Guides to playing a Paladin?

[Tanuki Tales]

Does anyone know any specific guides that really do a good job about going into how to properly play a Paladin? I don't mean in a mechanical sense, but how to properly roleplay the Paladin Code without going into Lawful Stupid or Blind Zealot territory.

[Xuldarinar]

Lets examine the CoC for paladins first.



A paladin must be of lawful good alignment and loses all class abilities if she ever willingly commits an evil act.

Additionally, a paladin’s code requires that she respect legitimate authority, act with honor (not lying, not cheating, not using poison, and so forth), help those in need (provided they do not use the help for evil or chaotic ends), and punish those who harm or threaten innocents.



A paladin must be of lawful good alignment and loses all class features except proficiencies if she ever willingly commits an evil act.

Additionally, a paladin's code requires that she respect legitimate authority, act with honor (not lying, not cheating, not using poison, and so forth), help those in need (provided they do not use the help for evil or chaotic ends), and punish those who harm or threaten innocents.

Pretty much identical word for word, so we don't need to discuss edition differences.



A paladin needs to be Lawful Good. This in of itself holds a range. One could be concerned with their own ethos, the code of an order they belong to, or societal laws. They should hold to this reasonably well, holding the Lawful angle. Respecting legitimate authority and acting with honor affirms this.

As far as maintaining the good alignment and the CoC.. You can have virtually any personality. You might be edging on smite happy, seeking to destroy evil.. but that in of itself may cause one to slip. You might be someone who believes killing is something to avoid under all but the most dire circumstances. You might be charitable, or you might not be. You can be good humored, or you might be stern. You might be a very nice paladin, but good isn't always nice.

Ultimately I think what is important here is to come up with a person and then see how they would follow their CoC, rather than creating a paladin first.

[sage20500]

There are not necessarily any guides per say to playing a paladin... how ever depending in your alignment you can find plenty of idea through resources such as tv tropes etc. If your playing lawful evil, i can remember the authors name but there is an extremely good guide handbook to playing lawful evil on gianttip. For lawful good, id personally recomend looking information on the character Michael Carpenter from the dresden files. He and the other knights of the cross have always been the way i have pictured playing a realistic paladin in d&d. Hell one of the knights in that series is freaking agnostic even though he serves a christian order. Use that for inspiration if you ever try out the eberron idea for being a paladin of an ideal instead of a god.

[sage20500]

Who your a paladin of might also have a large impact for how you roleplay them. Paladins of Helm and Heironious play out alot differently than paladins of other gods (they tend to mostly do things such as protect the helpless, be a generally good person, dont be a **** etc).

For example, i once had a paladin or heironeous whos personality was essentially the above suggested, mostly it she was all about having faith, being nice, and just trying to make a difference in the world by helping others. Though if you were an evil **** who had no intentions of reforming and hurt others before her, then shed smite your ass.

One roleplaying session our group stumbled upon a small town in the middle of way past no where that recently had a cleric of selune that was murdered by a "werewolf". A few days of investigating later, group finds out that 1\3rd of the town is secrectly natural lycanthropes that are trying to live in peace and dont wish to harm anyone, the other 2\3rds of the town were blissfully unaware, and we left the town with one dead body of an evil greedy bastard that was trying to frame the lycanthropes.


Now, spin that adventure with the paladin being a member of the silverflame instead. As soon as you found out about there being a large number of lycanthropes in that town, you would be duty bound to kill them all for the greater good in order to prevent them from accidentally infecting others in the future, since being a lycanthrope is strictly something they view as evil. After that you might go ahead and put the rest of the town to the sword because they might have accidentally been infected with lycanthrope and you cant take this risk of any one spreading the disease in the future. Finally youd raid the town registry and pull up any and all information on anyone who has lived in that town and moved within the past x years and then go put them down for the exact same reason. Now keep in mind, according to the tenneants of the silver flame, doing of the above is the proper thing for a Lawful Good paladin to do. Thats what they expect to be done.

[OldTrees1]

Paladins are the individual defined by their striving for moral perfection. As such a lot of the advice about Paladins would be similar to and vary just as much as advice on "What ought one do?".


For me I think of it in terms of 3 causes:
1) Personal Moral Perfection:
Strive to never do the morally prohibited and strive to do not only your moral duty but also do the morally supererogatory.

