Iomedae and her allegedly evilness

[Thealtruistorc]

I've heard people talk about this a lot but I'm not sure where it all comes from. There are some who say things like "she killed Aroden herself to gain his position" and whatnot, and I'm wondering what in the lore makes everyone so afraid of this goddess.

[Doc_Maynot]

Wait, Pathfinder has their own "Burning Hate" style of myth? Consider me intrigued!

[icefractal]

I think this may originate from the Wrath of the Righteous AP. There's a part where you meet Iomedae, and she acts ... not really how you'd expect a LG goddess to act. It may have just been something that seemed different in the author's head to how it came out, but it's enough to raise questions if you're looking for a twist like that anyway.

[legomaster00156]

I know nothing of this. I understand she can be a bit of a jerk when you meet her in a certain AP, but there's no question to her suitability to the role of "patron goddess of paladins".

[Kurald Galain]

It's always funny when somebody starts a thread with "I've heard everybody say that..." and then it turns out nobody actually says that :smallbiggrin:

Yeah, I've never heard this one before, either.

[Vhaidara]

I know nothing of this. I understand she can be a bit of a jerk when you meet her in a certain AP, but there's no question to her suitability to the role of "patron goddess of paladins".

Elaboration in spoiler below

In Wrath of the Righteous, when you meet her, she basically puts you on a quiz show where you have to answer trivia about her. For every question you get wrong, she blasts the entire party with increasing amounts of sonic damage (net total of 35d6). This is after she basically kidnaps you from wherever you are. Now, she also offers no evidence of her identity, and questioning her results in you being struck mute, and eventually being stripped of Good and Lawful alignments, struck mute and blind, and thrown back to Golarion at -1 HP. Bear in mind this is after spending 4 books crusading against the Worldwound and striking down some of the most powerful enemies of Good on the material plane, and is setting you up to go and kill not one, but 2 demon lords (Baphomet and Deskari). And I mean full on "pursue into their realm and permakill" kill them.

A side note (and additional spoiler) is that one of the traits makes you the child of your patron god. The above torture scene makes no allowances at all. Such as for being Iomedae's child. Or, say, the child of another Good aligned god. Or the PALADIN of another good aligned god.

Beyond the issues from the AP in question, iirc it is also canon that she is on abnormally good terms with Asmodeus.

This I only know from rumor. Supposedly, in Rebels/Vengeance, when Iomedae's paladins clash with the Godclaw Hellknights, who draw their power at least partially from her, all combatants were still at full strength. She did nothing to stop her own followers from tearing each other apart.

[Wartex1]

Elaboration in spoiler below

In Wrath of the Righteous, when you meet her, she basically puts you on a quiz show where you have to answer trivia about her. For every question you get wrong, she blasts the entire party with increasing amounts of sonic damage (net total of 35d6). This is after she basically kidnaps you from wherever you are. Now, she also offers no evidence of her identity, and questioning her results in you being struck mute, and eventually being stripped of Good and Lawful alignments, struck mute and blind, and thrown back to Golarion at -1 HP. Bear in mind this is after spending 4 books crusading against the Worldwound and striking down some of the most powerful enemies of Good on the material plane, and is setting you up to go and kill not one, but 2 demon lords (Baphomet and Deskari). And I mean full on "pursue into their realm and permakill" kill them.

A side note (and additional spoiler) is that one of the traits makes you the child of your patron god. The above torture scene makes no allowances at all. Such as for being Iomedae's child. Or, say, the child of another Good aligned god. Or the PALADIN of another good aligned god.

Beyond the issues from the AP in question, iirc it is also canon that she is on abnormally good terms with Asmodeus.

This I only know from rumor. Supposedly, in Rebels/Vengeance, when Iomedae's paladins clash with the Godclaw Hellknights, who draw their power at least partially from her, all combatants were still at full strength. She did nothing to stop her own followers from tearing each other apart.

"Wow, a patron of Paladins is a massive jerk? Who'd have thunk?" :smalltongue:

In all seriousness, yeah, how could that be considered good?

[Calthropstu]

For the paladins vs hellknights, I can see her ignoring it. Gods hopping directly into politics is usually avoided.
But wtf for the other one. That sounds seriously messed up.

[Psyren]

The short answer is that JJ admitted he screwed up the writing here. (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2qngl?Book-5-Discussion-on-Iomedae-SPOILERS-AHOY#8)

If you really want it to, sure, this scene could fertilize plenty of epileptic trees.