thoughts on a maturely played Vow of Nudity paladin of Sune?

[flamewolf393]

My reasoning for this character: Sune is known for being vain. Yes she is a good aligned goddess of beauty and love, but it is well known she typically favors skin deep beauty over deeper beauties.

This woman wants to be more than just a cleric or priestess, she wants to fight for the beliefs she follows, so she becomes a paladin (paladin of freedom for CG variant). She will most likely take a few levels of heartwarder later. Now, everything she does is based off her charisma. She is immensely beautiful and starts to exhibit one of the few flaws that Sune has: Vanity. Subconsciously she starts to glorify this trait and decides that it is her sacred duty to her goddess that her beauty never again be hidden from the eyes of those around her. Sune approves of her decision and grants her the Sacred Vow of Nudity. In exchange for never again being allowed to hide her beauty, said beauty can now be weaponized by the Grace of her Goddess.

Im not playing this to be a perv, Im trying to portray a delicate subject matter in a mature way with an intersting developed backstory. How many dm's do you think would allow this, and is there a way to convince dm's I can actually handle it?

Also side note question: Does she have to be uncovered even when she sleeps? Can she use a blanket for warmth? I imagine eventually getting a magic item of endure elements, but early on is this an issue?

[Geddy2112]

Treat it like The Emperor's New Clothes in the sense that your paladin thinks it is totally normal to be like this, and get the party to buy in. Another option is that your paladin is so free they refuse to be constrained by clothing or anything that could restrict their movement. Ideally play the paladin as the same gender as yourself, and be willing to compromise on that. The problem is that clothing serves a functional purpose for comfort and protection from the elements and sun. Instead of being Aphrodite in the shell, have them covered in scars, imperfections, bruises, deeply tanned from sun exposure, and the like of hard weathered skin exposed to the elements.

Regardless, your paladin should not even act sexual or make innuendo. Outright ignore anyone that does. Walk around as this is a default state, and if people ask why, have a deadpan "why not" or "why are you wearing clothing" or something similar.

As far as sleeping uncovered, you cannot wear anything or be covered by something touching you. Logistically, you could still be in a tent, under a suspended tarp, in a hammock with sides, or something else to keep you out of the elements as you are not wearing it, just using it as a barrier. Otherwise, you could not go inside a building as it would be "covering your beauty". I would also try to get that any backpack or bag you carry is not sufficiently covering you, but logistically required as well. Also, if it is see through it is not concealing your body, so you could have a see through suit that kept you warm and protected from the environment but gives zero modesty. A literal invisible suit like the emperor's new clothes.

[Vance_Nevada]

You'd need both GM buy-in and player buy-in to make it work, since the mere existence of the character is disruptive.

Ignoring the mechanical effects of a Vow of Nudity, every town you go into, people are going to stare at the nude super-babe, attempt to cover her up, hit on her, or arrest her. Every scene she's in is going to be about the lack of clothes. She can't have an audience with the king, or comfort a grieving man whose lost his wife, or make an inspiring speech to a troop of soldiers without the scene being about the fact she's got no clothes on. For everyone else in the party, it's even worse, since it's about the fact that they're just "the people who travel around with a naked woman with goddess levels of beauty" instead of being characters in their own right.

Once the mechanics of Vow of Nudity kick in, it's even worse, since every single entity who comes near you is forced to make a Will save or stare slack jawed at you, unable to interact with you or the party.

Then there's the out-of-game aspects, of the constant OOC chatter about her breasts, the endless jokes, etc.

You'll need a specific group of players OR a very specific campaign to buy into it. In a campaign where everyone is a special bizarre snowflake (naked paladin, dragon, 80 foot tall mutant, etc) and interacts with the world on that level, it'll be largely unnoticable, or in a Planescape style environment where people are used to weirdos. Sell the GM on that sort of campaign and it'd work.

[Hrugner]

The only real way I could see this working is if the character wasn't common enough for the nudity to be their most defining feature. If they were either tiny, huge, covered in hair, or sufficiently bestial, you could avoid being a cumbersome addition to the game. However you solve the problem, you're still throwing away an awful lot of gameplay solutions in favor of flavor with the pure nudity character. I think there would be a mix of play were only the naked person could be involved or only the clothed players could be involved, and that this separation would cause play to be slow and boring for one set or the other.

[Krobar]

I've been playing D&D for over 35 years now. I've played in a lot of groups in that time. Based on my experience, all I can say is "good luck with that."

[Lord Haart]

There are people IRL who would rather have nudity be the norm and who promote the belief that a person's body is beautiful, and not shameful, in its entirety. They're pretty well-accepted, and the society gives them a lot of freedom to live their way. They use it to create places where they can socialise naked, to be unclothed when with family and/or friends, to open and promote anclaves of their philosophy.
Notably, they don't demand to walk around nude everywhere they go, cultural and societal norms around them be damned, free of consequences. While they desire a society where this is possible, they're not childish about it.

Having supernatural powers stemming from/reinforcing such behavior, or even worse, allowing your character to bewitch and charm those willing to apprehend her, would only make things worse. Realistically, no matter how much proof there is she's holy to Sune, and no matter how otherwise harmless and thoughtful she behaves, she would quickly get a reputation of witchcraft and malefincence, and eventually threated as a monster. Not helped by the fact that, well, D&D isn't lacking in supernaturally beautiful, supernaturally charming hot babes that eat people/steal sould/replace their originals in human society/are otherwise complete monsters that are preferably handled via 120' range on a longbow firing squad.


The only real way I could see this working is if the character wasn't common enough for the nudity to be their most defining feature. If they were either tiny, huge, covered in hair, or sufficiently bestial, you could avoid being a cumbersome addition to the game.

Now i want to play a Vow of Nudity wookie.

[ericgrau]

I don't think I could take it seriously playing it nor playing alongside it. I don't think there really is a serious way to play this. It might work as a lark. The reason being that it doesn't make sense on a serious level. You pretty much would never be able to enter a city either as you would be breaking most city's laws, along with the beliefs of the occupants regardless of the law. As long as you work with such issues and don't force yourself on the unwilling regardless of the law and so on, it's fine.

Yes you should get endure elements ASAP as the vow seems to forbid long term covering with a blanket. That's pretty easy at paladin 4. Before then even a wand is a bit expensive. Hmm... does a tent break the vow? Or just grab the feat after you get the spell.

It's pretty good crowd control against anything that isn't immune. I think its power is another big problem to get past a DM besides requiring him to take the whole thing tongue in cheek. But never entering a city, avoiding children, playing peacefully with allies and so on is a pretty big drawback. As long as you convinced him that you wouldn't cause disruption and would eat these drawbacks that's fine. If you're playing serious and constantly show yourself to good people who don't want to see you then, no, that doesn't work at all. You'll have an army of guards in no time flat. That doesn't mean the only answer is to break your vow when pushed; it means you walk away. And get allies to peacefully agree to let you enter enemy situations nude because your appearance is a weapon.