2) Curing Evil:
While one can treat an infected limb by amputation, amputation does not cure the limb of its infection. Strive to save the evildoers from the corruption they are victims of.

Likewise one can let the symptoms run rampant while working on a cure, but said cure will not retroactively remove the suffering the symptoms caused. Continue to strive to prevent evildoers from doing evil while you work on redeeming them.

3) Seeding Good:
Good is not merely the absence of Evil, to have a truly morally perfect world we would need to encourage/inspire others towards moral perfection as well. A lot can be said about the inspiration resulting from leading by example but one need not be tongue tied when others ask for your wisdom.

Now how much individual Paladins might ascribe to these causes and the methods they use towards such causes can differ drastically from individual to individual (Not to mention that someone's moral character is not the sum total of their personality).

[Honest Tiefling]

I'm going to take the coward's way out. See, the problem as I see it, with the paladin is trying to maintain three things: Lawfulness, Goodness, and a Code of Conduct all at once. Any of those balls get dropped and whoops! You're now a crappy fighter. Seeing as no one here is an near-infinitely wise being of good or law that can communicate with the cosmos directly, everyone is going to have a different idea of each of those three things.

We can give you aid with debating these, but we aren't your gaming group. Not all of us, anyway. I suggest speaking with the DM, and seeing where they stand on this. Some are very loose when it comes to paladins, and some aren't. Some are going to be jerks about it. But without that context, all we can give you is a multitude of ideas, most of which won't even work with your party.

Personally, I don't think there is a proper way to roleplay a paladin anymore then there is a proper way to roleplay anything. It's going to be a reflection of your own beliefs and ideas. The only way to screw it up is to stop having fun at your table with your friends or cause them to do the same.

Consider the following:
1) How well do you know the group and believe an argument on morality is going to cause fights that leave behind bitter feelings? If the latter part is likely to be true, BAIL.
2) How much is the game invested in the roleplaying aspect? If not much, your DM is unlikely to throw moral dilemmas at you, and you can RP the paladin as such.
3) How does the DM feel about it? If you get hints that they love being rough on the paladin or test them...BAIL! This is never good. Being a paladin, hell, a character is hard enough without someone engineering situations to rain on your parade.
4) What is the code of conduct you and your DM want? If you really want to RP a paladin, consider writing your own or editing the existing one.
5) What setting are we talking about? Eberron and Forgotten Realms for instance, have some differences when it comes to alignment that will be an issue. The whole god thing is another thing to worry about.

That being said, good luck.

[digiman619]

I have three major suggestions: Firstly, you don't need to have the Paladin class to play a paladin; a ranger, a PF Warpriest of Inquisitor, or a Cleric/Fighter/Prestige paladin are all viable ways to play that Holy Knight archetype.
Secondly, always remember that just because you have "paladin" on your character sheet does not make you and more noble, virtuous, or all around " more good" than my CG barbarian. If you want to be a paragon of virtue, you have to act like it.
Finally, remember that while a good paladin isn't selfish, they aren't entirely selfless either. If all your character does is help others, he's one-dimensional and uninteresting. Have someone or something you care about that has nothing to do with helping others. Be it a hobby, a loved one, or something else that makes you more than "guy who smites and lays on hands".

[Blackhawk748]

Be Captain America. All the advice you will ever need.


https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/18/d8/b2/18d8b27188f8d38548d239832be97493.jpg

[sage20500]

Be Captain America. All the advice you will ever need.


https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/18/d8/b2/18d8b27188f8d38548d239832be97493.jpg


Isnt captain america technically chaotic good now on the account of him starting a civil war over his disagreement with a law that was designed to "protect the majority of people"

It just feels like the above quote you gave and the current depictions of him, he'd actually be better off as a paladin of freedom than a paladin of honor. His motivations just seem to line up more on the freedom side(chaotic good) side than the lawful side.

[Blackhawk748]

Isnt captain america technically chaotic good now on the account of him starting a civil war over his disagreement with a law that was designed to "protect the majority of people"

It just feels like the above quote you gave and the current depictions of him, he'd actually be better off as a paladin of freedom than a paladin of honor. His motivations just seem to line up more on the freedom side(chaotic good) side than the lawful side.

