Paladin of Slaughter Seems a Bit Nonsensical

[Mildly Inept]

Now, as fan of the goody-two shoes breed of Paladin, I admit to being a bit biased, but looking over the Paladin of Slaughter it seems a bit... nuts?

"A Paladin of Slaughter must be of chaotic evil alignment and loses all class abilities if he ever willingly commits a good act. Additionally, a paladin of slaughter's code requires that he disrespect all authority figures who have not proven their physical superiority to his, refuse help to those in need, and sow destruction and death at all opportunities."

I get how the Paladin of Tyranny could easily get by and be a functional, if evil, member of society in any number of oppressive areas, but I honestly don't get how the Slaughter guys stay alive at all. I mean, even bad guys have to interact with society on some level. How is this supposed to work? The only way I can see one fitting into a setting at all is a good paladin falling under an evil spell or cursed alignment shifting item and being sicced on the world as a kamikaze by the BBEG or perhaps some poor fellow being enthralled by demons.

[legomaster00156]

It's not. It's completely nonsensical.

[Aldrakan]

Correct. As someone pointed out a long time ago, if you leave a paladin of slaughter on watch their code demands they kill the party in their sleep.

[Crake]

Some things are just meant to be used as NPCS and not PCS

[Nifft]

D&D is a very silly place.

[Doctor Awkward]

Pictured: a paladin of slaughter in it's natural habitat:
https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/narutofanon/images/6/6b/Hidan_%282%29.png/revision/latest?cb=20160629194547

Probably the most well-known idealized version of the concept across any popular media.

Hidan despises weakness, and is the only member of his organization to openly declare his willingness to kill their leader if given the chance. He quite literally considers killing others a religious calling, and takes the greatest pleasure in making their deaths as painful as possible. He believes that the only practical purpose of shinobi is to kill and revels in the violence he causes. Probably his most telling line of dialogue is when he offers Yugito Nii the option of surrender, stating that his religion did not allow him to fight anyone and then leave them only half-dead. He is kept in line almost entirely by the fact that he is physically unable to defeat his immediate superior in a fight; a superior whom he takes great joy in constantly needling for the purpose of causing him to lash out in anger.


So yeah. Paladin of Slaughter can be played as a PC. But it will certainly require an exceptional party dynamic to keep him on the team.

[Mildly Inept]

Some things are just meant to be used as NPCS and not PCS

I mean like, even as a NPC how do you justify their existence at all? I guess maybe that anime fellow made it work? Can't say I'm familiar with him.

[OracleofWuffing]

Correct. As someone pointed out a long time ago, if you leave a paladin of slaughter on watch their code demands they kill the party in their sleep.
I am now imagining a party consisting of multiple Paladins of Slaughters, trying to work which order they are going to keep watch for the night.

This is going to be simultaneously a very long and very short campaign. :smalltongue:

[AMFV]

Correct. As someone pointed out a long time ago, if you leave a paladin of slaughter on watch their code demands they kill the party in their sleep.

To be fair, assuming a legalistic strict reading of a CE code is a little bit likely to be incorrect in the first place. If a Paladin of Slaughter could spread more death and destruction by not killing his teammates (yet) then he might want to hold off on doing that until he has used them for all the chaotic death and destruction he wants.

Edit: And to be fair "sowing death and destruction" is not equivalent to "immediately murder anybody who lets their guard down", if you can grow greater destruction from waiting, then wait, you can always kill them later, and if you haven't done it right away, they'll keep giving you opportunities because they're worthless sheep who believe that other people can be trusted.

[Doctor Awkward]

I mean like, even as a NPC how do you justify their existence at all? I guess maybe that anime fellow made it work? Can't say I'm familiar with him.

He was convinced to join his current organization when it was pointed out to him that if he continues indiscriminately going on a rampage, he'll eventually cause the Five Nations to band together and hunt him down. And that even if he can't be killed he can still be sealed away somewhere, which will prevent him from fulfilling his religious obligations. By signing up with Akatsuki, he would be given plenty of opportunities to kill people, and he would have backup to help him out should he be targeted. Just because his religion requires him to slaughter people doesn't mean he has to be stupid about it. He is still allowed to take the course of action that will eventually lead to the most number of dead people.

[Particle_Man]

Belkar Bitterleaf?

[Faily]

Pictured: a paladin of slaughter in it's natural habitat:
https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/narutofanon/images/6/6b/Hidan_%282%29.png/revision/latest?cb=20160629194547

Probably the most well-known idealized version of the concept across any popular media.

