What's My Motivation?: Pureblood Yuan-ti Pally

[Prince Zahn]

Hi there! I've been reading Volo's Guide for a bit today, and one thing I thought that would be interesting enough to make for when I (hopefully soon) try my hand at the Adventurer's League is a pureblood paladin of one sort or another. but there's a complication there that is pretty hard to miss: Paladins are passionate about their cause and faith, yuan-ti are not.
So I'd like to ask you, the wise and cynical sages of the playground, how would you go about justifying this unusual combination? how would you motivate a member of a cold, manipulative and calculating race to take upon itself a faith, and an oath that it intends to fulfill?

I'm really not picky over which oath to take when I'd get to level 3, as long as it's one of the 3 in the PHB. I'd also rather not be evil, if possible, but I don't really see this yuan-ti being LG either.

Thank you in advance. I eagerly await your wisdom :smallsmile:

[Sigreid]

If you look at the character trait tables there are options for both admiring a non yaun-ti civilization and wanting to be part of it and being emotional (and ashamed of it). Take both and you are an anomaly that will be killed by your people if they learn of it.

[Corran]

Just play the race against the racial stereotypes.
Most classic example is Dritzz.
I once played a shifter paladin who was very disciplened (had some rigid views as well) and had learned to control his savage nature/instincts, and even worshiped a diety of civilization (Erathis). All that due to him have being born and raised in human lands. Easy.

[Steampunkette]

Option 1: Dispassionate Order.

The Yuan-Ti has entered into a highly logical state with minimal, almost vestigial, emotions. However, unlike other members of the species who seek only to become less and less human, the Paladin has determined that such a goal is illogical at best, as it costs the lives of countless lesser beings for the advancement of the singular. The economy of exchange is foolish and one must, instead, seek out Order and Social Advancement through the improvement of the world.

Such a Yuan-Ti would seek out evil to destroy and good to do not out of caring or love for fellow man, or anger and hatred toward evil, but out of cold and dispassionate logic that comprehends the basic moral equations as a matter of mathematics rather than kindness. And so they hunt evil, they do good, not out of altruism but out of the simple understanding that one must improve the society one lives in, as the individual is essentially irrelevant. Don't expect them to give two frog farts about whether or not they actually save the princess from the Orc Kidnappers, so long as the threat to the greater populace is ended.



Option 2: The Mistake.

Taken for sacrifice at the altar of Dendar the Night Serpent to elevate a potential Yuan-ti to Pureblood status, the drug which coursed through your veins wore off. Through sheer luck you managed to wake during the ritual sacrifice and strike down the serpent-cultist with his own sacrificial dagger. Dendar, however, was not picky when granting the boon of snakedom and since you are the one who sacrificed the final victim, and thus completed the ritual, you are the one who became pureblooded.

Before you were a Paladin. Fighting evil out of zeal for good, of desire for Justice. Now, your emotions are muted. You barely feel stirrings of excitement or happiness, but you made Oaths that must be upheld, even if the joy in fulfilling them is now gone.



Option 3: Mystical Mayhem.

As a Squire to a paladin of good training you to follow in her footsteps, you stumbled into an ancient ossuary, a graveyard pit for those who were sacrificed to the Serpent gods, ages ago. Your mentor fought against a massive undead serpent creature, but perished in the wake of the battle. Alone, and lost, you took up her arms and forged onward to destroy the relic she had lead you here to shatter.

And as you brought down the Hammer of Gulg'uth'nah upon the ancient Serpent Orb, the backlash unleashed an era's magics and turned your world upside down and inside out... When you woke, you had the body and the powers of a Yuan-ti Pureblood, but your mind is still yours, still filled with emotion. Your devotion to good, to the cause, lead your deity to intervene on your behalf in some small way... Now you seek to hide what happened to you, as you make your way across the world destroying evil.


(Alternatively, maybe your god DIDN'T intervene, and you're only PRETENDING to have emotions as a way to cover up the truth)

You've got plenty of directions to go with it.

[Prince Zahn]

If you look at the character trait tables there are options for both admiring a non yaun-ti civilization and wanting to be part of it and being emotional (and ashamed of it). Take both and you are an anomaly that will be killed by your people if they learn of it.

Interesting, I might look into it.


Just play the race against the racial stereotypes.
Most classic example is Dritzz.
I once played a shifter paladin who was very disciplened (had some rigid views as well) and had learned to control his savage nature/instincts, and even worshiped a diety of civilization (Erathis). All that due to him have being born and raised in human lands. Easy.

Never once, in my time playing RPGs have I ever heard the advice "You should be more like Drizzt" used in the context of making unusual, if not original concepts work. I am in awe both at the simplicity and the efficiency of it, but I'm not entirely convinced that I wanna steal that idea yet. How would that be different to other Heroic Outcasts of an evil race?

[Prince Zahn]

Option 2: The Mistake.

Taken for sacrifice at the altar of Dendar the Night Serpent to elevate a potential Yuan-ti to Pureblood status, the drug which coursed through your veins wore off. Through sheer luck you managed to wake during the ritual sacrifice and strike down the serpent-cultist with his own sacrificial dagger. Dendar, however, was not picky when granting the boon of snakedom and since you are the one who sacrificed the final victim, and thus completed the ritual, you are the one who became pureblooded.

Before you were a Paladin. Fighting evil out of zeal for good, of desire for Justice. Now, your emotions are muted. You barely feel stirrings of excitement or happiness, but you made Oaths that must be upheld, even if the joy in fulfilling them is now gone.


Oh my goodness, Steampunkette, I love all of those suggestions! I think the quote above is my favorite. thank you!

[Sigreid]

Since it says in the book pure blood can skip generations in a human line, you could conceivably be unaware you are yuan-ti.

[Naanomi]

I've seen two yuan-ti Ancients paladins. One worshiped a serpent God of Hedonism (a Dionysus like figure) who indulged in 'passions' but could easily 'switch them off'

The second grew up in a Human church from infancy and was sort of a 'brainwashed and happy' sort of character who was intentionally conditioned by a Lawful Neutral church to 'prove' that 'snake men could join the fold'... a bit of a 'stepford wife' type with fake, 'too happy' emotions; but still dedicated to those ideals

[Unoriginal]

Hi there! I've been reading Volo's Guide for a bit today, and one thing I thought that would be interesting enough to make for when I (hopefully soon) try my hand at the Adventurer's League is a pureblood paladin of one sort or another. but there's a complication there that is pretty hard to miss: Paladins are passionate about their cause and faith, yuan-ti are not.
So I'd like to ask you, the wise and cynical sages of the playground, how would you go about justifying this unusual combination? how would you motivate a member of a cold, manipulative and calculating race to take upon itself a faith, and an oath that it intends to fulfill?

I'm really not picky over which oath to take when I'd get to level 3, as long as it's one of the 3 in the PHB. I'd also rather not be evil, if possible, but I don't really see this yuan-ti being LG either.

Thank you in advance. I eagerly await your wisdom :smallsmile:

You don't need to be passionate to be a Paladin, you need to be dedicated.

A Pureblood Yuan-ti can be extremely dedicated to a cause or faith.

As a matter of fact, Yuan-ti are often pretty religious.