Nah hes still Lawful Good, its just not governments Laws hes following. Hes a Paladin of Ideals, and he will fight to keep those Ideals alive and well. And that Civil War is as much Tony's and the Politicians faults as it was Caps. The comic version made this very explicit, the movie version is much muddier.

[Honest Tiefling]

I think the problem I have with that is where does it become LG as opposed to CG? A CG person would also stand by their ideals, because...Well, that's what goodly people tend to do. Their ideals might just be more mutable or less defined.

And sorry to side track, but OP, your mailbox is full, dude.

[sage20500]

Nah hes still Lawful Good, its just not governments Laws hes following. Hes a Paladin of Ideals, and he will fight to keep those Ideals alive and well. And that Civil War is as much Tony's and the Politicians faults as it was Caps. The comic version made this very explicit, the movie version is much muddier.

I guess the issue really is how you look at it. From the examples that the book of exalted deeds gives, a lawful good paladin that lives in a lawful evil or neutral society is said to be a person who would work towards their goals of being good by use of the system at hand. Theyd essentially try to change the government into being lawful good by working with the government.

A chaotic good person though in that situation is much more likely to be the revolutionary who tries to change an evil and corruot institution by taking it down and putting a better one in its place.

With the current generation of how i have seen Cap portrayed, hes almost always seems to be against the working with the government to change and instead directly opposing and fighting them for change
That to me screams chaotic good with hiw CG is described.

[Blackhawk748]

I think the problem I have with that is where does it become LG as opposed to CG? A CG person would also stand by their ideals, because...Well, that's what goodly people tend to do. Their ideals might just be more mutable or less defined.

And sorry to side track, but OP, your mailbox is full, dude.

I think thats just an issue with DnDs alignments. I mean the difference between a Lawful Good person who lives by a personal code and a principled Chaotic Good person are, frankly, pretty negligible, which makes these sort of discussions problematic.

I mean we all know you can be Lawful Good and completely ignore the Laws of Men, you're just following some other laws, like those of a god.


I guess the issue really is how you look at it. From the examples that the book of exalted deeds gives, a lawful good paladin that lives in a lawful evil or neutral society is said to be a person who would work towards their goals of being good by use of the system at hand. Theyd essentially try to change the government into being lawful good by working with the government.

A chaotic good person though in that situation is much more likely to be the revolutionary who tries to change an evil and corruot institution by taking it down and putting a better one in its place.

With the current generation of how i have seen Cap portrayed, hes almost always seems to be against the working with the government to change and instead directly opposing and fighting them for change
That to me screams chaotic good with hiw CG is described.

Ya BoED has some issues, mostly because it constantly says stuff like that. So, what, your not Lawful Good if you fight in an underground resistance movement to destroy Nazis the Evil Empire? I mean a point is reached where the system is so corrupt, so foul and so irredeemable that you have to tear it down, or the people in the system simply refuse to talk or negotiate on things, see Civil War. In both instances of that plot, it was an Ultimatum. "Do what we want or else". There was virtually no discussion or consultation of the affected party, just a flat statement and so you get the LG (as i see him) dude who refuses to bow to that and as such you get conflict.

[Honest Tiefling]

I guess the issue really is how you look at it. From the examples that the book of exalted deeds gives, a lawful good paladin that lives in a lawful evil or neutral society is said to be a person who would work towards their goals of being good by use of the system at hand. Theyd essentially try to change the government into being lawful good by working with the government.

That's also the book with Mind Rape for Goodness, and poisons that aren't poisons 'cause we call them by a different name so they're super legit! And Inner Beauty, because...Evil people are ugly? Oh, and the Unicorn class where only female medium sized maidens can enter. That's...Not weird at all!

It might be best to pretend that book doesn't exist when it comes time to discuss alignments.

[sage20500]

That's also the book with Mind Rape for Goodness, and poisons that aren't poisons 'cause we call them by a different name so they're super legit! And Inner Beauty, because...Evil people are ugly? Oh, and the Unicorn class where only female medium sized maidens can enter. That's...Not weird at all!

It might be best to pretend that book doesn't exist when it comes time to discuss alignments.

