Paladins, Dogma, and Moral Dillema.

[AMFV]

I know what we need right now is more discussion of the code of conduct for Paladins. But the previous thread, (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?360413-Paladin-will-fall-when-the-question-is-asked) has inspired me. Basically one of the things that I took out of that thread is that there might be multiple answers to any particular moral dilemma. Naturally since Paladins are lawful one would assume that each order would likely have thought about or at the very least considered these sort of dilemmas.

Basically what I'd like to do, and since this is mildly work intensive, I hope people will be interested is explore how those different orders might react, sort of putting ourselves into the seat of a particular subset of Paladins under a particular deity. Anyways without further ado, here are my moral dillema:

If you come across two wounded people on the side of the road, and they are both mortally wounded, how do you determine who you should save? If one of them is a member of your family should this affect your decision? If one of them is a noble would this affect your decision? Are there any other factors that would affect your decision?

For the second moral dilemma:

Suppose you are traveling on a quest to stop a mighty demon from overthrowing the kingdom (I know we're short on specifics here, but it is deliberately vague to make the scenario appropriate for all level ranges), you are stopped by a peasant who is clearly starving, supposing you have no magical means to feed him or yourself, he asks you for food, but this could prevent you from being able to reach the demon in time, do you feed him? What if it's a child? What factors might affect this decision?

And a third!

For the third dilemma, let us suppose, that we have a prisoner who has been captured, you suspect that he has committed severe crimes (significant enough to require that he be punished by execution). In fact he himself admits as such. But you are not able to take him to be tried at this time, what should you do?

It is important to note that many of these problems would be solvable using a very minor application of magic. However that's not really in the spirit of this particular challenge. Mostly I'm looking for both the normal religions and the odd ones, for example a Paladin of Tyr is likely to have a different moral outlook than a Paladin of Wee Jas might. And I'm very interested to see how that would play out in theory.

Edit: Forgot to add that there is no setting limitations here. However I'm not as familiar with the Pathfinder CoC so I can't speak to it, but I'd be interested in hearing how those folks would respond.

[FidgetySquirrel]

As to the second dilemma, you might want to add that you can't just 'chuck a ration at 'em.'

[JusticeZero]

1: Save both of them. The skill check is not limited by time. That said, if you go to one and stabilize them, and the other one dies as you do, you are without fault. Heal the one who is closer.

2: If you have no food, you cannot feed them. If you have trail rations, give them a bit. One sandwich won't make a significant difference to you. You can seek them out once the demon is defeated.

3: How did you come to have the prisoner? That matters a lot here. If they were the session BBEG, why are you taking prisoners you can't bring back?

Most situations aren't actually confining enough to make a dilemma a dilemma. When they come up, it's usually a contrived trap.

[Vizzerdrix]

If you come across two wounded people on the side of the road, and they are both mortally wounded, how do you determine who you should save? If one of them is a member of your family should this affect your decision? If one of them is a noble would this affect your decision? Are there any other factors that would affect your decision?

They are both murderers. Smite them.



Suppose you are traveling on a quest to stop a mighty demon from overthrowing the kingdom (I know we're short on specifics here, but it is deliberately vague to make the scenario appropriate for all level ranges), you are stopped by a peasant who is clearly starving, supposing you have no magical means to feed him or yourself, he asks you for food, but this could prevent you from being able to reach the demon in time, do you feed him? What if it's a child? What factors might affect this decision?

He is attempting to delay you from stopping the demon. Smite him.



For the third dilemma, let us suppose, that we have a prisoner who has been captured, you suspect that he has committed severe crimes (significant enough to require that he be punished by execution). In fact he himself admits as such. But you are not able to take him to be tried at this time, what should you do?


Paladin =/= police. Letting such a person live is equivalent to committing his future crimes yourself. Smite him.

[Coidzor]

If you come across two wounded people on the side of the road, and they are both mortally wounded, how do you determine who you should save? If one of them is a member of your family should this affect your decision? If one of them is a noble would this affect your decision? Are there any other factors that would affect your decision?

What *is* Mortally Wounded in d20, when you get right down to it?

[FidgetySquirrel]

What *is* Mortally Wounded in d20, when you get right down to it?Mechanically, the closest thing I can think of is undead, so I guess what Vizzerdrix said makes a lot more sense than I initially thought.

[Phelix-Mu]

Part of being good is that you can't ignore the small evil in preference of dealing with the big one. While a given order may modify this (like maybe the god of smiting demons for scenario 2), that would be about law, in my mind. All evil must be avoided whenever possible; if you leave the man on the side of the road to starve to save the city from the demon, maybe the man dies and becomes a ghost who slaughters thousands. You can't see the future, but any evil that you are confronted with, you must deal with in the best way that you can.

Is there a solution to do both? Can you feed the man and save the kingdom? Then that is what you should do. Be creative and exceed your limits; those are both strong suits of being good, and paladins should be the epitome of spitting in the face of impossible situations and achieving virtue in the face of doom.

There are definitely multiple ways to solve any situation. In fact, the idea of "choose A or B" is a very seductively evil way to look at things. And thus evil often uses the False Choice as a method of corrupting mortals, making them think that evil option A is acceptable because it is less evil than option B. The truth is that reality is almost never binary; thinking that way pre-judges reality, placing the paladin in a position of thinking "I understand the situation perfectly" (very unlikely) and sets up a dichotomy that, as often as not, will result in the paladin not operating at his most virtuous.

And, as in all of this, a paladin can be in situations where badness happens, by omission or commission, and should be saddened and seek atonement/spiritual guidance about how to act better in the future. Good people should try not to fall, but, much more important than never falling, is always getting back up, the wiser for one's failures. (Fall here in the gravity sense, not the paladin sense.)

[AMFV]

What *is* Mortally Wounded in d20, when you get right down to it?

Well let's say for the purposes of this exercise, they can be at -9 and both are going to fail their fortitude saves next round (now you'd have no way of knowing this, but we can assume that since this is an in-universe hypothetical that would work), and you only have sufficient movement to reach one of them rather than both.

[AMFV]

1: Save both of them. The skill check is not limited by time. That said, if you go to one and stabilize them, and the other one dies as you do, you are without fault. Heal the one who is closer.

They are both of equal distance, and you can only reach one, the question is how does a Paladin notionally decide which one.



2: If you have no food, you cannot feed them. If you have trail rations, give them a bit. One sandwich won't make a significant difference to you. You can seek them out once the demon is defeated.

Well let's say it does, you're tight on food, as well, and you have just enough for you, but not enough if you give them food.



3: How did you come to have the prisoner? That matters a lot here. If they were the session BBEG, why are you taking prisoners you can't bring back?

Because he surrendered, to your lawful authority. He surrenders, now the question how does one deal with evil.



Part of being good is that you can't ignore the small evil in preference of dealing with the big one. While a given order may modify this (like maybe the god of smiting demons for scenario 2), that would be about law, in my mind. All evil must be avoided whenever possible; if you leave the man on the side of the road to starve to save the city from the demon, maybe the man dies and becomes a ghost who slaughters thousands. You can't see the future, but any evil that you are confronted with, you must deal with in the best way that you can.

Is there a solution to do both? Can you feed the man and save the kingdom? Then that is what you should do. Be creative and exceed your limits; those are both strong suits of being good, and paladins should be the epitome of spitting in the face of impossible situations and achieving virtue in the face of doom.

There are definitely multiple ways to solve any situation. In fact, the idea of "choose A or B" is a very seductively evil way to look at things. And thus evil often uses the False Choice as a method of corrupting mortals, making them think that evil option A is acceptable because it is less evil than option B. The truth is that reality is almost never binary; thinking that way pre-judges reality, placing the paladin in a position of thinking "I understand the situation perfectly" (very unlikely) and sets up a dichotomy that, as often as not, will result in the paladin not operating at his most virtuous.

And, as in all of this, a paladin can be in situations where badness happens, by omission or commission, and should be saddened and seek atonement/spiritual guidance about how to act better in the future. Good people should try not to fall, but, much more important than never falling, is always getting back up, the wiser for one's failures. (Fall here in the gravity sense, not the paladin sense.)

Well here what we are looking for is how a paladin order would have dogmatized it. They are certainly lawful and therefore would each likely have more guidance than the Paladin's CoC.

Here I will provide an example of what I'm kind of looking for, provided as a Paladin of we'll say Ilmater (I know he's easy but it's at least a better situation)

In the first, the Paladin of Ilmater attempts to save whoever is most likely to survive, since this is clear, however if he can't do that he'd choose to save somebody that is more innocent, since Ilmater values innocence. He would be less likely to save somebody close to him because of the importance he places on personal sacrifice.

In the second, a Paladin of Ilmater would absolutely give the rations to the begger, even if he would starve to death himself, that sort of sacrifice is something that Ilmater values highly, and is in the highest ideal for his orders. Even if there was a greater evil a Paladin of Ilmater would likely take the higher sacrifice and try to push through.

In the last scenario, a Paladin of Ilmater would likely not execute somebody, because they themselves do not hold that sort of authority, and they don't believe in that particular sort of subversion of authority. They would likely attempt to leave him for the authorities.

And yes I know that there are many ways around these, these are supposed to be in-universe hypotheticals as proposed by an Order of Paladins to determine Dogma, so the clever way around isn't really in the spirit of it (although that can be fun too)

Edit: And furthermore there are scenarios where you have only a limited number of options. The two people dying and you have only time to help one is one that I've met people who have encountered in the real world. It happens and to imply that they could have found a "way around" is a little bit ridiculous. If you run into a starving child and you have only enough food for you, you can give him food or not, but you can't magic more of that into existence. Which is explicitly why I limited the hypotheticals as I did.

Edit 2: Also I forgot to mention that there Ilmater also values mercy more highly perhaps than some patrons and would likely be more inclined to encourage his orders to be merciful rather than vengeful.

[JHShadon]

They are both of equal distance, and you can only reach one, the question is how does a Paladin notionally decide which one.

If the situation is as dire as you said, there's no time to decide, just go to the one your instincts tell you to.

[AMFV]

If the situation is as dire as you said, there's no time to decide, just go to the one your instincts tell you to.

There would certainly be Paladin orders that would encourage that. But I doubt all of them would. For example with Corellon Latharian you might find that encouraged, or with Sune. But it is unlikely that Helm wouldn't have some complex set of procedures, or that Wee Jas wouldn't. The question here isn't what would somebody do in that scenario, but what would their order expect them to do.

[AuraTwilight]

If you run into a starving child and you have only enough food for you, you can give him food or not, but you can't magic more of that into existence.

Yes you can. It's in the PHB.

[AMFV]

Yes you can. It's in the PHB.

Well you don't have that spell prepared, or you're in a wild magic zone where it could be unpredictable and have much worse results than the food. Or you're a Paladin with a wisdom of 8... There are numerous reasons why that may be unavailable to you.

[Gildedragon]

1) both at -9 and about to fail a save? Heal any one of them, bury the other. Nobility, race, age, sex all have nothing to do with the choice. If having trouble picking pick the one on your non dominant side, the fist one that catches your eye, or has a good omen over them.
2) retain them as help, share rations for a few days until you and them can craft a hunting lure with which they can get a 10 in survival.
3) try and redeem them. Otherwise, seeing how both you and them agree on the guilt and severity of the crimes, an execution. Clean and single blow. Ideally while they sleep, having forewarned them you'll have to execute them for their crimes.

[jedipotter]

This depends on if you think there is a Cosmic Good or not. I don't. I see Good as a big tent sort of thing, so there is no ''one'' answer.


1.A true good person would ''try'' and save both. If they can't, they would ''triage'' and save the one more likely to live a long life. They would sure save a good person over a neutral or bad person. They should save a ''more importiant'' person, then a common nobody.....even more so if this would be importiant in worldly matters. They would save Ambassaidor Jones before Farmer Fred. I'd say they could save the family member for anyone less then like the high cleric/king.

2.The paladin can ignore the commoners. The paladin is a warrior of good, not a preistly missionary. The paladin does not have arms, armor and all manner of combat abilities so he can feed the poor. The demon is far more importaint then one or two lives, even more so if the demon would kill dozens or more. And if your a paladian that feels he must feed the poor at all times....you'd better carry lots of extra food at all times.

3.Paladin's are judge, jury and enforcer if needed. They can take justice into thier own hands and take care of the prissoner. They are a lot like Marshals in the old west.

[JusticeZero]

Two people at -9? Whoever is closest. Don't waste time pondering.

[PaucaTerrorem]

Brings up the difference in orders. Does one Pally swing more Law than Good and another more Good than Law? Remember, Paladins don't necessarily follow a Deity. They follow an Ideal.

First dilemma I say Pally attempts to heal both. Does whatever he can and if one dies it's not on his head.

For the second question one could argue that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. Although that Pally better return after and check on the beggar. If that beggar does die and returns as a ghost and goes on a spooky murderous rampage, the Pally better deal with it.

Third scenario is easy. Bind the captive and take him with. Pally WILL be required to provide for the prisoner until he can bring him to the proper authorities. Or just Detect Evil. If he pings then get yo' smite on!