Hidan despises weakness, and is the only member of his organization to openly declare his willingness to kill their leader if given the chance. He quite literally considers killing others a religious calling, and takes the greatest pleasure in making their deaths as painful as possible. He believes that the only practical purpose of shinobi is to kill and revels in the violence he causes. Probably his most telling line of dialogue is when he offers Yugito Nii the option of surrender, stating that his religion did not allow him to fight anyone and then leave them only half-dead. He is kept in line almost entirely by the fact that he is physically unable to defeat his immediate superior in a fight; a superior whom he takes great joy in constantly needling for the purpose of causing him to lash out in anger.


So yeah. Paladin of Slaughter can be played as a PC. But it will certainly require an exceptional party dynamic to keep him on the team.

Damn, I didn't really make the connection before how much of a Paladin of Slaughter-type Hidan really is. xD Nice summary and description there.


Also, yeah, Hidan following the orders of the Akatsuki makes sense too considering his "superiors" and how powerful they are compared to him. Kakuzu got good control on him, and the top dogs of Akatsuki like Pain, Kisame, and Itachi are on the top power-level in the organization, and I'm not really sure if he could've managed to take out Sasori either, who I would consider on the lower end of the power-scale compared to Hidan...

*crawls back into Narutard-corner to avoid derailing thread*

Paladin of Slaughter is very very silly, but can work.

[Kish]

When D&D 3.0 first came out, the DMG included an evil counterpart to paladins: blackguards, who had to be Any Evil alignment, but didn't have a specific code to follow. Because the writers recognized that Good and Evil can't be treated as simple mirror images of each other, such that you can play with antonyms and expect to get a functional class at the end if you had one at the start.

Some time later, Unearthed Arcana came out. Part of it was written by someone who thought that Good and Evil were simple mirror images of each other, and if a class could have the restrictions "never willingly commit an evil act, respect legitimate authority, act with honor, help those in need, and punish those who harm or threaten innocents," one could just as well have the restrictions "never willingly commit a good act, disrespect all authority figures who have not proven their physical superiority, refuse help to those in need, and sow destruction and death at all opportunities."

[GoodbyeSoberDay]

Long ago I played a game where the PCs were all worshipers of Erythnul who were living under a Lawful Good/Stupid theocracy. Our raison d'être was to "sow destruction and death" on our hated enemies and any witnesses (read: innocent bystanders) who happened to be nearby when we struck. While the paladin of slaughter was even more impetuous, hateful, and violent than the rest of the party, the GM correctly ruled that she could exercise a degree of patience and teamwork both because it was sanctioned by Erythnul (who could beat her up in a fight, being a god) and because such behavior led directly to better opportunities to sow destruction and death.

Outside of niche cases like that, though, I don't find the RAW Paladin of Slaughter to be functional as a teammate, and it would require extensive hand-waving even as a member of an NPC group.

[Ramza00]

Trying to codify the idea of alignment and codes of conduct often leads to absurd things.


And thirdly, the code is more what you'd call "guidelines" than actual rules.

If you do not want to take the rules to absurd places you should think of these rules as soft rules instead of hard rules.

I think it is obvious the intent for the Paladin of Slaughter is a being who

1) Does not do anything for the sake of goodness for its own sake, actions are evil, neutral, or perhaps even good but when good it is merely a means towards another evil or neutral act in the long term. Never goodness for its own sake, never an act of kindness for its own sake, but instead the contrast wickedness for its own sake.

2) The paladin of slaughter should act like a person / child with oppositional defiant disorder. (Perhaps even conduct disorder or antisocial personality disorder.) This ODD applies to even allies, the paladin of slaughter acts like a childish brat who will follow rules if forced to but at the same time they will be belligerent, and if not manually forced in this moment the ODD kicks in where he challenges the rules merely for the sake of challenging the authority (being defiant for defiant sake.)

This archetype that the paladin of slaughter is supposed to embody does exist alot in fiction, but never to the extreme which the "hard rules" that the quoted paragraph seems to require.

----

Remember D&D is a free form game meant to express creativity and so on. The rules in the PHB, DMG, and splatbooks are merely meant to be guidelines for the players and the DM. Not some official Canon that is never deviated from. Especially since Paladin of Slaughter is introduced in a book that is a compendium of variant rules.

[Zaq]

I think the general consensus is that the PoS (acronym chosen intentionally) is basically unplayable if you take a hard view of the Code, pretty much for the reasons already mentioned. It's a cliché/truism that it's easier to destroy than to create or to preserve, so sowing "destruction [. . . ] at all opportunities" means that you really have to be aware of a hell of a lot more opportunities than simply, you know, not committing Evil acts and so on.

The PoS Code actually prescribes a lot more behavior than the regular Code does, and the regular Code is already pretty restrictive. Oh, and also the line about "never helping those in need" is painfully vague. Your ally has been swallowed by a monster; are you restricted from attacking said monster because doing so would "help" your ally "in need"? It's fairly easy to take it to somewhat extreme interpretations (just how hard do you have to work to ensure that no one but you ends up having some need met by your actions/adventures?), but even not getting intentionally obtuse with it, it's kind of obnoxiously restrictive.

