Alignment trouble with one of my oldest campaigns

[Super Evil User]

When I was 13 years old, me and my friends liked to play sessions of Dungeons and Dragons together. We'd either use pre-made campaigns or plagiarize from our favorite movies/TV shows.

One of the campaigns we played was basically a ripoff of both the Wicker Man and the first two episodes of FMA. We were fighting a pagan cult headed by an LE sorcerer who claimed to be the god's representative on Earth. He was definitely the biggest threat in the village, but the villagers were opponents who tried to subdue us too.

So one thing led to another and we ended the campaign launching alchemic fire bombs (they were hidden under the temple - it's a long story) at the village, killing everyone except us. Note that we never learned the alignments of the villagers who did this.

The trouble here is that we were all non-evil. I was considered the most "radical" of the group at a solid Chaotic Neutral. Most of the players were Lawful Good or Lawful Neutral.

That got me to thinking: given what we did, would we still be considered non-evil or would our alignment shift? It was made explicit at the start that the townsfolk weren't like the cult leader. He was the oldest guy around (elf) and most of these people hadn't been exposed to anything outside of his manipulative religion. They were trained not to accept views that opposed what they had learned. And while they did try to kill us, looking back it would be relatively simple for us to stop them non-lethally.

Of course, that doesn't change the fact that they did try to kill a bunch of non-evil PCs with much higher levels than them. If there's one thing they could be faulted for, it would be their stupidity.

What do you guys think? Was what we did bad?

[Synvallius]

Generally, so long as the good guys at least attempt (sincerely so) to stop the bad guys from doing their evil deeds in a non-violent manner once or twice, it wouldn't necessarily mean that the good guys are evil for dealing with the bad guys violently if a non-violent method does not seem to work. Technically, you could also get by with using violent methods of "concluding" evil activity so long as you didn't know that there was a non-violent method that was actually applicable in that scenario (i.e. if there was a scroll of entanglement [or something] that was present in the room that could have stopped the evil cleric of doom just as well as the orb of annihilation could have, you wouldn't have done anything evil if you used the orb to defeat the cleric, so long as you didn't know that the scroll existed).
And for the villager thing, ignorance cannot be considered a reprieve from the consequences of your crimes. If you do evil, even if it is unknowingly done, you are still responsible for your actions. In consideration of people raised in intentional ignorance, specially conceived punishments (i.e. punishments not ending in execution) could be implemented instead of just wantonly killing (also, assuming that the criminals are cooperating, and accept the judgement handed down, if they're not cooperating they obviously are evil in both deed and thought, so there would be little reason in treating them as potential penitents).
So, overall, I'd say that your party could probably have resolved things in a more "good" aligned way, but so long as your first attempt to resolve the conflict was not the firebombing idea, your alignment should not be called into question, and probably shouldn't be changed (so long as none of you were laughing manically while you tossed firebombs down upon the heads of the villagers, while simultaneously saying, "Those stupid impure peons, I revel in the agony of their screams of torment." etc. If that was said, then you've all probably moved down a level or two on the evil scale).

[Super Evil User]

Non-violent methods were out of the question. We were sent by the Church to execute the leader for heresy. Of course the Church didn't know that the guy held the entire village under his sway, so we could have executed him without harming the others.

Let me clarify. These villagers posed literally zero threat to us. They were under-equipped and all of them had the Commoner NPC class. A lot can be said about their intelligence for attacking us in the first place, I'll give you that.

We had already resolved the conflict even before the firebomb thing. It was simplicity itself to get away. The thing was that one of our PCs decided to firebomb the village folk to "purge" all of the heathens. What I'm worried about is that that sounds a bit too much like Miko for my tastes.

[Synvallius]

In that kind of circumstance, I suppose it would be considered an evil action, but still, if the villagers were evil to begin with, although your actions could have been more restrained, I would not consider it grounds for alignment changing, just a warning, perhaps. If the villagers had been completely innocent then it would be different, however, the fact that you could have gotten away and chose to stay and kill people obviously isn't a good act, but it could be looked upon as a means of keeping their evil ways or thoughts or beliefs from spreading, so I'd still say that a warning and not an actual alignment shift would be in order, unless this is something your group does regularly, then you're probably evil.
The reason Miko had an alignment shift was because she was good in name only, her actual intent was more lawful/neutral rather than lawful/good. If your characters have largely done only good deeds, but in this particular instance decided to nip a problem in the bud, I'd still say they could crawl out of this scenario with their alignment remaining good. If you had been firebombing a village of bunnies that supported the good empire with their crop of carrots and turnips, then that would have been an outrightly evil act, the fact that the villagers were evil to begin with would at least bring it up to being a neutral act, although definitely one to be frowned upon by any truly good character. Like said, if your group has a history of murdering whole villages with little cause or incitement, then you're probably evil, if not then I'd consider it a one time "battlefield judgement call" of sorts, wherein the tension (if there was any) made the characters feel that more extreme measures were necessary. Without that justification, premeditated murder is obviously evil, so if they were planning the firebombing, then I would say that your group is evil because the firebombing was uncalled for and unnecessary retaliation on relatively defenseless people. Also, the intent is another big factor, if the intent of the group was to keep the evil heretics from harming other people, then that's a pretty reasonable action to take, even if not a very good one. But if their reason for killing the people was based upon anger or something like that, then it's evil.
So, if your group had a reason to firebomb them (aside from wanton murder and feelings of sadism) then they are probably not evil (the killing of heretics could be some justification, but not unless you were provoked), but if they decided that killing off the villagers should be done because they had annoyed them, or they were just feeling particularly vengeful, then you're probably evil (I feel like I've said that many times, I probably reiterate too much).

[Super Evil User]

You are correct! It was to execute heretics.

Their alignment was never brought up because the DM was 13 and didn't care.

The teachings of the cult, though, were more geared towards giving the LE sorcerer money and influence. It obviously involved a lot of brainwashing but otherwise it was fairly innocuous. Sort of like modern day Wicca.

[atemu1234]

I'll put it this way. If you have a lawful or chaotic neutral character, period, they will not be subject to the same restraints as a good character. If you had a choice between your own life and a bunch of ambiguously-aligned villagers, then a good character may sacrifice himself. Neutral doesn't have to, and good has a good reason to. If they serve evil, killing them isn't an evil act, unless they pose no threat to you. If they're actively trying to kill you, no matter what their alignment, you're allowed to kill them and not have to deal with alignment issues. If they're being dominated, killing them is ok, if not good. But nothing here really warrants an alignment change, but it may be cause for an atonement spell or something if you've got a hardcore LG cleric or paladin dedicated to helping the helpless.

[Super Evil User]

Thanks for answering this guys. I was deeply troubled by the moral implications of bombing a defenseless, brainwashed population bereft of what little leadership it had despite the clear presence of an easy getaway. We did a lot of things that seem morally troubling to me now and I just want to get it out.

I can assure you, none of us were twirling our moustaches and cackling, although I suppose the LG paladin proselytizing about heresy would not have been out of place.