See funnily enough i could totally see a civilization that actually does the mind rape for good thing and theyd actually count as being lawful good. Essentially what you would have is a society that doesnt need the death penalty or any huge sprawling prisons because anyone who commits a crime would essentially have that happen to them. Sad part is it would actually work. No spending thousands of gold keeping people locked up so they cant commit a crime again, and anyone who goes through the process is comepletly rehabilitated with little to no chance of ever becoming a repeat offender. Its essentially the idea of clockwork orange, only better implemented in practice, mist likely cheaper and less time consuming, and your cons will legitimately become moral upstanding good citizens that are back to contributing to your society instead of being a drain on it.

Does it take away their free will and ability to choose to be good. Yes. Is it something that youd see only imeplemented in some kind of tyranical utopian\distopian type of society. You bet your ass so.

But does it fix the issue of crime and for the larger benefit of everyone else solve the issue in a way where you are not needlessly killing sentient beings or wasting resources on people who have a high chance of repeating said evil acts should you set them free. Yes it does, and for a lawful good society that cares more about the law side of the spectrum while wanting to make sure their people stay pure, this entirely fits the bill as advertised.

[Honest Tiefling]

I think by the time you have to rely on mind rape, you really shouldn't be playing a paladin. That sort of setting/story combined with a class that loses powers for failing to achieve goodness just makes alarm bells go off in my head and I could quickly see that not working out so well.

[Blackhawk748]

See funnily enough i could totally see a civilization that actually does the mind rape for good thing and theyd actually count as being lawful good. Essentially what you would have is a society that doesnt need the death penalty or any huge sprawling prisons because anyone who commits a crime would essentially have that happen to them. Sad part is it would actually work. No spending thousands of gold keeping people locked up so they cant commit a crime again, and anyone who goes through the process is comepletly rehabilitated with little to no chance of ever becoming a repeat offender. Its essentially the idea of clockwork orange, only better implemented in practice, mist likely cheaper and less time consuming, and your cons will legitimately become moral upstanding good citizens that are back to contributing to your society instead of being a drain on it.

Does it take away their free will and ability to choose to be good. Yes. Is it something that youd see only imeplemented in some kind of tyranical utopian\distopian type of society. You bet your ass so.

But does it fix the issue of crime and for the larger benefit of everyone else solve the issue in a way where you are not needlessly killing sentient beings or wasting resources on people who have a high chance of repeating said evil acts should you set them free. Yes it does, and for a lawful good society that cares more about the law side of the spectrum while wanting to make sure their people stay pure, this entirely fits the bill as advertised.

Congrats, you just made a massive dystopia.

[Troacctid]

Here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?448799-To-March-Into-Hell-for-a-Heavenly-Cause-A-Lawful-Good-Handbook) is a handbook on being Lawful Good.


That's also the book with Mind Rape for Goodness, and poisons that aren't poisons 'cause we call them by a different name so they're super legit! And Inner Beauty, because...Evil people are ugly? Oh, and the Unicorn class where only female medium sized maidens can enter. That's...Not weird at all!
I think all of those things are reasonable, and you're mischaracterizing them a bit.

[Sagetim]

See funnily enough i could totally see a civilization that actually does the mind rape for good thing and theyd actually count as being lawful good. Essentially what you would have is a society that doesnt need the death penalty or any huge sprawling prisons because anyone who commits a crime would essentially have that happen to them. Sad part is it would actually work. No spending thousands of gold keeping people locked up so they cant commit a crime again, and anyone who goes through the process is comepletly rehabilitated with little to no chance of ever becoming a repeat offender. Its essentially the idea of clockwork orange, only better implemented in practice, mist likely cheaper and less time consuming, and your cons will legitimately become moral upstanding good citizens that are back to contributing to your society instead of being a drain on it.

Does it take away their free will and ability to choose to be good. Yes. Is it something that youd see only imeplemented in some kind of tyranical utopian\distopian type of society. You bet your ass so.

But does it fix the issue of crime and for the larger benefit of everyone else solve the issue in a way where you are not needlessly killing sentient beings or wasting resources on people who have a high chance of repeating said evil acts should you set them free. Yes it does, and for a lawful good society that cares more about the law side of the spectrum while wanting to make sure their people stay pure, this entirely fits the bill as advertised.