[Gildedragon]

There would certainly be Paladin orders that would encourage that. But I doubt all of them would. For example with Corellon Latharian you might find that encouraged, or with Sune. But it is unlikely that Helm wouldn't have some complex set of procedures, or that Wee Jas wouldn't. The question here isn't what would somebody do in that scenario, but what would their order expect them to do.

Wee jas probaby has rules regarding proper care taking of bodies, officiating of weddings (she is the core deity of love), as to triage: well that seems more like a Pelor thing.

[AMFV]

1) both at -9 and about to fail a save? Heal any one of them, bury the other. Nobility, race, age, sex all have nothing to do with the choice. If having trouble picking pick the one on your non dominant side, the fist one that catches your eye, or has a good omen over them.
2) retain them as help, share rations for a few days until you and them can craft a hunting lure with which they can get a 10 in survival.
3) try and redeem them. Otherwise, seeing how both you and them agree on the guilt and severity of the crimes, an execution. Clean and single blow. Ideally while they sleep, having forewarned them you'll have to execute them for their crimes.

Well the thing is that different orders would have different viewpoints on those things... Those are all valid options (as far as falling goes) but not necessarily as far as your order goes. This isn't a would you fall? exercise, this is a what dogma would exist exercise.

For example in 1, Nobanion would be inclined to encourage his order members to act to save the nobility, since nobles are of greater societal value, the Red Knight might as well. The same with Horus-Re. Heironious values Chivalry and so might his encourage his orders to save damsels over gentlemen. Not all orders have the same viewpoints, that's what I'm trying to look at. So yes, all good answers, but not all good answers for all orders.

[PaucaTerrorem]

Well the thing is that different orders would have different viewpoints on those things... Those are all valid options (as far as falling goes) but not necessarily as far as your order goes. This isn't a would you fall? exercise, this is a what dogma would exist exercise.

For example in 1, Nobanion would be inclined to encourage his order members to act to save the nobility, since nobles are of greater societal value, the Red Knight might as well. The same with Horus-Re. Heironious values Chivalry and so might his encourage his orders to save damsels over gentlemen. Not all orders have the same viewpoints, that's what I'm trying to look at. So yes, all good answers, but not all good answers for all orders.

I think you're shooting for individual answers in things that are case by case scenarios. If you're that worried about it then I suggest writing up a CoC for Paladins you play and asking the same for anyone playing one in a game you run.

Like I said, two people of LG alignment might hold different values while still maintaining LG status.

[AMFV]

I think you're shooting for individual answers in things that are case by case scenarios. If you're that worried about it then I suggest writing up a CoC for Paladins you play and asking the same for anyone playing one in a game you run.

Like I said, two people of LG alignment might hold different values while still maintaining LG status.

I'm shooting for that, yes, as I said I'm shooting for the position of various orders. Because they would likely have thought about and codified the answers. I'm not looking for the right answers. I'm looking for the right answers as a Paladin of Heironious, or as a Paladin of Wee Jas, or as an Illmaterite Paladin. And any others people want to include.

[Gildedragon]

Is then a paladin more beholden to Good and Law as transdivine forces or to their Order?
Problem with saying that due to class sex or race (without any other considerations) a life is more important than another... Well it is a clear path to Evil from there (start by saving the noble/woman/elf that is 100' away before saving the commoner/man/orc right next to one).
If an order has a code that says save X type of individuals before Y type, how far can it bend before a paladin is sacrificing Good or Law to obey their Patron, and is a Patron that would ask that of a paladin Patron that a paladin would serve?
My take is that a deity that would have paladin of orders cannot have Laws that contravene Good. Corellon Larethian's paladins' code ought not allow them to kill a surrendering non-combatant Drow just because of drow-ness, although LG clerics of him could be reasonably expected to off the spider worshiper.
This, naturally, can create tension between paladin and cleric orders of the same deity, as their expected conducts are different.

[AMFV]

Is then a paladin more beholden to Good and Law as transdivine forces or to their Order?
Problem with saying that due to class sex or race (without any other considerations) a life is more important than another... Well it is a clear path to Evil from there (start by saving the noble/woman/elf that is 100' away before saving the commoner/man/orc right next to one).
If an order has a code that says save X type of individuals before Y type, how far can it bend before a paladin is sacrificing Good or Law to obey their Patron, and is a Patron that would ask that of a paladin Patron that a paladin would serve?
My take is that a deity that would have paladin of orders cannot have Laws that contravene Good. Corellon Larethian's paladins' code ought not allow them to kill a surrendering non-combatant Drow just because of drow-ness, although LG clerics of him could be reasonably expected to off the spider worshiper.
This, naturally, can create tension between paladin and cleric orders of the same deity, as their expected conducts are different.

Well in this case, the point is that there is no distinction in terms of good, these are not falling offenses, and therefore the authority would likely be in the hands of the Order or the Paladin himself. Also you can't have an LG Cleric of Corellon Larethian, so they wouldn't have the issue of law against their particular order. Furthermore Correlon doesn't advocate the wholesale slaughter of Drow, he just hates them.

So the question is what reasonable guidance would those sort of lawful orders have, I mean we aren't bending anywhere near breaking the CoC here, so there would likely be guidance from such a lawful order regarding which thing to choose.

Edit: In essence if one had a Phylactery of Faithfullness what would it indicate for various deities in that scenario...

[Gildedragon]

I would figure orders have to do with resolving conflicts between Good and Law (like: no attacking a lawmaker/ruler/higher ranking individual regardless of alignment, or having no obligation to obey unjust and evil laws, or what is allowed in resisting evil laws (yes to disobeying by inaction but no to deliberately doing the opposite)) and what (and how) neutral actions are to be read as good or lawful (rules about proper food preparation, norms for sex/love, prohibitions on use of certain materials/spells)

[AMFV]

I would figure orders have to do with resolving conflicts between Good and Law (like: no attacking a lawmaker/ruler/higher ranking individual regardless of alignment, or having no obligation to obey unjust and evil laws, or what is allowed in resisting evil laws (yes to disobeying by inaction but no to deliberately doing the opposite)) and what (and how) neutral actions are to be read as good or lawful (rules about proper food preparation, norms for sex/love, prohibitions on use of certain materials/spells)

Yes, but they would clearly have guidance about this sort of thing. Since this is not an unheard of dilemma, and certainly those others things as well. I'm just interested in explicitly exploring what those guidelines might be for a specific order.

[Coidzor]

There would certainly be Paladin orders that would encourage that. But I doubt all of them would. For example with Corellon Latharian you might find that encouraged, or with Sune. But it is unlikely that Helm wouldn't have some complex set of procedures, or that Wee Jas wouldn't. The question here isn't what would somebody do in that scenario, but what would their order expect them to do.

However complex they'd be, they'd have to be able to be boiled down into quite recall and adjudication on the spur of the moment, too.

[Gildedragon]

I understand. And the other two cases have a lot of merit in sussing out order differences.
However in the first there is a nasty issue: a paladin order that says certain sorts of people are more valuable than others is extremely open to corruption; to small evils being allowed to befall the less worthy to protect the worthy. Those paladins soon cease to be paladins of honor but tyranny.
How many commoners does it take to match up to a noble's life? How great must the difference of need be?
Paladins can't function as agents of Good and Law in a system that tells them it's okay to kill an innocent kobold for the sake of an innocent gnome.

In cases such as 1 the paladin should make their choice personally, have no backup of Law to protect them from or justify their prejudices and expectations.

A Patron that says to paladins "certain evils are okay in the pursuit of my agenda" is not a deity that can have full-hearted paladins. (Note that this is my problem with Vow of Obedience)

[AMFV]

However complex they'd be, they'd have to be able to be boiled down into quite recall and adjudication on the spur of the moment, too.

Well this is more a setting thought experiment than anything else, I'm profoundly interested in what those differences would wind up being. I'm mostly interested in exploring the deeper parts of being a Paladin, especially as there had been some really good insights in the previous thread, so I'm interested to see what people would come up with.


I understand. And the other two cases have a lot of merit in sussing out order differences.
However in the first there is a nasty issue: a paladin order that says certain sorts of people are more valuable than others is extremely open to corruption; to small evils being allowed to befall the less worthy to protect the worthy. Those paladins soon cease to be paladins of honor but tyranny.
How many commoners does it take to match up to a noble's life? How great must the difference of need be?
Paladins can't function as agents of Good and Law in a system that tells them it's okay to kill an innocent kobold for the sake of an innocent gnome.

In cases such as 1 the paladin should make their choice personally, have no backup of Law to protect them from or justify their prejudices and expectations.

A Patron that says to paladins "certain evils are okay in the pursuit of my agenda" is not a deity that can have full-hearted paladins. (Note that this is my problem with Vow of Obedience)

But people are not equally valuable... Not to all orders or all peoples. And inequality is NOT Evil in D&D, in fact many lawful societies have inequality. This is a modern values issue. In this case there clearly is a need to choose who to save. Furthermore the only scenario where the Paladin is (potentially) "killing" anyone is the last one, in the other two, he's determining if he can save them, which is something where one's God's preferences might come into play. Yes killing somebody to save somebody you like is probably not that great, but choosing to save somebody because you only have time to save one, are you telling me that choosing to save somebody that is important to me or to my philosophy is morally wrong?

Paladins belong to dogmatic orders (generally) as such, and as they are lawful, they should follow their orders unless there is direct conflict with their consciousness as there is no question of good here (since saving one person is roughly as good as another), there is then a question of law or what other motivations might be used. "I used my gut" is not going to cut it at all Paladin orders, because they don't all value gut instinct, many of them, particularly the rules heavy ones value the rules.

For example we could have an order that advocates saving family, like Moradin might, Dwarves place a huge importance on family, and if there is a choice then that's what must be made, and there should be no shame in that, because the Paladin is not murdering anybody, he's acting to make a difficult choice in a bad situation.

Lastly, Wee Jas (who has evil tendencies) can have Paladins, Helm (LN not LG) can have Paladins, Kelemvor (who maintains the wall, and yes I know there is logic behind it, but as far as I'm concerned it's stupid logic) can have Paladins. A God can be not good and have Paladins, and their Paladins might behave in a different manner in how they mete out justice and good, and that is important. They don't ask their Paladins to do evil, but they might ask them to do good differently than another Paladin might, or with more difference to law, or with specific agendas, there's a lot of different agendas where there is room for good.

[Blackhawk748]

Ok im gonna go with how my Pally of Wee Jaas would deal with these (i played him a LONG time ago so i dont remember his specific CoC)

1. Hes gonna go with his gut, if ones a child hes probably gonna heal them first otherwise it will be whoever he noticed first.

2. (im gonna change it to Lich for this) He'd give some rations to the guy and then point him towards town and tell him to tell the priest that the pally sent him and that he is to be given a job. He'll deal with the lack of food by either having the Druid/Ceric (depends whose in the party) or the Ranger loan him some food.

3. He probably would have gotten a warrant for the guy before, so hed probably be licensed to kill him, but if not i would just have to deal with him until i could get to the proper authorities.

Wee Jaas Pallies lean more Law than Good.

[PaucaTerrorem]

Remember: Paladins don't follow a Deity. They follow an Ideal. They CAN, if they choose to, follow a Deity; but are in no way compelled to. They follow whomever matches their Ideals best.

[Gildedragon]

Problem with your reasoning, AMFV, is that putting lives' worth as something ordinal is that it legitimizes the doing of Evil to the less valuable. The paladin might not themselves do it, but they are endorsing it and acting in collusion with those who do, by following the rules that condone such acts. A Paladin order of Wee Jaz will not have promotion via assassination (though that it is IIRC par for the course in the clergy) it would speak out against it. LN gods can have paladins but the orders cannot condone evil

[AMFV]

Remember: Paladins don't follow a Deity. They follow an Ideal. They CAN, if they choose to, follow a Deity; but are in no way compelled to. They follow whomever matches their Ideals best.

It should be noted that this is highly setting dependent. FR Paladins definitely, definitely receive their powers directly from a deity. And they'd still have orders for each deity, those have been outlined before, so it's reasonable to expect that the orders would have theology. And furthermore all of the options that people have presented fit with the ideals as presented of "law and good" so we have multiple options for that same ideal, so the question is what roles does that Dogma play? How does it affect a Paladin's choice when he has a dilemma where neither answer is clearly any better. This is a clear matter of law, and it I suspect unreasonable to assume that Paladin Orders would not think about this.


Ok im gonna go with how my Pally of Wee Jaas would deal with these (i played him a LONG time ago so i dont remember his specific CoC)

1. Hes gonna go with his gut, if ones a child hes probably gonna heal them first otherwise it will be whoever he noticed first.

2. (im gonna change it to Lich for this) He'd give some rations to the guy and then point him towards town and tell him to tell the priest that the pally sent him and that he is to be given a job. He'll deal with the lack of food by either having the Druid/Ceric (depends whose in the party) or the Ranger loan him some food.

3. He probably would have gotten a warrant for the guy before, so hed probably be licensed to kill him, but if not i would just have to deal with him until i could get to the proper authorities.

Wee Jaas Pallies lean more Law than Good.

This is pretty close although it's worth noting that these are hypotheticals in-universe, so think of these as questions proposed to his order.

