Help with rp element: The Paladin

[HereBeMonsters]

Alright i am going to be rping a cleric//paladin gestalt who fights a lot like thor. Throwing a big hammer at folks.

So i need advice on how to rp him. I kind of wanted to take him the route of the avatar from the ultima games. But he will not be lawful stupid.

[Zweisteine]

Play him however you like, just stay lawful.

Aim to do good above all else (but don't consider yourself above lying, except where lying would be an Evil act).

Have some sort of code of honor (preferably not written out; then your DM can try to hold you to it).

If you want to have a part of your code that will make playing a challenge, consider something like not killing helpless/unarmed foes. You might want to limit this to humanoids, though, as tying up some things can be quite hard. Bonus points if you convince your party not to kill the goblin children/noncombatants.


This is an attempt to use examples to illustrate a point:

Respect legitimate authority, except where it is Evil. In that case, take it down unless the odds are bad. If they are, pretend to show respect, and wait for the best time to strike.

[Sith_Happens]

Just remember:

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a311/estelindis/hinjo.gif, http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i294/trytoguess/O-Chul.png, http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i294/trytoguess/lien.png = Good

:miko: = Bad

Also, if [insert deity here]-forbid you end up in a "To be Lawful or Good" scenario, RAW says to choose Good. You also don't auto-fall for doing something Chaotic or breaking the non-"willingly commits an Evil act" parts of your code, just don't make it a habit.

As for general roleplaying tips, think "knight in shining armor" and you should be good.

[HereBeMonsters]

My paladin is going to follow three principles of truth, love, and courage. With eight virtues as tenants.
Honesty, Compassion, Valor, Justice, Sacrifice, Honor, Spirituality, and Humility.

[jedipotter]

Alright i am going to be rping a cleric//paladin gestalt who fights a lot like thor. Throwing a big hammer at folks.

So i need advice on how to rp him. I kind of wanted to take him the route of the avatar from the ultima games. But he will not be lawful stupid.

Um, well here is a thought........why not play him like Thor?

[Sith_Happens]

Um, well here is a thought........why not play him like Thor?

Ooh, good idea. Nothing throws more people for a loop than a Paladin that likes to party.:smallwink:

[HereBeMonsters]

He is a dwarf... He is gonna he getting drunk and having fun this os kinda assumed for dwarfs.

But yeah he is kinda gonna be thor like but his code and so forth is what i need advice rping

[Gale]

The eight virtues themselves essentially describe how your character will role-play. Simply incorporate these ideas into your character's personality. He is someone who strives to adhere to these things thus he would act as such. Your character should be honorable, humble, righteous, compassionate, etc.
Now come up with some hypothetical scenarios and determine what your character would do based on his beliefs. If he sees an injured man on the side of the road his first instinct is going to be to help him; if a thief runs off with someone's coin purse he's going to try and stop him.
Really, I don't think playing a character based off the Avatar is much different form most lawful good characters. It mostly just means being a good person.

Also...
What's a Paladin?

[HereBeMonsters]

The eight virtues themselves essentially describe how your character will role-play. Simply incorporate these ideas into your character's personality. He is someone who strives to adhere to these things thus he would act as such. Your character should be honorable, humble, righteous, compassionate, etc.
Now come up with some hypothetical scenarios and determine what your character would do based on his beliefs. If he sees an injured man on the side of the road his first instinct is going to be to help him; if a thief runs off with someone's coin purse he's going to try and stop him.
Really, I don't think playing a character based off the Avatar is much different form most lawful good characters. It mostly just means being a good person.

Also...
What's a Paladin?

And you win lol

[T.G. Oskar]

My paladin is going to follow three principles of truth, love, and courage. With eight virtues as tenants.
Honesty, Compassion, Valor, Justice, Sacrifice, Honor, Spirituality, and Humility.

Just remember that Honor is more important to the Paladin than anything else. In fact, a Paladin who follows all Eight Virtues could use Honor as its measuring stick: by following all other seven Virtues, it defines its Honor (also, questing: only Questing grants a boost to Honor).

@TechMoogle: I don't read sarcasm. Still: Dupre. Enough said.

[Greenish]

With eight virtues as tenants.I'm not sure charging virtues for rent is something a paladin would do.

[BWR]

Maybe it's a paladin of the (Land)Lord.

[TuggyNE]

I'm not sure charging virtues for rent is something a paladin would do.

Perhaps he's Sacrificing Compassionately in order to give them housing for free.

(The proper spelling is tenet, for a precept or principle of doctrine or code.)

[DMVerdandi]

Honestly, I think harping on honor is one of the quickest ways to blow up a paladin rp-wise. Why? Because it is a virtue that is based on being overly attentive to one's deeds, and makes all actions personal.

It's like a spiritual form of reputation, thus attention to one's honor can create vanity, as one with honor also attains glory, and glory, although a virtue, is a wild one that can drive men to madness.

Instead, take those virtues, and then don't just have them for nothing. Either have them from epiphany from your deity, perhaps being taught by some rector, having them as clan/family dogma, or maybe your character read them in a book.

Here is some food for thought, why not make your character a cleric of thor???
Have him come from the frozen north, bringing religion, knowledge of the runes, and sweet, sweet norse stories and culture. Even cooler, have it be significantly advanced through magic.


Also, I suggest a few things.

1. Get rid of the paladin.
It's kind of dragging you down. What you COULD do is make the cleric one of good and nobility or law, and suddenly, voila. He is super paladin. Same values, more power. After all, everything that paladins get can be replaced by VERY low level cleric spells. It is redundant.

2. Somehow get your hands on dynamic priest.
It allows your casting to run off of charisma instead of wisdom.
The reason for this is Paladin is a charisma based class, and having both creates MAD.
Yes, charisma fuels Turn undead, but do you really want all of those scores necessary to keep high? Ick.


3.Alternative secondary classes.
If you go the cleric of nobility/good route you will need a second class. Here are a few ideas.

A.Barbarian
Yes, you cannot cast spells while you rage, BUT, if you are attacking, why cast spells??? Your buffs still last, so buff, and wreck faces.
The Spirit Lion totem barbarian is by far the best, as you get pounce. Best thing is, you don't have to stay one for the best benefits, you could take one level and leave. Now you cannot be lawful, so that might not be an option for you.

B.Fighter.
Why? More fighter feats. They actually don't suck during gestalt, and give your player more variety and ways to attack, as well as allowing you to pick feats that don't take away from the ones you earn by level. Because of that, your regular feats can be spent on the cleric side, and you will have back-ups on your fighter side for combat feats.

C.Martial class
If you take dynamic priest, crusader
If you take academic priest, warblade
If you take neither swordsage

D. Rogue or Factotum
With Academic priest, this gets good.
spells and skills galore. INT SAD.
And it has that quick, skillful feel that raiders had.



However, you don't have to take any of this advice. I just think it would make for a smoother build to represent what you are thinking. Cleric is almost always better than a paladin, so taking both is a bit redundant.
It's like if you were to pick a favored soul on the other side of the cleric.
For what? Cleric can be a knight, a priest, a paragon, hell anything in which some idea gives you power, and a paladin just has less ideas to give him power.

That and a horse (phantom steed takes care of that)

Smite (Smiting spell takes care of that)

Lay on hands (Spontaneous healing or a wand takes care of that)

Charisma to saves (Nothing quite this good, BUT With the ability to use persistant spell, this suddenly becomes weak. Cleric is KING of buffs)

Cleric already has better options than the paladin, just on the spell list.