I think you should read the book Villains By Necessity. But putting aside the whole 'mind rape is never a good action' side of the argument, I just want to point out that incarcerating someone in dnd is not thousands of gold per anything. It's coppers a day if you bother to care to feed them. It's a medieval dungeon, not a modern prison system, and there are not likely any laws prohibiting cruel and unusual punishments, so if you want to just leave prisoners chained up to a wall and let them starve to death, that's more than likely your right as a landed noble who owns a dungeon. Now, the local good priests would probably have issues with that, and at least petition you to let them go around using create food and water, cure disease and so on to ensure that your prisoners aren't just dying from not being cared for while incarcerated. But that would be the church doing it on it's own initiative as an act of mercy and a self affirmation of faith. You wouldn't have to pay for that. In fact, if that was going on your costs would be somewhere between little to none because you already paid for the dungeon as part of the construction, it's not an ongoing cost. It's not like it's wired with electricals that need maintenance or plumbing or something. If you want to get really cost effective, ever burning torches would eventually pay themselves off in the whole 'not having to replace the torches every day' and 'not choking everyone in the dungeon with smoke' aspects, and you could have it cast on the bricks in the walls or similarly built in features that are tough if not impossible to remove. In fact, you could have it cast on the ceiling of the dungeon cells as an adde bit of torture while being imprisoned there. With no windows to the outside you might need to make sure there's an air flow to keep them from asphyxiating, but the benefit would come in the form of completely disorienting your prisoners by giving them no means to tell night from day or how much time is passing because it's always the same constant amount of light in their little stone room.

Anyway, that got sidetracked from paladins a bit. And probably describes the kind of dungeon a paladin would go into and be disgusted by on a moral level. However, it would stand as an example of different kinds of lawful good. The noble who owns that dungeon could still be lawful good, because he is compassionate towards his law abiding people by being tough on crime, and is following the laws of his land which allow him to do some very morally dubious things as a landed lord. By contrast, the paladin could very easily by morally good and motivated by the outline of his faith, so if he was a paladin of pelor (sun god of healing and all that) he might have some issues with what he sees as the mistreatment of the prisoners. And that's where having unlimited detect evil would help him out. Because if the local lord doing this still doesn't ping on the evildar, then he knows smite evil won't work on the guy. He could still work to try and convince the lord that what he's doing is wrong, or even work against the lord because they are both operating on different interpretations of the lawful alignment...but he's probably not going to bust down the door in the middle of the lord's breakfast and smite him to death in front of his family.

That said, a paladin of torm (god of justice and upholding laws and all that) could be very much into the 'obeying the laws of the land' thing and see a dungeon like the one described as being perfectly legitimate. It's a punishment for crimes, not a rehabilitation center. And if the laws of the land allow it, then the local lord is justified in their actions. Hell, the paladin of torm could even be a sworn knight of a particular noble and it would probably never clash with his ideals as a paladin of torm as long as he didn't swear to an evil lord.

edit: Oh, right, and if you are using some form of mind rape where wizards are involved, they tend not to work for free. Ever. Clerics maybe with a good sob story, but even then they would expect a similar size to paying a wizard donation to their church (or a building). Pretty much any caster or manifester hired to do that kind of thing would be costing you in the gold range, possibly per casting if you didn't manage to negotiate a by the month or what have you payment plan to keep your costs from ballooning. I think the player's handbook suggests something like 5x caster level gold piece per spell? yeah, that would add up if you're dropping 45 gold per offender to shake their marbles around for the greater good.

[sage20500]

I think by the time you have to rely on mind rape, you really shouldn't be playing a paladin. That sort of setting/story combined with a class that loses powers for failing to achieve goodness just makes alarm bells go off in my head and I could quickly see that not working out so well.

Im not argueing for a paladin to use mind rape, im argueing that saying you should exclude the book of exalted deeds from discussions such as these because of examples such as mind rape for good seems slightly ignorant. Yes its not necessarily a sound thing you should do, but as stated in the above post it can still be argued that for the purposes of being lawful good, using mind rape in such a fashion can in fact be considered good and a much better alternative to the traditional methods of dealing with evil acts. The same can be said with the silver flame. They are a lawful good system of power that believes in doing anything you can for the "greater good". Such things can include leaving alone and exploiting a clearly evil person so long as what ever it is that your exploiting them for is for the greater good of everyone, to an earlier example of how they deal with lycanthropes, because lycanthrope afflictions forever change a not pcs moral alignment and they have argued that this in and of itself is strictly evil, so for the greater good any and all lycanthropes or suspected lycanthropes must be put down. Even if you have things such as werebears... who become lawful good from the affliction. Doesnt matter, silver flame still says you should kill them to save everyone else, because that is the lawful good thing to do.