1.) Well let's say he notices both of them first, so is the only issue that a Paladin of Wee Jas consider childhood? Would beauty factor in? Since Wee Jas values beauty? Would she want magic-users saved before those who could not? What about Suel Ancestry?

2.) We'll say that the Paladin is alone in this scenario, his party is absent or dead. So you would be willing to lose out on pursuing the lich as rapidly? I'm not sure if that dogmatically fits Wee Jas or not, although I expect her Paladin orders would be interesting since they would be so vastly outnumbered.

3.) We'll say that he is someone who has abused magic. You weren't hunting him, he remorsefully threw himself on your mercy, you're not in a location where you can take him to town quickly, and in fact are trying to avoid drawing notice to yourself and he's conspicuous, would a Paladin of Wee Jas believe that they constituted sufficient authority under those circumstances?


Problem with your reasoning, AMFV, is that putting lives' worth as something ordinal is that it legitimizes the doing of Evil to the less valuable. The paladin might not themselves do it, but they are endorsing it and acting in collusion with those who do, by following the rules that condone such acts. A Paladin order of Wee Jaz will not have promotion via assassination (though that it is IIRC par for the course in the clergy) it would speak out against it. LN gods can have paladins but the orders cannot condone evil


You are mistaken sir, there is no scenario here where the Paladin is directly committing evil, he did not collude with the murderers who injured the travelers, but he can only save one of them, and you're telling me that all orders would all say "trust your gut"? I doubt that would be the case. I mean if both options are equally good, and they are... then it falls to law to determine what the correct option for a paladin would be, and that varies depending on order.

[PaucaTerrorem]

Than I would say you have some homework. Read Deities & Demigods. Check each and every portfolio and codify all the CoC for each sect.

My problem with this is that one Pally of Wee Jas might follow the more Neutral path while another Pally of Wee Jas follows the more Lawful side of things. Both fully Lawful Neutral. That means you now have two Pallys of the same deity with two slightly differing beliefs on whats mostest important. Two sets of CoC.

[AMFV]

Than I would say you have some homework. Read Deities & Demigods. Check each and every portfolio and codify all the CoC for each sect.

My problem with this is that one Pally of Wee Jas might follow the more Neutral path while another Pally of Wee Jas follows the more Lawful side of things. Both fully Lawful Neutral. That means you now have two Pallys of the same deity with two slightly differing beliefs on whats mostest important. Two sets of CoC.

That seems unlikely, they'd have a codified order. They're lawful, and law is all about codifying the rules. Also you can't follow any path as a Paladin that is not Lawful and Good without using some variant rules (not that I'm opposed to them, but they would introduce more complexity than we need). I accept that a LN Paladin (I don't remember what Dragon called them, sorry) would have different rules than a LG Paladin, but I don't accept that LG Paladins from the same order would have different rules. Also I'm not aiming to rewrite the CoC, I'm aiming to explore the dogma created by the CoC as a matter of course. And while I could do all of that myself, I find discussion on the subject to be illuminating.

[Gildedragon]

I did not mean collude with the folk that waylaid the travelers but with folk that would have harm befall innocent group A for the sake of group B.
The paladin in choosing Bob to live (because Bob is B) is saying Bs are worth more than As. The paladin justified Evil acts there and then. The paladin justifies Bs merely watching As get slaughtered by Cs when they could help; Bs marginalizing As out of resources and livelihoods; Bs exploiting As; Bs treating As as less.
A paladin ought not expect all folk be LG but if they are doing E stuff and justifying it with a paladin's code and actions, it means the paladin should look into their code and actions and fix something somewhere

The order might state preferences but the moment it states them as mandate they place themselves in opposition to the paladin's imperative to do right.
A paladin can live in a hierarchy, but their imperative to G means they cannot see those lower down the totem pole as less worthy or valuable than those on high.
Individual discernment is how it would work: be it triage, strategy, reasoning, or prejudice. A paladin ought never justify doing (or not doing) good/evil by "it was the law".

You are having the paladin defend their acts post-facto and saying "I followed my gut" is a bad defense. Much worse is "I saved Al and not Bob because Bob was not one of Us/ Bob was a B/ Bob was not an A, and the Law says Bs are less worthy of saving"

Nepotism, sexism, nationalism, classism and racism ought not figure into a paladin's code regardless of the paladin having said attributes.

[AMFV]

I did not mean collude with the folk that waylaid the travelers but with folk that would have harm befall innocent group A for the sake of group B.
The paladin in choosing Bob to live (because Bob is B) is saying Bs are worth more than As. The paladin justified Evil acts there and then. The paladin justifies Bs merely watching As get slaughtered by Cs when they could help; Bs marginalizing As out of resources and livelihoods; Bs exploiting As; Bs treating As as less.

But they aren't doing that, they aren't allowing any kind of injustice. Period. They are figuring which good ends they should work towards, and they clearly a matter for the order.



The order might state preferences but the moment it states them as mandate they place themselves in opposition to the paladin's imperative to do right.

A Paladin has a mandate to do right, but also to follow authority, they do not have a blanket mandate, they have a responsibility to law as well as good.



A paladin can live in a hierarchy, but their imperative to G means they cannot see those lower down the totem pole as less worthy or valuable than those on high.
Individual discernment is how it would work: be it triage, strategy, reasoning, or prejudice. A paladin ought never justify doing (or not doing) good/evil by "it was the law".

A paladin absolutely, ABSOLUTELY should follow the law, they need to follow the law, that's part of their code. Individual discernment is how a Paladin of Freedom should operate, formal laws is how a standard Paladin should, since he places a higher value on order than on his personal instincts, and that is often the correct thing to do.



You are having the paladin defend their acts post-facto and saying "I followed my gut" is a bad defense. Much worse is "I saved Al and not Bob because Bob was not one of Us/ Bob was a B/ Bob was not an A, and the Law says Bs are less worthy of saving"

I didn't say that "I followed my gut" is a bad defense, in general. I only said that in specific cases it would be.



Nepotism, sexism, nationalism, classism and racism ought not figure into a paladin's code regardless of the paladin having said attributes.

Nepotism, sexism, nationalism, classism and racism, are not necessarily Evil in a D&D context, morality in D&D is not real-world morality. And part of the fun in exploring fantasy religions is having to step outside a real world comfort zone.

[PaucaTerrorem]

We house-rule Pallys of any alignment mix besides TN. Just gotta make sure you play the alignment.

But sticking to the LG ones I revert to my last bit of advice. Read what each deity holds dearest and work it in. I enjoy this topic but to hold this conversation in a Forum is tedious to me. Too much typing, not enough yelling at those who disagree with me.:smallbiggrin:

[AMFV]

We house-rule Pallys of any alignment mix besides TN. Just gotta make sure you play the alignment.

But sticking to the LG ones I revert to my last bit of advice. Read what each deity holds dearest and work it in. I enjoy this topic but to hold this conversation in a Forum is tedious to me. Too much typing, not enough yelling at those who disagree with me.:smallbiggrin:

Well it is a lot of typing but it could be fun. I mean some of those Paladin orders are really unusual. The Red Knight would be interesting I think, there are so many fascinating options here.

[Starbuck_II]

Basically what I'd like to do, and since this is mildly work intensive, I hope people will be interested is explore how those different orders might react, sort of putting ourselves into the seat of a particular subset of Paladins under a particular deity. Anyways without further ado, here are my moral dillema:

If you come across two wounded people on the side of the road, and they are both mortally wounded, how do you determine who you should save? If one of them is a member of your family should this affect your decision? If one of them is a noble would this affect your decision? Are there any other factors that would affect your decision?

Are they the same race as me?
If I'm a halfling and two humans are dying. I'll save the less tasty looking one.



For the second moral dilemma:

Suppose you are traveling on a quest to stop a mighty demon from overthrowing the kingdom (I know we're short on specifics here, but it is deliberately vague to make the scenario appropriate for all level ranges), you are stopped by a peasant who is clearly starving, supposing you have no magical means to feed him or yourself, he asks you for food, but this could prevent you from being able to reach the demon in time, do you feed him? What if it's a child? What factors might affect this decision?

Hope the peasant eats humans because the dying one from choice one is my meal. :smallbiggrin:
I'll share a leg.


And a third!

For the third dilemma, let us suppose, that we have a prisoner who has been captured, you suspect that he has committed severe crimes (significant enough to require that he be punished by execution). In fact he himself admits as such. But you are not able to take him to be tried at this time, what should you do?

I am not the LAW, unless I am. If I am the LAW, the I execute him for dinner!
If I am not the LAW, then I bide him to repent and continue on my way.

[Phelix-Mu]

Lemme try Moradin:

1.) Is either a dwarf? If not, is either a child or an elder? Dwarf society is deferential both to elders and to the young (since young dwarves are a rare and treasured commodity relative to other races), so those might get preference, even if neither is a dwarf. Is either in a position of responsibility within a community? Dwarves have strong community ethic, and thus an order might recognize the practicality in saving people who help enforce or uphold the rule of law within a community. But, the bottom line is that the actual saving of at least one of them is key; a dwarf paladin of Moradin probably wouldn't ignore the tenets of triage for any of the above reasons.

2.) Is the person capable of earning for themselves? If so, give them a ride to the nearest settlement on the way to the endangered kingdom, a tool, a can to shake, and so forth. If there is even the smallest way to improve the starving person's chances, then take it. Otherwise, Moradin focuses a lot on law and order, so making sure the kingdom doesn't fall into anarchy is likely more important to a dwarven pally of Moradin.

3.) Personal responsibility to the community is important to dwarves. A dwarven pally might take on an approved role as executioner, but it would have to be approved. Assigning oneself executioner duties when convenient doesn't seem to be something of which Moradin would approve.

[AMFV]

Lemme try Moradin:

1.) Is either a dwarf? If not, is either a child or an elder? Dwarf society is deferential both to elders and to the young (since young dwarves are a rare and treasured commodity relative to other races), so those might get preference, even if neither is a dwarf. Is either in a position of responsibility within a community? Dwarves have strong community ethic, and thus an order might recognize the practicality in saving people who help enforce or uphold the rule of law within a community. But, the bottom line is that the actual saving of at least one of them is key; a dwarf paladin of Moradin probably wouldn't ignore the tenets of triage for any of the above reasons.

2.) Is the person capable of earning for themselves? If so, give them a ride to the nearest settlement on the way to the endangered kingdom, a tool, a can to shake, and so forth. If there is even the smallest way to improve the starving person's chances, then take it. Otherwise, Moradin focuses a lot on law and order, so making sure the kingdom doesn't fall into anarchy is likely more important to a dwarven pally of Moradin.

3.) Personal responsibility to the community is important to dwarves. A dwarven pally might take on an approved role as executioner, but it would have to be approved. Assigning oneself executioner duties when convenient doesn't seem to be something of which Moradin would approve.

This is pretty interesting. Moradin is a pretty interesting case since his dogma is in many ways a microcosm of dwarven culture. This is pretty much spot-on, I imagine, I'm not familiar enough with Moradin's stuff, and I'm not near my RoS at the moment, but it looks really outstanding.

[Phelix-Mu]

It is an interesting case. Dwarves are actually pretty practical; while their society has a lawful/conservative bend to it, their traditions have largely come from being a pretty down-to-earth culture that values hard work, self-defense capability, and connection to kin and clan. Outsiders may view dwarves as insular and somewhat racist (or at least offensively "proud"), but a lot of this comes from an engrained reliance on each other for survival in hostile areas, for production of complicated goods, and for mining (almost always best accomplished with a group ethic). They value what they make, whether by the sweat of their labors or the family traditions they perpetuate, and guard such things closely (hence their tendency to ask "is there a dwarf?", but almost all the racial deities have such a caveat).

Thus, overall, their paladins are actually not quite as ardently Lawful as one might expect, as all of dwarf society is generally respecting of the law (at least traditional society; there are always outliers). Instead, they kind of bring a bit of practicality to the normal paladin schtick, trying to represent their god's connection to all dwarven values, even outside of dwarf society. In effect, they are trying to represent the best of being a dwarf to everyone, which isn't well-achieved by being a bigoted tightwad. Of course, the subtext is that dwarves believe that everyone would benefit from being more dwarf-like, but, what can you expect from a racial priesthood, really?

At least that is my take on it. I am steeped in 2e dwarfdom from days of yore, so I can't quote Races of Stone at you, but from what I recall they didn't change that much.

EDIT: Classically, dwarves have had problems sustaining population due to low birthrates. It's interesting to consider how such an issue might or might not soften a culture's view toward conflict, outsiders, and proselytizing.

[Blackhawk748]

This is pretty close although it's worth noting that these are hypotheticals in-universe, so think of these as questions proposed to his order.

1.) Well let's say he notices both of them first, so is the only issue that a Paladin of Wee Jas consider childhood? Would beauty factor in? Since Wee Jas values beauty? Would she want magic-users saved before those who could not? What about Suel Ancestry?

2.) We'll say that the Paladin is alone in this scenario, his party is absent or dead. So you would be willing to lose out on pursuing the lich as rapidly? I'm not sure if that dogmatically fits Wee Jas or not, although I expect her Paladin orders would be interesting since they would be so vastly outnumbered.

