turning the tides against evil. And it is something individuals of every level are capable of.