The point to this being, just because a source or splat book contains something that you might disagree with, doesn't mean that you should say it has no place being brought up in discussions.

[Troacctid]

Mindrape is never a good action. The spell has the [Evil] descriptor, so the act of casting it corrupts the caster towards evil, even if she thinks she's using it toward a good end.

[Pugwampy]

2) Curing Evil:
While one can treat an infected limb by amputation, amputation does not cure the limb of its infection. Strive to save the evildoers from the corruption they are victims of.

I totally disagree with that . Thats exactly how a Paladin would "operate" on the forces of evil . This "guiding light, savior and redeemer " pouf belongs to a priest or cleric class . Paladin is the sword of justice , the lion of the church . Where the healer is kind the paladin is stern .

A paladin to me is a very strict rp class , A zealot , a champion , a hero,s hero , A stick in the mud. A soul of vengence who would not give one little bit of evil anywhere to take root . A rogue player shoplifts , well paladin would turn him in and apologize . An assassin would join the party without his head because the Paladin has already lopped it off .

A paladin player must tell the DM what good deed she is going to do today .
Upholds the strictest moral codes . Where the normal heroes flees a monster , the paladin marches towards it . When a farmer gives the party a reward , the paladin gives it back to him . The deed was reward enough .

As a chaotic evil DM I am totally disgusted by the concept of a Paladin .

[Sagetim]

I totally disagree with that . Thats exactly how a Paladin would "operate" on the forces of evil . This "guiding light, savior and redeemer " pouf belongs to a priest or cleric class . Paladin is the sword of justice , the lion of the church . Where the healer is kind the paladin is stern .

A paladin to me is a very strict rp class , A zealot , a champion , a hero,s hero , A stick in the mud. A soul of vengence who would not give one little bit of evil anywhere to take root . A rogue player shoplifts , well paladin would turn him in and apologize . An assassin would join the party without his head because the Paladin has already lopped it off .

A paladin player must tell the DM what good deed she is going to do today .
Upholds the strictest moral codes . Where the normal heroes flees a monster , the paladin marches towards it . When a farmer gives the party a reward , the paladin gives it back to him . The deed was reward enough .

As a chaotic evil DM I am totally disgusted by the concept of a Paladin .


While I have no problem with most of this interpretation of a paladin as long as you are clear with your players that this is what a paladin is...there is just one line that bugs me in here: Where the normal heroes flees a monster , the paladin marches towards it .

Just to clarify, I'm pretty sure paladins don't have to suicide charge optional fights. I mean, sure, if there's a dragon menacing a town this kind of paladin is going to want to try and take it down or interpose himself between it and innocent people and so on...but if the party is wandering through the woods and you rolled a random encounter with a sleeping green cr 15 dragon in the forest for your party of level 1 adventurers, the paladin should not feel obligated to get himself killed by stabbing it's face with his glorified pointy stick. He should probably put up some signs to warn people about it though, maybe tell the local hamlets about it if they aren't aware of it, you know...put the word out so someone who has a chance at winning can show up and deal with it instead of dying and provoking it to terrorize the nearby area without warning. If anything would earn you a post mortem falling from paladin status from me, I think it would be being the guy who stabbed a sleeping dragon in the face, woke it up, and caused it to start murderizing the entire local area because you couldn't keep your sword sheathed and think.

[Amphetryon]

Playing a Paladin has one really good guiding principle: Talk To Your DM.

Some DMs will almost reflexively put the Paladin in difficult moral quandaries, where choosing incorrectly will cause a fall. Some Players will enjoy that. In my experience, most will not enjoy it when the moral quandaries recur rapidly, or require the Paladin's Player to play 'guess what the DM is thinking.' This most often happens when the Player and the DM do not share a common view on what it means to be LG, or what the particular Code actually entails.

[AslanCross]

I think the Talk to your DM advice is the easiest to generalize, without getting into a whole morass of moral and ethical debates with people who likely have different worldviews and thus are difficult to convince otherwise.

[Pugwampy]

but if the party is wandering through the woods and you rolled a random encounter with a sleeping green cr 15 dragon in the forest for your party of level 1 adventurers,


...Then I weep for them because DM is suffering from Down Syndrome .