3.) We'll say that he is someone who has abused magic. You weren't hunting him, he remorsefully threw himself on your mercy, you're not in a location where you can take him to town quickly, and in fact are trying to avoid drawing notice to yourself and he's conspicuous, would a Paladin of Wee Jas believe that they constituted sufficient authority under those circumstances?

Ok now that ive had some time to think i believe i can answer some of these.

1. Ok i put children first because they have untapped potential, Wee Jaas would probably put Sorcerers first (as there are only so many of them), with Wizards and people with vast knowledge second, but this is generally hard to tell from a quick glance.

2. If alone, id prbly just suck it up and make the Fort save against starvation, it would take me maybe 2 minutes to do this. (this is the good side kicking in)

3.This one is.....tricky. Its possible, it kinda depends what he did, did he reanimate a bunch of people into intelligent undead? Then id probably pronounce sentence and give him a quick death.

Slight note that i forgot to include earlier. My Paladin of Wee Jaas was more oriented with the Death side of her portfolio, so he wasnt ok with undead because it screwed with a Universal Law, though he accepted that all Laws must be flexible and have occasional exceptions ie good undead.

[hamishspence]

A Paladin has a mandate to do right, but also to follow authority, they do not have a blanket mandate, they have a responsibility to law as well as good.

A paladin absolutely, ABSOLUTELY should follow the law, they need to follow the law, that's part of their code.

Good is the highest priority though.

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

Lawful does not necessarily mean "adheres to the letter of the law." A law (or body of laws) is merely a rule that a government imposes on those who are subject to its power. A lawful alignment, on the other hand, represents an orderly approach to matters of ethics and personal conduct. Most lawful characters do respect the order that the laws of the realm represent, but adherence to local ordinances is only one way of demonstrating a lawful alignment.
...
Any character might fear the consequences of breaking a local law, especially when the authorities rule with an iron hand. Very few characters, however, should make important decisions based solely on the legality of the choices. For a lawful good character such as a paladin, achieving goals in the right way -- that is, in a way that promotes the general welfare and doesn't unnecessarily imperil others -- is the most important consideration.
...
A paladin is both lawful and good, and she must uphold both aspects of her alignment. Thus, if the laws in a particular realm are corrupt and evil, she is under no obligation to obey them.

[Auramis]

For all of the following scenarios, I'm assuming I'm a paladin to Pelor.

For the first dilemma: "How do you weigh a life?"
Is one of them older than the other? If so, I'd save the younger one, as he'she has experienced less of life and may have the potential to do more good in the future than the older dying person. If they are humble and good, they may agree with that decision.
If it's a man and a woman, I would save the woman, because it's considered honorable to save women and children before men (sexist and archaic as they may sound to some).
If one of the dying people is an authority figure and has large influence over the region, it's important that they live, as their death could upset the region.
If I actually know one of the two, I'd allow myself to be biased and save the person I know, as that would be a sign of loyalty to that friendship.
Regardless of all of the above, if either one of them told me to save the other in the time they have left, I would save the one they wish to be saved. If they both ask that of me, I'll simply follow the logic of the above reasons.


For the second dilemma: "The good of the many outweighs the good of the few or the one."
Simple as this solution may seem, I'd simply offer him coinage or rations and tell him I am in hurry to save lives of several people.
If I don't have any money or rations and I don't have the ability to conjure food, regretful as it may be, stopping to feed him would be willingly ignoring my duty to protect the kingdom and the lives of many more people. Even if I were to feed him, if I failed to save the kingdom, his life would be in danger anyway. If I am able to save the kingdom, hopefully, once I am done, I may be able to find him and save him.


For the third dilemma: "The wicked do not go unpunished."
Only if I am absolutely certain he is guilty (Zone of Truth, if possible), I would carry out his execution as formally as possible. As a paladin, I should have the authority to do such, if it is necessary. I will explain everything later to the authorities after having the man write a confession and signing it. If he is willing to state he deserve to be killed for his crimes, then he should have no qualms with it. I also ask him if he has any final requests that he wants to be heard and if he wishes to pray with me before I execute him. Just because he has committed a crime doesn't mean he isn't deserving of dignity and respect or that he is necessarily an evil person (unless Detect Evil says otherwise, though that doesn't mean I should disrespect him either: I'm Lawful Good, not Lawful Inhumane).
Alternatively, if it's possible to prove that he is innocent and simply wishes to die because he is miserable, I would do what I can to talk with him and convince him to muster the will to live however I can. The dilemma doesn't say that he has concretely and definitely committed crimes, after all: only that we suspect it. Suspicion is far from fact.

[Sith_Happens]

Hm, out of the deities likely to have Paladin orders, which one is closest to "god of crazy preparation?" Because I'm suddenly imagining a Paladin with a Haversack full of random scrolls, each one purchased based on some overly-specific moral or ethical quandary that it could be used to sidestep.

[Gildedragon]

Hm, out of the deities likely to have Paladin orders, which one is closest to "god of crazy preparation?" Because I'm suddenly imagining a Paladin with a Haversack full of random scrolls, each one purchased based on some overly-specific moral or ethical quandary that it could be used to sidestep.

Wee Jas: Goddess of magic, advocates lichdom and necropolitanizing (ie planning for undeath, ie planning very long term)

[AMFV]

Hm, out of the deities likely to have Paladin orders, which one is closest to "god of crazy preparation?" Because I'm suddenly imagining a Paladin with a Haversack full of random scrolls, each one purchased based on some overly-specific moral or ethical quandary that it could be used to sidestep.

The Red Knight in Faerun is literally that. That's pretty much his/her (for the life of me I can't recall that deity's gender), but the deity is completely focused on strategy and planning.


For all of the following scenarios, I'm assuming I'm a paladin to Pelor.

For the first dilemma: "How do you weigh a life?"
Is one of them older than the other? If so, I'd save the younger one, as he'she has experienced less of life and may have the potential to do more good in the future than the older dying person. If they are humble and good, they may agree with that decision.
If it's a man and a woman, I would save the woman, because it's considered honorable to save women and children before men (sexist and archaic as they may sound to some).
If one of the dying people is an authority figure and has large influence over the region, it's important that they live, as their death could upset the region.
If I actually know one of the two, I'd allow myself to be biased and save the person I know, as that would be a sign of loyalty to that friendship.
Regardless of all of the above, if either one of them told me to save the other in the time they have left, I would save the one they wish to be saved. If they both ask that of me, I'll simply follow the logic of the above reasons.


For the second dilemma: "The good of the many outweighs the good of the few or the one."
Simple as this solution may seem, I'd simply offer him coinage or rations and tell him I am in hurry to save lives of several people.
If I don't have any money or rations and I don't have the ability to conjure food, regretful as it may be, stopping to feed him would be willingly ignoring my duty to protect the kingdom and the lives of many more people. Even if I were to feed him, if I failed to save the kingdom, his life would be in danger anyway. If I am able to save the kingdom, hopefully, once I am done, I may be able to find him and save him.


For the third dilemma: "The wicked do not go unpunished."
Only if I am absolutely certain he is guilty (Zone of Truth, if possible), I would carry out his execution as formally as possible. As a paladin, I should have the authority to do such, if it is necessary. I will explain everything later to the authorities after having the man write a confession and signing it. If he is willing to state he deserve to be killed for his crimes, then he should have no qualms with it. I also ask him if he has any final requests that he wants to be heard and if he wishes to pray with me before I execute him. Just because he has committed a crime doesn't mean he isn't deserving of dignity and respect or that he is necessarily an evil person (unless Detect Evil says otherwise, though that doesn't mean I should disrespect him either: I'm Lawful Good, not Lawful Inhumane).
Alternatively, if it's possible to prove that he is innocent and simply wishes to die because he is miserable, I would do what I can to talk with him and convince him to muster the will to live however I can. The dilemma doesn't say that he has concretely and definitely committed crimes, after all: only that we suspect it. Suspicion is far from fact.


The only thing I might have an issue with is the third point. Since if I recall Pelor's dogma correctly, I seem to recall that he had some focus on redemption over punishment, but I may be not correctly recalling.

Edit: Also I do want to say that's a very superb catch on the may be confessing even if he's not guilty. Since a confession is not necessarily an absolute indication of guilt. As I said the only thing I might have issue with is the redemption stance, although I assume that you assumed that he was not seeking redemption or was beyond redemption.


Good is the highest priority though.

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

Lawful does not necessarily mean "adheres to the letter of the law." A law (or body of laws) is merely a rule that a government imposes on those who are subject to its power. A lawful alignment, on the other hand, represents an orderly approach to matters of ethics and personal conduct. Most lawful characters do respect the order that the laws of the realm represent, but adherence to local ordinances is only one way of demonstrating a lawful alignment.
...
Any character might fear the consequences of breaking a local law, especially when the authorities rule with an iron hand. Very few characters, however, should make important decisions based solely on the legality of the choices. For a lawful good character such as a paladin, achieving goals in the right way -- that is, in a way that promotes the general welfare and doesn't unnecessarily imperil others -- is the most important consideration.
...
A paladin is both lawful and good, and she must uphold both aspects of her alignment. Thus, if the laws in a particular realm are corrupt and evil, she is under no obligation to obey them.



But in this case we are looking at the regulations of an order of Paladins. And there is no good-evil dilemma. So the adherence to law must be the most important thing. We're not suggesting that the Paladin should value Law over Good, but rather that if there is no question of which action is more good the Paladin should then follow Law.

[Auramis]

The only thing I might have an issue with is the third point. Since if I recall Pelor's dogma correctly, I seem to recall that he had some focus on redemption over punishment, but I may be not correctly recalling.

Edit: Also I do want to say that's a very superb catch on the may be confessing even if he's not guilty. Since a confession is not necessarily an absolute indication of guilt. As I said the only thing I might have issue with is the redemption stance, although I assume that you assumed that he was not seeking redemption or was beyond redemption.

Thanks about the catch! A lot of people seemed to be waving him off as guilty, and that didn't quite sit well with me, since there was never anything saying that was the truth of the matter!

As for why I would opt to execute him: While my deity may focus on the redemption of others, that doesn't mean that, if the laws of the land say otherwise, I have the right to supersede them with my religious beliefs. That would be unlawful. I have to respect the rule of the land if it is not grossly unjust. While I might have a problem with the law, were I a paladin to Heironeous or St. Cuthbert, it would be a non-issue. There's also the matter of the severity of his alleged crimes.

Pelor is Neutral Good, so there's no doubt you're probably right in saying he'd prefer the man not to die, but, as a Lawful Good paladin, I have allegiances to my god and to the rules of the land. There are some matters were one will supersede the other, but this isn't one of those cases for me.

[AMFV]

Thanks about the catch! A lot of people seemed to be waving him off as guilty, and that didn't quite sit well with me, since there was never anything saying that was the truth of the matter!

As for why I would opt to execute him: While my deity may focus on the redemption of others, that doesn't mean that, if the laws of the land say otherwise, I have the right to supersede them with my religious beliefs. That would be unlawful. I have to respect the rule of the land if it is not grossly unjust. While I might have a problem with the law, were I a paladin to Heironeous or St. Cuthbert, it would be a non-issue. There's also the matter of the severity of his alleged crimes.

Pelor is Neutral Good, so there's no doubt you're probably right in saying he'd prefer the man not to die, but, as a Lawful Good paladin, I have allegiances to my god and to the rules of the land. There are some matters were one will supersede the other, but this isn't one of those cases for me.

I concede the point then, also it's worth noting, that as a Neutral God, Pelor might be more okay with a Paladin taking on a role that he doesn't necessarily posses in legality (that of an executioner) than say St. Cuthbert, who would want the rule of law followed to a more exacting degree.

[Auramis]

I concede the point then, also it's worth noting, that as a Neutral God, Pelor might be more okay with a Paladin taking on a role that he doesn't necessarily posses in legality (that of an executioner) than say St. Cuthbert, who would want the rule of law followed to a more exacting degree.

Yep yep! Thanks for posing the questions, btw. I love moral dilemmas for paladins, since they're my favor class flavor-wise.

[atemu1234]

I'm going to respond to this thread candidly: A paladin would have to do the good thing as soon as it presents itself, and hope that their deity can work it out. This means that in the first case, he'd do his best to save both, even though he knows he's risking both their lives to do it. He would feed the peasant (apparently who lacks arms and legs so you must spoon-feed him) and he would hope to arrive in time to save people, even if he's risking it.

As pointed out in the previous thread, there are unwinnable (albeit very, very contrived) scenarios, in which they literally cannot commit good without committing evil. I presented a few of them. But that doesn't mean that he's completely at fault. Sure, he'd fall. But he'd atone fairly easily (any DM somewhere north of reasonable would agree to no-xp atonement) and if he roleplayed the decision well, may even get some XP as a bonus.

[AMFV]

I'm going to respond to this thread candidly: A paladin would have to do the good thing as soon as it presents itself, and hope that their deity can work it out. This means that in the first case, he'd do his best to save both, even though he knows he's risking both their lives to do it. He would feed the peasant (apparently who lacks arms and legs so you must spoon-feed him) and he would hope to arrive in time to save people, even if he's risking it.