Playing a Paladin has one really good guiding principle: Talk To Your DM.


Every DM has different play style and interpretation of stick in the mud class not to mention the Gods . Asking him about it and whats allowed will save you lots of grief .

Main thing i would want from player is what good deed are you going to do today inbetween crushing evil ? Some role playing thingy like soup kitchen volunteer work or healing a leper .
Not suffering an evil party member to live . Not wishing out loud to be an Anti Paladin . Killing anything evil he comes across "thats within his power" . His every word thought and deed DM will take note of . Fall you wretched Paladin .....FALL!!

Perhaps its a bit strict of me but understand this class limits the freedoms of the other players and DM . In a do what you want world players will naturally try to a be a little naughty <sometimes very very naughty> .Dm will naturally want to be a bit naughty too , peddling magic items for players souls for example .
Having a policeman player watching everyone sucks.

Same problem in reverse if you have an Anti Paladin player .

[BearonVonMu]

On a related note, I would recommend purchasing a Phylactery of Faithfulness as soon as it was available.
It tells you when you are about to commit an act that would adversely affect your alignment or relationship with your deity. In short, you would know before you did something that might make your paladin fall.
It's really quite inexpensive, too.

[Anachronity]

The most important step to playing a paladin: make sure that your GM understands that paladins aren't always lawful stupid.

I once had a GM tell me that my Paladin/Oracle was going to die due to my Shield Other spell I had cast on someone who was currently drowning (even though drowning doesn't deal damage...). Lacking any way to save said person, and of the understanding that my Shield Other was not helping them in any way even though it was killing me, I said that I dismiss the spell. The DM told me that if I did so, I would fall.

If your GM has an unrealistic expectation of Paladins and his/her mind can't be changed, do yourself a favor and play a LG Warpriest instead.

EDIT: In other words, what Honest Tiefling said. The 'Lawful' part is definitely the hardest part when it comes to Paladins.

EDIT EDIT: And Amphetryon.

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

Does anyone know any specific guides that really do a good job about going into how to properly play a Paladin? I don't mean in a mechanical sense, but how to properly roleplay the Paladin Code without going into Lawful Stupid or Blind Zealot territory.

That's going to depend a lot on your particular paladin and from whence it comes. In a broad sense, custom world paladin =/= Dragonlance paladin =/= Faerun paladin =/= Spelljammer paladin. And in a more specific sense, your Spelljammer paladin isn't mine or my friend's or your friend's. So I'm going to echo the advice of others, and say that you ought to focus on your character first and on paladin second. If you can make a character who happens to be a paladin, it'll be a lot easier to keep to your code than making a paladin who you have to play as a character.

Second, I'd get things real straight with your DM and what his/her expectations are; you could get someone who's more about the Lawful than the Good and expects rigorous adherence to a bunch of unsaid, unwritten rules, or you could get someone who's fine with you being Neutral Good as long as you try really hard to act well.

Third, I'd be looking real intently at the various paladin sub-classes and variants, specifically the paladin of freedom (or prestige paladin), as that might give you a bit of latitude in interpreting codes in ways that are more natural for your character. It's important to stress that you should have an idea what your character is and why, totally apart from paladinhood.

Fourth, I'm always going to say that the whole falling mechanic is a crock, and that the numbers and abilities bundled under 'paladin' ought to be totally separate from the fluff that is 'Paladin".

[Seppo87]

Does anyone know any specific guides that really do a good job about going into how to properly play a Paladin?
Yes.
Do this.

Ask your GM the following:

"If a cleric of my deity asked the following questions to the deity herself, what would be the answers?
(whatever)*
Since my character has formal religion training and has become a Paladin, he should know these things."

*
-Can a Paladin of Deity have fun drinking and having occasional sexual encounters?
If the answer is no, the guide suggests you don't play a Paladin of Deity.

-How does Deity feel about her Paladin only being able to save one of two innocents?
If the answer is "you must save both", the guide suggests you do not play a Paladin of Deity.

-Can the Paladin of Deity not intervene when minor infractions happen, as long as the goal is to preserve a good relationship with a fellowmate that would be beneficial in the long run for the greater good?
If the answer is no, you should definitely not play a LG Paladin. Try a CG one instead.