As pointed out in the previous thread, there are unwinnable (albeit very, very contrived) scenarios, in which they literally cannot commit good without committing evil. I presented a few of them. But that doesn't mean that he's completely at fault. Sure, he'd fall. But he'd atone fairly easily (any DM somewhere north of reasonable would agree to no-xp atonement) and if he roleplayed the decision well, may even get some XP as a bonus.

Actually the general consensus was that there were no unnwinnable scenarios. And the point of this thread is that the Paladin orders would have dogma to deal with how to act in situations where there is moral ambiguity. We aren't looking at situations where a Paladin must choose between a good or an evil choice, but rather where one must choose between two good choices that are not necessarily equal depending on your perspective. The question is how would the lawful orders behind those Paladins affect the choices in question.

As to your answers: As was stated, saving both is impossible, you lack the time and the resources to do so, and spending time trying to save both may very well result in both dying, you have to make a choice, what factors might an order of Paladins consider important? Obviously this isn't a falling matter as none of them are, but that choice must be made.

As to the second, that may very well be an appropriate answer, but I cannot conceive that all orders of Paladins would agree, in fact if you'll read the post on the Paladin of Moradin, you'll see some very detailed and well founded arguments against that very idea from the perspective of that sort of Paladin.

[Coidzor]

That seems unlikely, they'd have a codified order. They're lawful, and law is all about codifying the rules. Also you can't follow any path as a Paladin that is not Lawful and Good without using some variant rules (not that I'm opposed to them, but they would introduce more complexity than we need). I accept that a LN Paladin (I don't remember what Dragon called them, sorry) would have different rules than a LG Paladin, but I don't accept that LG Paladins from the same order would have different rules. Also I'm not aiming to rewrite the CoC, I'm aiming to explore the dogma created by the CoC as a matter of course. And while I could do all of that myself, I find discussion on the subject to be illuminating.

Paladinism is kinda tricky, really. It has many parallels to being Called rather than truly made or learned by training, which would tend to make organization a bit difficult, and yet they're prototypically Lawful Good for a variety of reasons, some probably on spot and some probably no longer relevant to our understanding of the game or morality or alignment.

And then you've got these orders which just have Paladins shooting out of the wazoo straight out of the yin-yang like it's something you can just train people to do by taking in/kidnapping orphans off the street.

*shrug*

[atemu1234]

Actually the general consensus was that there were no unnwinnable scenarios. And the point of this thread is that the Paladin orders would have dogma to deal with how to act in situations where there is moral ambiguity. We aren't looking at situations where a Paladin must choose between a good or an evil choice, but rather where one must choose between two good choices that are not necessarily equal depending on your perspective. The question is how would the lawful orders behind those Paladins affect the choices in question.

As to your answers: As was stated, saving both is impossible, you lack the time and the resources to do so, and spending time trying to save both may very well result in both dying, you have to make a choice, what factors might an order of Paladins consider important? Obviously this isn't a falling matter as none of them are, but that choice must be made.

As to the second, that may very well be an appropriate answer, but I cannot conceive that all orders of Paladins would agree, in fact if you'll read the post on the Paladin of Moradin, you'll see some very detailed and well founded arguments against that very idea from the perspective of that sort of Paladin.

Whatever, I'm not going to hijack another thread to argue the point. In short, the paladin is supposed to act in good faith that things will work themselves out. He would feed the man, he'd try and save both, because he should honestly believe that things will work out. He'd try and make it work, even if he risks two people to do it, and risk people losing lives if it means saving a life. Like you pointed out, theoretical other people don't matter, right?

[AMFV]

Paladinism is kinda tricky, really. It has many parallels to being Called rather than truly made or learned by training, which would tend to make organization a bit difficult, and yet they're prototypically Lawful Good for a variety of reasons, some probably on spot and some probably no longer relevant to our understanding of the game or morality or alignment.

And then you've got these orders which just have Paladins shooting out of the wazoo straight out of the yin-yang like it's something you can just train people to do by taking in/kidnapping orphans off the street.

*shrug*

Well, being called is all well and good, but that doesn't mean that there ceases to be structure. I may be a standback to the way things were, but back in my day Paladins had orders they had to answer to, these newfangled folks without orders can't be trusted to necessarily be able to think through these kind of moral dilemma particularly not on the spot, that's part of the reason why orders are necessary, for guidance.


Whatever, I'm not going to hijack another thread to argue the point. In short, the paladin is supposed to act in good faith that things will work themselves out. He would feed the man, he'd try and save both, because he should honestly believe that things will work out. He'd try and make it work, even if he risks two people to do it, and risk people losing lives if it means saving a life. Like you pointed out, theoretical other people don't matter, right?

But the point is that he knows he can't. He's not acting in good faith if he tries to save both, he's acting without sense. The problem we have is that in this scenario one must choose who to save, that's all there is to it, it's not an evil thing to have to make that choice, a poor thing yes, but not evil. So how does one decide?

[atemu1234]

But the point is that he knows he can't. He's not acting in good faith if he tries to save both, he's acting without sense. The problem we have is that in this scenario one must choose who to save, that's all there is to it, it's not an evil thing to have to make that choice, a poor thing yes, but not evil. So how does one decide?

Ok, that's a bit clearer. Decide based on who would accomplish more in their life. Maybe go for the King Solomon scenario.

[AMFV]

Ok, that's a bit clearer. Decide based on who would accomplish more in their life. Maybe go for the King Solomon scenario.

My argument was that different orders would have different views on who would accomplish more in their lives, and would have dogma to back this up. Probably written ideals about what one should do in these sorts of scenarios. Since both are mortally wounded, the King Solomon scenario isn't very effective as they are both incapable of speech.

[Kuulvheysoon]

I know what we need right now is more discussion of the code of conduct for Paladins. But the previous thread, (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?360413-Paladin-will-fall-when-the-question-is-asked) has inspired me. Basically one of the things that I took out of that thread is that there might be multiple answers to any particular moral dilemma. Naturally since Paladins are lawful one would assume that each order would likely have thought about or at the very least considered these sort of dilemmas.

Basically what I'd like to do, and since this is mildly work intensive, I hope people will be interested is explore how those different orders might react, sort of putting ourselves into the seat of a particular subset of Paladins under a particular deity. Anyways without further ado, here are my moral dillema:I guess that I can try and tackle these.


If you come across two wounded people on the side of the road, and they are both mortally wounded, how do you determine who you should save? If one of them is a member of your family should this affect your decision? If one of them is a noble would this affect your decision? Are there any other factors that would affect your decision?

Suppose you are traveling on a quest to stop a mighty demon from overthrowing the kingdom (I know we're short on specifics here, but it is deliberately vague to make the scenario appropriate for all level ranges), you are stopped by a peasant who is clearly starving, supposing you have no magical means to feed him or yourself, he asks you for food, but this could prevent you from being able to reach the demon in time, do you feed him? What if it's a child? What factors might affect this decision?

For the third dilemma, let us suppose, that we have a prisoner who has been captured, you suspect that he has committed severe crimes (significant enough to require that he be punished by execution). In fact he himself admits as such. But you are not able to take him to be tried at this time, what should you do?


Likely the nearer one, unless she could obviously tell that one was much more beautiful than the other, and would then proceed to heal them (more of a subconscious choice, rather, as Sunites love beautiful things).
Hand the starving peasant some of her own rations. Failing that, give them a token of mine and tell them to go to the nearest Sunite temple, and they'll provide for them.
Bring him to the (proper) authorities, and give my full testimony.

Save the nearer one. No questions asked, really - Hoar has such a small clergy, they don't bother to curry favor with any nobility or merchant classes, and every life is equal. Get a friendly cleric to interrogate the spirit of the one that you couldn't save, though, and seek proper justice for it.
Hand out what rations he could, but then stop and listen to a (condensed) story of his situation. No injustice is too small, and he might be starving because of a tyrannical local lord (who would need to be dealt with). If an injustice had, in fact, been committed, return after dispensing justice to the demon.
If I've got absolute proof of his deeds (via a friendly caster, official documentation, or other such means), then go forward with the execution. Not just chopping off his head, however - the Doombringer has a sense for poetic justice, so the execution method would fit the crime. for example, if he apprehended Jack the Ripper, he'd probably slit his throat with his own weapon.

Hoar insists that his followers follow the spirit of the law, however, not the letter, so if I have a man who's clearly guilty but escapes via legal loopholes (gleefully so), then he'd probably still execute him.

Hoar is actually a really fun one - my sister and I once played a Paladin/LE cleric team. It was pretty amusing.

Red Knight is a demigoddess, for whoever was wondering her gender.

[AMFV]

I guess that I can try and tackle these.




Likely the nearer one, unless she could obviously tell that one was much more beautiful than the other, and would then proceed to heal them (more of a subconscious choice, rather, as Sunites love beautiful things).
Hand the starving peasant some of her own rations. Failing that, give them a token of mine and tell them to go to the nearest Sunite temple, and they'll provide for them.
Bring him to the (proper) authorities, and give my full testimony.

Save the nearer one. No questions asked, really - Hoar has such a small clergy, they don't bother to curry favor with any nobility or merchant classes, and every life is equal. Get a friendly cleric to interrogate the spirit of the one that you couldn't save, though, and seek proper justice for it.
Hand out what rations he could, but then stop and listen to a (condensed) story of his situation. No injustice is too small, and he might be starving because of a tyrannical local lord (who would need to be dealt with). If an injustice had, in fact, been committed, return after dispensing justice to the demon.
If I've got absolute proof of his deeds (via a friendly caster, official documentation, or other such means), then go forward with the execution. Not just chopping off his head, however - the Doombringer has a sense for poetic justice, so the execution method would fit the crime. for example, if he apprehended Jack the Ripper, he'd probably slit his throat with his own weapon.

Hoar insists that his followers follow the spirit of the law, however, not the letter, so if I have a man who's clearly guilty but escapes via legal loopholes (gleefully so), then he'd probably still execute him.

Hoar is actually a really fun one - my sister and I once played a Paladin/LE cleric team. It was pretty amusing.

Red Knight is a demigoddess, for whoever was wondering her gender.

I was the one wondering the gender (or not actually wondering, just being too lazy to look it up. I really enjoyed your Sune interpretations, particularly the section on where things might not be necessarily linked to dogma but rather to the inclinations of a Sunite. I wonder if Sunites would have less Dogma as a result of their Chaotic Patron, or more, since they might assume that more guidance was necessary. It would certainly be interesting. I could definitely see that going either way.

I'm less familiar with Hoar, but that sounds pretty exceptional, when I have some time tomorrow I'll throw my own hat into the ring and write some up, since it's not that fair for me just to be picking your guys' brains, as exceptional as they may be.

[Kuulvheysoon]

I was the one wondering the gender (or not actually wondering, just being too lazy to look it up. I really enjoyed your Sune interpretations, particularly the section on where things might not be necessarily linked to dogma but rather to the inclinations of a Sunite. I wonder if Sunites would have less Dogma as a result of their Chaotic Patron, or more, since they might assume that more guidance was necessary. It would certainly be interesting. I could definitely see that going either way.

I'm less familiar with Hoar, but that sounds pretty exceptional, when I have some time tomorrow I'll throw my own hat into the ring and write some up, since it's not that fair for me just to be picking your guys' brains, as exceptional as they may be.

Sune's one of the oddest patrons for a FR Paladin, I find. I mean, they chafe under their Lawful alignment in a church of Chaotic clerics (and NG). But apparently, she supports them as the ideal of the knight in shining armor (anything for true love, etc...). In practice, though, my one player who played a Sunite paladin just went Paladin of Freedom.

And for such a minor deity, Hoar's pretty well represented - there's a cleric/paladin of his in at least two Realms novels (Viper's Kiss and Bloodwalker). And come on - how can you not love a deity of vengeance and poetic justice?:smallbiggrin:

[kellbyb]

Wee jas probaby has rules regarding proper care taking of bodies, officiating of weddings (she is the core deity of love), as to triage: well that seems more like a Pelor thing.

...I did not know that.

[atemu1234]

My argument was that different orders would have different views on who would accomplish more in their lives, and would have dogma to back this up. Probably written ideals about what one should do in these sorts of scenarios. Since both are mortally wounded, the King Solomon scenario isn't very effective as they are both incapable of speech.

Since you'd probably have access to resurrection, as well as speak with dead, you'd most likely be able to resurrect one or both of them afterward. In the meantime, flip a coin. If you know one of them, it's not an evil act to save that one over the one who isn't evil unless the one you know is undeserving (IE a redeemed evil character) and the other is completely innocent. Otherwise, do what you can to ease his suffering (I'd suggest having an arcane caster cast sleep on him so he dies painlessly) but save the one you know. Better the angel you know, after all.

[Coidzor]

Well, being called is all well and good, but that doesn't mean that there ceases to be structure.

It actively works against structure, however, which is why I mentioned it. If any grizzled veteran or green milkmaid or butcher or baker or candlestick maker or former brigand can be chosen, then finding them and organizing them beyond their own sense of justice is a bit of a logistical problem, even before you get into philosophical differences.

If they're called then that's an element of chaos from the perspective of a temporal organization that's trying to organize them, especially one that's not directly linked up with whatever is empowering them in the first place.


I may be a standback to the way things were, but back in my day Paladins had orders they had to answer to, these newfangled folks without orders can't be trusted to necessarily be able to think through these kind of moral dilemma particularly not on the spot, that's part of the reason why orders are necessary, for guidance.

Once you've got organizations who are coercing people to follow *their* version of Lawful Good over a number of competing other versions you get into the place where LG starts to slide into LN before they've even met the enemy.

[AMFV]

Sune's one of the oddest patrons for a FR Paladin, I find. I mean, they chafe under their Lawful alignment in a church of Chaotic clerics (and NG). But apparently, she supports them as the ideal of the knight in shining armor (anything for true love, etc...). In practice, though, my one player who played a Sunite paladin just went Paladin of Freedom.

And for such a minor deity, Hoar's pretty well represented - there's a cleric/paladin of his in at least two Realms novels (Viper's Kiss and Bloodwalker). And come on - how can you not love a deity of vengeance and poetic justice?:smallbiggrin:

I think that a Sunite Paladin might be likely to be even more lawful than most as a reaction to being in a Church where that was not the norm, she'd (or he'd) certainly be more likely to have a unique perspective.


Since you'd probably have access to resurrection, as well as speak with dead, you'd most likely be able to resurrect one or both of them afterward. In the meantime, flip a coin. If you know one of them, it's not an evil act to save that one over the one who isn't evil unless the one you know is undeserving (IE a redeemed evil character) and the other is completely innocent. Otherwise, do what you can to ease his suffering (I'd suggest having an arcane caster cast sleep on him so he dies painlessly) but save the one you know. Better the angel you know, after all.

Actually that was explicitly rejected in the scenario, lets say you're level 1. Now obviously if you have resurrection then this isn't a dilemma... although even that's not 100%, but having resurrection opens up a lot more options. But it is important to note that Paladins do not get that by default, and therefore we cannot assume (particularly at lower levels) that they'll have access to it.


It actively works against structure, however, which is why I mentioned it. If any grizzled veteran or green milkmaid or butcher or baker or candlestick maker or former brigand can be chosen, then finding them and organizing them beyond their own sense of justice is a bit of a logistical problem, even before you get into philosophical differences.


However you have the advantage that they are called. Which means that they may be called when there is somebody nearby to train them, or pulled in the direction of an order. Being called by forces that are inherently lawful this is likely to be the case.



If they're called then that's an element of chaos from the perspective of a temporal organization that's trying to organize them, especially one that's not directly linked up with whatever is empowering them in the first place.

And it's worth noting that fluffwise whether there is a link varies from book to book, so that's probably more a DM call than anything else

Edit: And it's even more important to note that this varies even in Greyhawk, from book to book. In FR and DL it's explicitly linked to deities.



Once you've got organizations who are coercing people to follow *their* version of Lawful Good over a number of competing other versions you get into the place where LG starts to slide into LN before they've even met the enemy.

Absolutely not. Lawful Good is as much Lawful as it is good, and where there are Laws there are going to be differences of opinion. Again somebody who is lawful believes that their own code is the correct one, else they wouldn't follow it. Just as one CG person might have a different idea of what's best in one scenario, one lawful organization would have a different idea of what was best. Good people do not always agree.

Edit: Furthermore, these organizations aren't coercing random passerby to follow their bylaws, they are requiring that people in said organizations follow their rules, that's the essence of lawful, and not even a little bit evil, even if trying to set up a legal system was evil (and it's not)

[Segev]

If you come across two wounded people on the side of the road, and they are both mortally wounded, how do you determine who you should save? If one of them is a member of your family should this affect your decision? If one of them is a noble would this affect your decision? Are there any other factors that would affect your decision? While the paladin shouldn't be a seeker after wealth or personal glory and power as a general rule, nothing says he can't value personal gain enough to wish to help the one who can help him more. All else being equal, personal preference is as valid a choice as any for even the Lawful Good.

This is really the "train at a fork in the track" conundrum disguised as something else. But it removes the element of the paladin's action forcibly shifting "who will die." Here, his choices are: both die, or one dies and the other lives. He is all but compelled to take the latter option, but it's his choice how he decides who to help. Maybe he helps the younger one. Maybe he helps the prettier one. Maybe he helps the richer one. Maybe he flips a coin. Maybe he helps the poorer one, just to prove to himself that he's no respecter of wealth. There's really no wrong choice, here, as long as we aren't injecting qualities onto the two in need of help which would make one of them less deserving of said help (e.g. one's a known criminal, or the like).

I suppose, if there's clear desire on one of their parts that the other be helped first, that should weigh on the paladin's choice. A mother begging for her child to be saved, for instance. If both are pleading that the other be helped, it's back to the paladin's choice.


Suppose you are traveling on a quest to stop a mighty demon from overthrowing the kingdom (I know we're short on specifics here, but it is deliberately vague to make the scenario appropriate for all level ranges), you are stopped by a peasant who is clearly starving, supposing you have no magical means to feed him or yourself, he asks you for food, but this could prevent you from being able to reach the demon in time, do you feed him? What if it's a child? What factors might affect this decision?If I HAVE food on me and will be in danger of starving before reaching the great battle, there's enough wiggle-room in time to stop and hunt or pray to my god that he might send another friendly being who can help me get the food I need. I likely can ration my food out for at least one skipped meal, too. I therefore give the peasant a meal's worth of my rations and send him back to town with some money to buy more. That should at least get him moving.

If I don't have food on me at all, then I can't be that far from the fight. I give the peasant whatever I can, then promise to find him after the battle.

If we're so far out in the wilderness that it's just me, my rations, and the peasant for days of travel either way...yeah, taking him with me and getting him to help me gather berries or hunt for game or something as we travel's my best bet. (Honestly, if I am a lone adventurer of this sort, I darned well better have Survival, because trail rations won't always be reliable anyway.)


For the third dilemma, let us suppose, that we have a prisoner who has been captured, you suspect that he has committed severe crimes (significant enough to require that he be punished by execution). In fact he himself admits as such. But you are not able to take him to be tried at this time, what should you do? I execute him. He surrendered to my lawful authority, confessed to his crimes, and I am a bloody Paladin, so I can roll Sense Motive and can use Detect Evil to confirm that he is, in fact, guilty. Adventuring is a lot like a military operation: sometimes field trials require one judge, jury, and executioner. This is assuming I don't trust that this guy'll honor the conventions of being a prisoner, and will instead attempt to escape (possibly through violence) in the future if I keep him with us. IF he's a particularly lawful sort, himself, I might force him to agree to remain a well-behaved prisoner in exchange for letting him wait until we get to a place where an official trial can occur. But I'd have to know he's VERY lawful, so he won't break his word when I am unable to enforce those conditions.

[Vortalism]

If you're familiar with the philosophical field of ethics and the Ethics of Law, then I feel this Harvard lecture "Justice" should colour some of your arguments. It touches on some interesting thought experiments as well as introducing the various modes of moral thinking that could apply to your world's and this thread's discussions on Paladin ethics.

http://www.justiceharvard.org/ Michael Sandel ensues.

[AMFV]

While the paladin shouldn't be a seeker after wealth or personal glory and power as a general rule, nothing says he can't value personal gain enough to wish to help the one who can help him more. All else being equal, personal preference is as valid a choice as any for even the Lawful Good.

This is really the "train at a fork in the track" conundrum disguised as something else. But it removes the element of the paladin's action forcibly shifting "who will die." Here, his choices are: both die, or one dies and the other lives. He is all but compelled to take the latter option, but it's his choice how he decides who to help. Maybe he helps the younger one. Maybe he helps the prettier one. Maybe he helps the richer one. Maybe he flips a coin. Maybe he helps the poorer one, just to prove to himself that he's no respecter of wealth. There's really no wrong choice, here, as long as we aren't injecting qualities onto the two in need of help which would make one of them less deserving of said help (e.g. one's a known criminal, or the like).

Yes, neither choice is in violation of the code, what the goal was here was to look at what factors different orders of Paladins might use to determine this sort of decision. It's not exactly a matter of personal preference, but rather personal codes, and those generally reflect the codes of orders to which we belong, particularly for Paladins.



I suppose, if there's clear desire on one of their parts that the other be helped first, that should weigh on the paladin's choice. A mother begging for her child to be saved, for instance. If both are pleading that the other be helped, it's back to the paladin's choice.

Well depending, not all philosophies believe that an individual has a right to argue that another be saved at their expense, in fact certain orders of Paladins might be interested enough in preserving that sort of behavior as to save them over the other. That might be more along the lines of the Red Knight or some of the more pragmatic orders.



If I HAVE food on me and will be in danger of starving before reaching the great battle, there's enough wiggle-room in time to stop and hunt or pray to my god that he might send another friendly being who can help me get the food I need. I likely can ration my food out for at least one skipped meal, too. I therefore give the peasant a meal's worth of my rations and send him back to town with some money to buy more. That should at least get him moving.

If I don't have food on me at all, then I can't be that far from the fight. I give the peasant whatever I can, then promise to find him after the battle.

If we're so far out in the wilderness that it's just me, my rations, and the peasant for days of travel either way...yeah, taking him with me and getting him to help me gather berries or hunt for game or something as we travel's my best bet. (Honestly, if I am a lone adventurer of this sort, I darned well better have Survival, because trail rations won't always be reliable anyway.)

Well these are all good answers, although again there really isn't a wrong answer here. Some orders might be less likely to help though, see the Moradin order for a very, very good description of why that might be.



I execute him. He surrendered to my lawful authority, confessed to his crimes, and I am a bloody Paladin, so I can roll Sense Motive and can use Detect Evil to confirm that he is, in fact, guilty. Adventuring is a lot like a military operation: sometimes field trials require one judge, jury, and executioner. This is assuming I don't trust that this guy'll honor the conventions of being a prisoner, and will instead attempt to escape (possibly through violence) in the future if I keep him with us. IF he's a particularly lawful sort, himself, I might force him to agree to remain a well-behaved prisoner in exchange for letting him wait until we get to a place where an official trial can occur. But I'd have to know he's VERY lawful, so he won't break his word when I am unable to enforce those conditions.

Well the question is: Does the Paladin have that jurisdiction, and how should that factor into a Paladin's choices, we'll say that he was acting in a capacity where he was not behaving in a manner that would get him punished, a war Criminal in his own lands overcome by guilt. Should local laws factor into the Paladin's response, I think again you'll find a wide breadth of difference between different groups of Paladins.


If you're familiar with the philosophical field of ethics and the Ethics of Law, then I feel this Harvard lecture "Justice" should colour some of your arguments. It touches on some interesting thought experiments as well as introducing the various modes of moral thinking that could apply to your world's and this thread's discussions on Paladin ethics.

http://www.justiceharvard.org/ Michael Sandel ensues.

It looks really interesting, is there a particular lecture you feel is suited to the conversation, since I'm unlikely to be able to watch an entire series of College lectures before this thread is suitably derailed.

[Segev]

As a general rule, paladins are adventurers. Particularly in the games typical to D&D. While it is possible to construct a scenario such that the paladin would be out of line for executing this criminal, the scenario as presented under standard "this is a D&D game" assumptions would leave the paladin as having both moral and ethical authority in this situation. Really, regardless of order. Any order that did not leave a paladin in this generic situation (again, absent any unstated circumstances that would alter the basic thought that the paladin is out adventuring and cannot take the varmint in for prosecution due to exigencies of time and general lack of law enforcement structure within easy travel distance) would not be able to field adventuring paladins as a practical matter.

[Vortalism]

Well I'd recommend the first episode in particular. Because moral thinking and value is all about a taking of perspective. D&D supports moral absolutism for ease of use, but in reality certain propositions often lend themselves to evil or good rather than a fixed result. Which is a problem for us, because that leads to all kinds of metaphysical problems about the existence of god, evil and freewill. eugh :smalltongue:

The first episode would be useful because it touches upon these kinds of "who do you save?" types of questions, introducing ideas such as consequentialist moral reasoning and many aspects to value theory. Which I would assume would be important when coming to a conclusion based on the values of certain gods, what kinds of predilections they have. But gods of law and justice will definitely be troubled by the philosophizing that can arise from the series :smallbiggrin:

A major conflict that really marks the divide in moral reasoning is that of utilitarianism and libertarianism. Because moral reasoning concerns the lives of people and how we chose to respect or ignore the rights of individuals vs groups, it is the ultimate decider of what is deemed "evil" vs what is "good". You can broadly use the catchall terms of Lawful and Chaotic, but they are inherently simplifying very complex and ambiguous situations.

You can try to watch the Liberterian Episode 03 or the Immanuel Kant 06 episode, but the first episode is what really drives home the importance of recognising this divide.

[AMFV]

As a general rule, paladins are adventurers. Particularly in the games typical to D&D. While it is possible to construct a scenario such that the paladin would be out of line for executing this criminal, the scenario as presented under standard "this is a D&D game" assumptions would leave the paladin as having both moral and ethical authority in this situation. Really, regardless of order. Any order that did not leave a paladin in this generic situation (again, absent any unstated circumstances that would alter the basic thought that the paladin is out adventuring and cannot take the varmint in for prosecution due to exigencies of time and general lack of law enforcement structure within easy travel distance) would not be able to field adventuring paladins as a practical matter.

Well there are orders that would be focused enough on the importance of the process of Law as to not permit their Paladins field executions. Helm comes to mind pretty heavily here. St. Cuthbert also. Just because somebody is guilty does not absolve them of legal rights (even if they wish to be), and that is something that a Paladin should consider. Now I don't think that executing somebody under those circumstances is evil, but there is certainly a validity to the perspective that it may not be the best good.

Consider, the individual has surrendered himself to your mercy, that in essence makes his life your responsibility to a degree, and also is an indication of remorse. So that would need to be considered in the decision.

As I've stated prior, he may not have violated local laws, and therefore execution may not be appropriate, just because he believes that he should die, and the Paladin does, does not give the Paladin carte blanche to execute him, else we would have Paladins from certain regions performing some very unpleasant (harsh legal) acts. So there is a certain importance in keeping the law of the land in mind. It's a complex issue, and there may be no one right answer. The thread is mostly to explore how Paladins from different orders and different outlooks might approach these sort of tricky issues.

[Segev]

1) It was not stated that he surrendered out of any feeling of remorse. If that were the case, the paladin could rightfully feel safe in binding him to follow and behave until he can be brought to a court of law. The most common form this scenario tends to take is that the paladin, on an adventure, encounters Badman McNasty the bandit. Badman gloats about his crimes, but finds himself outmatched. Hoping to catch the paladin in a conundrum (or at least avoid dying), he calls out his surrender before the paladin lands a lethal blow. Badman has indicated no remorse and very likely will try to escape or murder the paladin at the first opportunity. Or, his remorse is ringing hollow to the Paladin's Sense Motive (as well as the player's, since he is remorseful only now that he's about to get killed for his crimes).

2) Unless the paladin has a certain respect for the local laws, the laws of his homeland/his own personal code are going to take precedence. Those of his order are likely to coincide with his personal code, and certainly will take precedence even if those of his homeland do not. Paladins are not slaves to whatever law happens to be around; they are under no obligation to turn themselves over to the tyrant they're here to overthrow just because his laws say anybody who doesn't report their own subversive goals is breaking the law. Neither are they required to treat an unrepentant monster who is slaughtering innocent orphans in a sick gladiatorial game with the respect due them under the evil local laws that permit this behavior.

[AMFV]

1) It was not stated that he surrendered out of any feeling of remorse. If that were the case, the paladin could rightfully feel safe in binding him to follow and behave until he can be brought to a court of law. The most common form this scenario tends to take is that the paladin, on an adventure, encounters Badman McNasty the bandit. Badman gloats about his crimes, but finds himself outmatched. Hoping to catch the paladin in a conundrum (or at least avoid dying), he calls out his surrender before the paladin lands a lethal blow. Badman has indicated no remorse and very likely will try to escape or murder the paladin at the first opportunity. Or, his remorse is ringing hollow to the Paladin's Sense Motive (as well as the player's, since he is remorseful only now that he's about to get killed for his crimes).

True. that was meant to be an appending statement to the hypothetical rather than a core statement to it. I probably should have written: "What if he surrendered out of a deep feeling of remorse?" Which would change the scenario. However immediately executing him following his surrender, is executing a disabled prisoner (which is explicitly evil), so there has to be some middle ground here, either the Paladin believes he has the authority to execute said prisoner, and he might, or he doesn't. If it's a vengeful execution on the heels of expedience, I would say it's almost unequivocally evil. But if the Paladin believed that he had the rightful authority to execute the prisoner that changes the metric considerably.



2) Unless the paladin has a certain respect for the local laws, the laws of his homeland/his own personal code are going to take precedence. Those of his order are likely to coincide with his personal code, and certainly will take precedence even if those of his homeland do not. Paladins are not slaves to whatever law happens to be around; they are under no obligation to turn themselves over to the tyrant they're here to overthrow just because his laws say anybody who doesn't report their own subversive goals is breaking the law. Neither are they required to treat an unrepentant monster who is slaughtering innocent orphans in a sick gladiatorial game with the respect due them under the evil local laws that permit this behavior.

But what if the Paladin is from Mulholrand, and believes that slavery is all well and good? What if the appropriate punishment for the crimes described in Mulholrand is enslavement. Let's say that the Paladin is traveling along the Sword Coast (where slavery is illegal). Said prisoner surrenders to him, the penalty for such crimes is life enslavement. Does the Paladin violate local law and enslave the prisoner? I mean that is the law of his home, and that's why it's very important to have these kind of scenarios planned out, it can't just be a spur of the moment thing, on has to think these through before hand, and it's highly unlikely that orders of Paladins wouldn't have.

[Segev]

However immediately executing him following his surrender, is executing a disabled prisoner (which is explicitly evil), so there has to be some middle ground here, either the Paladin believes he has the authority to execute said prisoner, and he might, or he doesn't. If it's a vengeful execution on the heels of expedience, I would say it's almost unequivocally evil. But if the Paladin believed that he had the rightful authority to execute the prisoner that changes the metric considerably.Eh, if the paladin thinks the guy should die, there should also be the option to not accept his (paladin-honestly-believes-is-duplicitous) surrender at all, and just finish him off.


But what if the Paladin is from Mulholrand, and believes that slavery is all well and good? What if the appropriate punishment for the crimes described in Mulholrand is enslavement. Let's say that the Paladin is traveling along the Sword Coast (where slavery is illegal). Said prisoner surrenders to him, the penalty for such crimes is life enslavement. Does the Paladin violate local law and enslave the prisoner? I mean that is the law of his home, and that's why it's very important to have these kind of scenarios planned out, it can't just be a spur of the moment thing, on has to think these through before hand, and it's highly unlikely that orders of Paladins wouldn't have.Again, does he have respect for the local laws? Generally speaking, paladins only run into "nope, ignoring these laws" situations when the laws conflict with that whole "good" part of their alignment. If he's in a position to "enslave" somebody who's committed a crime, he's in a position to turn them over to the local authorities. Really, the only time he should be overriding local law is when local law is such that grave injustice and harm to innocents will result.

I can't really think of a situation where "my punishment is enslavement" is going to result in greater justice than whatever the local laws are, unless local laws are "there's no punishment because this isn't a crime, go forth and do more of it to more people."

[atemu1234]

Actually that was explicitly rejected in the scenario, lets say you're level 1. Now obviously if you have resurrection then this isn't a dilemma... although even that's not 100%, but having resurrection opens up a lot more options. But it is important to note that Paladins do not get that by default, and therefore we cannot assume (particularly at lower levels) that they'll have access to it.

Everyone levels up. In either case, my second suggestion still stands.

Also, as to the last one, I seem to remember there being a sourcebook (BoVD?) that said all executions committed lawfully are explicitly lawful evil acts, regardless of the person's guilt, and that all executioners are lawful evil.

[AMFV]

Eh, if the paladin thinks the guy should die, there should also be the option to not accept his (paladin-honestly-believes-is-duplicitous) surrender at all, and just finish him off.

Again, does he have respect for the local laws? Generally speaking, paladins only run into "nope, ignoring these laws" situations when the laws conflict with that whole "good" part of their alignment. If he's in a position to "enslave" somebody who's committed a crime, he's in a position to turn them over to the local authorities. Really, the only time he should be overriding local law is when local law is such that grave injustice and harm to innocents will result.

I can't really think of a situation where "my punishment is enslavement" is going to result in greater justice than whatever the local laws are, unless local laws are "there's no punishment because this isn't a crime, go forth and do more of it to more people."

Well somebody from Mulholrand would believe that summary execution was much worse than enslavement. After all one cannot later revive an innocent man (under most circumstances) if his guilt is proven later to be false, and one can certainly free a slave. Also that way one works towards redemption rather than being inherently evil.

The point is that a Paladin is likely to have to have a good idea about what exactly they should be doing vis a vis captured prisoners, and it is again unlikely that their order would not have thought the scenario through at length.

As to the respect for local laws, I think you are mistaking my intent for trying to solve a specific scenario, I'm more interested in trying to solve the scenarios as might be done by different orders of Paladins. That's why the Mulholrand example is so interesting, because to them the idea of enslavement is better than execution and is significantly more merciful. So it's a difference of perspective.


Everyone levels up. In either case, my second suggestion still stands.

Also, as to the last one, I seem to remember there being a sourcebook (BoVD?) that said all executions committed lawfully are explicitly lawful evil acts, regardless of the person's guilt, and that all executioners are lawful evil.

I do not recall that, and I just checked in BoVD, and that is not correct. There is no implicit evilness. In fact the BoVD defines Murder as requiring some sort of personal gain in order for it to qualify as murder. If killing somebody for any reason was evil than almost all adventurers would be inherently evil.

[AMFV]

Well it's probably time to throw my hat into the ring since I did promise as much yesterday. I'm examining some of the deities from Deities and Demigods.

Paladin of Artemis

Scenario 1:

Artemis favors folk who are from the woodlands and those who are female. It is likely that even barring any formal dogma, her Paladins would choose to help them first. I suspect that there would likely be dogma that would require the Paladins to protect women over men, largely due to Artemis' status as a protector of women. Therefore they would likely have dogma that would instruct them to care for women first, because that is primarily their duty and men have other protectors. The woodland folk or peasant folk, is more likely to be an unconscious realization.

Scenario 2:

Artemis is less likely to pity those who cannot take care of their own material Gods. Since she's a wilderness goddess and values self-sufficiency, here is where there is most likely to be a sharp contrast among her followers, snce she teaches people to pity those who are in circumstances outside of their control. They would be most likely to help in a way that would increase the agency of those they were helping, giving the peasant equipment to hunt with for example, so that way they would be encouraging a balance in nature rather than creating a scenario where there is dependancy.

Scenario 3:

Artemis tends to be pretty vengeful, and it is likely that given her less lawful bent, she would be more inclined to encourage her Paladins to carry out sentences as expeciently as possible. Additionally since the majority of her Paladins are in the wilderness, she would be most likely to have a much more forgiving attitude towards frontier justice and might even encourage the practice.


I'll probably do a few more later, I do find the idea of an order of Paladins of Artemis pretty fascinating, that would be a very interesting roleplay challenge.

Also it's worth noting that I've had to adopt several contradictory positions in this thread, I'm not necessarily talking about what I believe but what various groups of Paladins might. Which has been a really thought provoking exercise at least for me, hopefully it's an interesting for everyone else.

[atemu1234]

I do not recall that, and I just checked in BoVD, and that is not correct. There is no implicit evilness. In fact the BoVD defines Murder as requiring some sort of personal gain in order for it to qualify as murder. If killing somebody for any reason was evil than almost all adventurers would be inherently evil.

I definitely remember it saying somewhere an execution is a lawful evil act.

[AMFV]

I definitely remember it saying somewhere an execution is a lawful evil act.
Well I couldn't find it.

[atemu1234]

Well I couldn't find it.

I understand. I was more or less guessing with BoVD. I think it may have just been a website on alignment I found a while back when I was still learning to play the game. I'll see if I can find it, but in any case, most paladins wouldn't.

[Nibbens]

For the third dilemma, let us suppose, that we have a prisoner who has been captured, you suspect that he has committed severe crimes (significant enough to require that he be punished by execution). In fact he himself admits as such. But you are not able to take him to be tried at this time, what should you do?

Would I be incorrect by saying that the paladin could immediately kill him (as long as it's painlessly) and carry a piece of his body with him, as long as he paid for the True Resurrection later when he is finally able to bring him before a judge?

While strange, it could be argued that the act of killing him (with the intent to resurrect him) is little more finding a way to detain him until a more appropriate time. Being that this is a fantasy world and such things are possible - why couldn't this be a possibility?

... darn moral conundrums... lol

[atemu1234]

Would I be incorrect by saying that the paladin could immediately kill him (as long as it's painlessly) and carry a piece of his body with him, as long as he paid for the True Resurrection later when he is finally able to bring him before a judge?

While strange, it could be argued that the act of killing him (with the intent to resurrect him) is little more finding a way to detain him until a more appropriate time. Being that this is a fantasy world and such things are possible - why couldn't this be a possibility?

... darn moral conundrums... lol

Because killing an innocent person is an evil act. To quote, RAW: Totally rules legal, totally silly.

Also, the same reason holding someone in stasis wouldn't work as prison time: Prison is supposed to (on a certain level) rehabilitate the person. Whether or not this works is up for debate, but in either case it's the try or not that matters.

[Nibbens]

Because killing an innocent person is an evil act. To quote, RAW: Totally rules legal, totally silly.

It's strange that even in a world where death means nothing, the act of killing still has the same weight as a world where it's permanent. I just find it funny, is all. lol.

[atemu1234]

It's strange that even in a world where death means nothing, the act of killing still has the same weight as a world where it's permanent. I just find it funny, is all. lol.

Agreed. But, to be fair, these are liable to be LVL 1 commoners, with 3 constitution. The act of anything other than a true rez would probably kill them.

[Nibbens]

Agreed. But, to be fair, these are liable to be LVL 1 commoners, with 3 constitution. The act of anything other than a true rez would probably kill them.

Which is why I mentioned true rez in my earlier post - no penalty. In a sense, he get's to hang out in his preferred eternal resting place while my Pally has to wait to find a judge - again, that's something good for the maybe criminal/maybe innocent person. It might even make an evil person rethink their life/alignment and win the Pally's god one more worshiper - another good thing. The only thing the pally has to do is make it swift and find a cleric of the appropriate level as quick as he can.

I just don't think that in D&D death ain't all that bad of a thing, with PC's and monarchs getting resurrected every time they get eaten by a tarrasque or choke on a walnut. Without consequences, what is moral?

Gah, I can see it now - a twisted king who gets off on killing his serving girls and having his trusted cleric buddy resurrect them every time he does it - they can choose whether or not to come back, but eventually he might find a like-minded serving wench... weird...
....
Okay, i'm so using this in my next campaign! lol.

[AMFV]

Because killing an innocent person is an evil act. To quote, RAW: Totally rules legal, totally silly.

Also, the same reason holding someone in stasis wouldn't work as prison time: Prison is supposed to (on a certain level) rehabilitate the person. Whether or not this works is up for debate, but in either case it's the try or not that matters.

Well Prison is not always rehabilitative, particularly in medieval worlds (they are often punitive). Furthermore execution is NOT killing an innocent person.

[aberratio ictus]

So, are you only interested in the dogma of orders you know, or will others do as well?

I've spent some time playing as a paladin of the Order of the Golden Light, and would share their perspective, if you'd like.
To be perfectly clear, there's been two big factions in the order during the time we played, so I'll just state the opinions of the part of the order my character belonged to.
The order doesn't worship a specific deity, even though many if not all are still religious.

Scenario 1:

A Paladin is, first and foremost, the protector of those who cannot protect themselves.
Therefore, who the Paladin helps first does indeed depend on who they are. A child would be helped before an adult, a woman before a man (though, in certain cases, a scrawny young man might be helped before a muscle-bound female barbarian). Wealth and status shouldn't play a role (this would, by the way, be a point the other half of the order would disagree on)
However, even if the odds are extremely stacked against him or her, the paladin should try to help them both in the end, but do so wisely, without losing them both in the end.

Scenario 2:

Of course the food would be shared with the starving peasant. Those couple of seconds can't seriously be assumed to make that big of a difference.
Of course, the other half of the order wouldn't care about the peasant.

Scenario 3:

The obvious approach, of course, would be to take him to be tried by the proper authorities. If this isn't possible at all in the current situation, for example because of being miles and miles away from civilisation on an important quest - paladins of the golden light are considered to have the authority to act as judges and executioners, especially in a "lawless" land.

However, they would take their role as judge seriously, maybe have an outright trial and give the prisoner the chance to speak for himself.
Why does he admit to have committed severe crimes? Does he repent? In that case, the paladin might even let him live and atone for his sins by helping the paladin in his quest if he deems the risk to be worthwhile. Nonetheless, he or she would of course keep a close eye on the prisoner.
In the other case, the paladin would do his duty and execute the man as fast and painless as possible.
And, of course, get him a proper burial in the end.

[AMFV]

So, are you only interested in the dogma of orders you know, or will others do as well?

I'm interested in all dogma. And I appreciate you sharing something from your personal gaming experience.



I've spent some time playing as a paladin of the Order of the Golden Light, and would share their perspective, if you'd like.
To be perfectly clear, there's been two big factions in the order during the time we played, so I'll just state the opinions of the part of the order my character belonged to.
The order doesn't worship a specific deity, even though many if not all are still religious.


A non-religious order dogma is interesting to me, although I would like to know a little more about the fundamental beliefs of the order so I can understand the answers better.



Scenario 1:

A Paladin is, first and foremost, the protector of those who cannot protect themselves.
Therefore, who the Paladin helps first does indeed depend on who they are. A child would be helped before an adult, a woman before a man (though, in certain cases, a scrawny young man might be helped before a muscle-bound female barbarian). Wealth and status shouldn't play a role (this would, by the way, be a point the other half of the order would disagree on)
However, even if the odds are extremely stacked against him or her, the paladin should try to help them both in the end, but do so wisely, without losing them both in the end.


So for the Golden Light the protective aspect is the most essential? So they presume the ones that most need saving are those who are most needing protection? To play Devil's advocate, aren't those also the one that are least likely to be able to survive in the future? Should this affect a Paladin's choice.



Scenario 2:

Of course the food would be shared with the starving peasant. Those couple of seconds can't seriously be assumed to make that big of a difference.
Of course, the other half of the order wouldn't care about the peasant.


I think I may have misrepresented the scenario slightly as it's been misinterpreted several times. The issue is not that you don't have time to share the food, the issue is that you yourself are starving and only have just enough food to keep yourself alive. So it's not an issue of time, but rather potential survival.

Of course we assume that there isn't a magical solution available at this time.



Scenario 3:

The obvious approach, of course, would be to take him to be tried by the proper authorities. If this isn't possible at all in the current situation, for example because of being miles and miles away from civilisation on an important quest - paladins of the golden light are considered to have the authority to act as judges and executioners, especially in a "lawless" land.

However, they would take their role as judge seriously, maybe have an outright trial and give the prisoner the chance to speak for himself.
Why does he admit to have committed severe crimes? Does he repent? In that case, the paladin might even let him live and atone for his sins by helping the paladin in his quest if he deems the risk to be worthwhile. Nonetheless, he or she would of course keep a close eye on the prisoner.
In the other case, the paladin would do his duty and execute the man as fast and painless as possible.
And, of course, get him a proper burial in the end.

Fair enough, that's certainly a well thought out explanation, and I do apologize for playing devil's advocate up there, I want to make it clear that I'm not necessarily disagreeing with the stance you took, I'm just trying to explore the reasoning behind the decisions.

[aberratio ictus]

A non-religious order dogma is interesting to me, although I would like to know a little more about the fundamental beliefs of the order so I can understand the answers better.

All right, I'll do my very best without being too wordy.
As you correctly assumed, the protective aspect is of extraordinary significance in the order's system of beliefs. They are mostly focused on "good", to put it into game terms, but usually don't consider "law" to be another axis on a coordinate system, but as a "shield" for good, to prevent it from being corrupted and as a guideline to further the cause in the most efficient and lasting way possible. To them, law is all about looking at the bigger picture.

The members of the order are also somewhat scholarly about that, so talking about such scenarios is quite in character for them.
Regrettably, that scholarly approach has also led to the formation of different factions inside the order, as I hinted at in my first post.

Redemption is highly regarded, but the Golden Light isn't naive about that. They know redemption isn't for everyone, and that unredeemable evil exists. Therefore they examine possible candidates very thoroughly, and they don't see anything wrong in redeeming people inside prison cells. It is a spiritual thing, after all.




So they presume the ones that most need saving are those who are most needing protection? To play Devil's advocate, aren't those also the one that are least likely to be able to survive in the future? Should this affect a Paladin's choice.

This particular reasoning is something the order absolutely despises. You wouldn't need to be a order of Paladins if you're going to help the ones who are already strong instead of those who really need your help. It's a matter of empathy and kindness, and thoughts about how much potential to be useful an individual has are misguided.
Furthermore, regarding children, that statement wouldn't even be true.
Being strong for the weak is a cornerstone of the Golden Light's dogma, and even the order's very reason for existing.



I think I may have misrepresented the scenario slightly as it's been misinterpreted several times. The issue is not that you don't have time to share the food, the issue is that you yourself are starving and only have just enough food to keep yourself alive. So it's not an issue of time, but rather potential survival.

Of course we assume that there isn't a magical solution available at this time.

I'm sorry, maybe I didn't read one of your previous responses close enough.
To be perfectly honest, this would make it even easier for a paladin of the Golden Light. Self-sacrifice is regarded highly, after all, and letting another person starve for one's own sake would probably be as much of a danger to the mission as starvation, regarding the paladin's morale.
If the situation was really that dire, the paladin would probably share.




Fair enough, that's certainly a well thought out explanation, and I do apologize for playing devil's advocate up there, I want to make it clear that I'm not necessarily disagreeing with the stance you took, I'm just trying to explore the reasoning behind the decisions.
No need to apologise, I understand your motivation, and I've already gathered this thread is all about exploring reasonings :smallwink:

[AMFV]

For good measure...

The Paladin Of Odin

The Paladin is fairly interesting exploration since it is from a very different culture. And this sort of lends itself well to a series of moral explorations.

Scenario 1

In the first scenario, one would be inclined to save the one who appears to be the most worthy, the one who is struggling the most against their wounds. Which also would often translate to the most likely to survive. If there were women and children a Paladin might be inclined to save them first. But that would certainly not be an order requirement.

Scenario 2

In the second scenario, a Paladin of Odin would not be willing to jeopardize their mission to save more in order to feed somebody who could not feed themselves. It might be permissible to allow them to accompany them though in order for them to die an honorable death rather than wasting away due to starvation, such a Paladin would likely make that offer.

Scenario 3

In the final scenario barring the legal methods for a trial the Paladin would arm the prisoner and face him in a trial by combat, trusting that the gods would favor the one who was in the right, protecting the prisoner if he was innocent, and dooming him if he was not, and allowing the Paladin to die in battle.

[Vogonjeltz]

I know what we need right now is more discussion of the code of conduct for Paladins. But the previous thread, (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?360413-Paladin-will-fall-when-the-question-is-asked) has inspired me. Basically one of the things that I took out of that thread is that there might be multiple answers to any particular moral dilemma. Naturally since Paladins are lawful one would assume that each order would likely have thought about or at the very least considered these sort of dilemmas.

Basically what I'd like to do, and since this is mildly work intensive, I hope people will be interested is explore how those different orders might react, sort of putting ourselves into the seat of a particular subset of Paladins under a particular deity. Anyways without further ado, here are my moral dillema:

If you come across two wounded people on the side of the road, and they are both mortally wounded, how do you determine who you should save? If one of them is a member of your family should this affect your decision? If one of them is a noble would this affect your decision? Are there any other factors that would affect your decision?

For the second moral dilemma:

Suppose you are traveling on a quest to stop a mighty demon from overthrowing the kingdom (I know we're short on specifics here, but it is deliberately vague to make the scenario appropriate for all level ranges), you are stopped by a peasant who is clearly starving, supposing you have no magical means to feed him or yourself, he asks you for food, but this could prevent you from being able to reach the demon in time, do you feed him? What if it's a child? What factors might affect this decision?

And a third!

For the third dilemma, let us suppose, that we have a prisoner who has been captured, you suspect that he has committed severe crimes (significant enough to require that he be punished by execution). In fact he himself admits as such. But you are not able to take him to be tried at this time, what should you do?

It is important to note that many of these problems would be solvable using a very minor application of magic. However that's not really in the spirit of this particular challenge. Mostly I'm looking for both the normal religions and the odd ones, for example a Paladin of Tyr is likely to have a different moral outlook than a Paladin of Wee Jas might. And I'm very interested to see how that would play out in theory.

Edit: Forgot to add that there is no setting limitations here. However I'm not as familiar with the Pathfinder CoC so I can't speak to it, but I'd be interested in hearing how those folks would respond.

Scenario 1: paladin offers aid in the order in which he encounters them (that is to say, he wouldn't move on to see what else is happening if he could help the first person). So it's a matter of chance as to whom is encountered first. So I guess details won't matter, because my paladin would auto-triage.

Scenario 2: Assuming the peasant passes the detect evil and sense motive tests, I would provide what food I could, and forage until reaching the next town or village to acquire new supplies (paladins who are likely to have higher wisdom are more likely to make those survival checks).

I would also try and bring them with me, if they were really so incapable of taking care of themselves, to the nearest friendly temple.

Scenario 3: This is rather vague. What is the evidence against them? Why can't they be taken to the magistrates? If the paladin only has suspicion, that really isn't enough to act on.

*a character lugging around a prisoner is the basis of a large number of stories :)

[AMFV]

Scenario 1: paladin offers aid in the order in which he encounters them (that is to say, he wouldn't move on to see what else is happening if he could help the first person). So it's a matter of chance as to whom is encountered first. So I guess details won't matter, because my paladin would auto-triage.

Scenario 2: Assuming the peasant passes the detect evil and sense motive tests, I would provide what food I could, and forage until reaching the next town or village to acquire new supplies (paladins who are likely to have higher wisdom are more likely to make those survival checks).

I would also try and bring them with me, if they were really so incapable of taking care of themselves, to the nearest friendly temple.

Scenario 3: This is rather vague. What is the evidence against them? Why can't they be taken to the magistrates? If the paladin only has suspicion, that really isn't enough to act on.

*a character lugging around a prisoner is the basis of a large number of stories :)


These are all good but they're slightly generic, are you going for the behavior of a generic order of Paladin?

As for 3. He himself confesses his crimes to you. You are too remotely located to take him to the magistrates; or even better, his cries are legal where you are located, for example a slavetaker in Thay. So how does one act?

Basically the whole point of this is explore different ways out of dilemma, since I don't think there are auto-fall options. And for that matter I don't think falling is that big a deal in any case.