I think there's plenty of design space available here, but the as-written Code needs some heavy editing and some very intentional interpretation ahead of time before such a character is functional at all, let alone "not so much of a jackass at the table that even an Evil party would kick them out."

Amusingly enough, a PoS who falls for failing to burn down an abandoned building they encounter ("you had an opportunity to destroy it!") can still cash in their PoS levels for Blackguard levels once they meet the other criteria.

[AmberVael]

I think this is the tagline for Paladin of Slaughter:

"I am compelled to do evil, regardless of its utility." (http://dresdencodak.com/2009/01/27/advanced-dungeons-and-discourse/)

[Doctor Awkward]

I think the general consensus is that the PoS (acronym chosen intentionally) is basically unplayable if you take a hard view of the Code, pretty much for the reasons already mentioned. It's a cliché/truism that it's easier to destroy than to create or to preserve, so sowing "destruction [. . . ] at all opportunities" means that you really have to be aware of a hell of a lot more opportunities than simply, you know, not committing Evil acts and so on.

The PoS Code actually prescribes a lot more behavior than the regular Code does, and the regular Code is already pretty restrictive. Oh, and also the line about "never helping those in need" is painfully vague. Your ally has been swallowed by a monster; are you restricted from attacking said monster because doing so would "help" your ally "in need"? It's fairly easy to take it to somewhat extreme interpretations (just how hard do you have to work to ensure that no one but you ends up having some need met by your actions/adventures?), but even not getting intentionally obtuse with it, it's kind of obnoxiously restrictive.

I think there's plenty of design space available here, but the as-written Code needs some heavy editing and some very intentional interpretation ahead of time before such a character is functional at all, let alone "not so much of a jackass at the table that even an Evil party would kick them out."

Amusingly enough, a PoS who falls for failing to burn down an abandoned building they encounter ("you had an opportunity to destroy it!") can still cash in their PoS levels for Blackguard levels once they meet the other criteria.

You can essentially make the same argument for vanilla paladins and their code of conduct.

In fact, most of the arguments in this thread on why a paladin of slaughter would never ever work are more or less the same arguments I've seen over the years against the normal Code, just in reverse:

-"Did you not use your Lay on Hands to stop the criminal from dying after defending the shopkeeper he was trying to rob at knife-point? He needed your help. That's a violation of your code."
-"Did you lie to the bad guy about your true purpose with this adventuring party when he questioned your presence in the area? That's a violation of your code."
-"How come you didn't immediately challenge the evil ancient red wyrm to single combat? Innocent people are dying because of his actions. That's a violation of your code."

And your take on what a paladin of slaughter should and should not be doing on an average day takes a likewise absurdly narrow approach to them. A paladin is only in danger of falling if he executes a "gross violation" of their code, or willfully and intentionally goes against both the letter and spirit of the rules he is bound to.

Much like telling a single white lie is not going to put a paladin in danger of falling, a paladin of slaughter is not required to at all times immediately and instantly kill every single living thing he comes across. This is especially true if it is readily apparent that momentarily restraining himself will lead to a much bigger wholesale slaughter in the future. And just like how a regular paladin will be conflicted in the face of an immediate evil they cannot stop on account of serving a greater good later on, a paladin of slaughter will feel the same regret over allowing an innocent to live while simultaneously looking forward to the greater evil down the road.

You are chaotic evil. Not chaotic stupid.

[Kish]

A paladin is screwed if the DM has it in for them. A Paladin of Slaughter is screwed unless the DM reparses their code out of any reasonable reading of the words on the page.

Not really comparable.

[Asmotherion]

it's basicaly playable as long as the player can justyfy the code to do interesting RP instead of just being a murderhobo.

You can go stupid evil with this (just as the regular paladid can go stupid good and willingly give his fortune away to strangers or become a nuisance to the party by not allowing anyone to kill "on his watch").

Or one may not interpreat the "saw death and chaos" as "try to murder your party in their sleep" since they are instruments that can be used to speread more death and chaos. He may also try to arrange a war between nations (going his way in society as he spreads rumors of enemy infiltrations) as this would prove a much more fruitful effort to spread death and chaos than murdering some random hobos.

[Pleh]

"A Paladin of Slaughter must be of chaotic evil alignment and loses all class abilities if he ever willingly commits a good act. Additionally, a paladin of slaughter's code requires that he disrespect all authority figures who have not proven their physical superiority to his, refuse help to those in need, and sow destruction and death at all opportunities."

I dunno. I feel like any of the harsher, grittier versions of The Joker (especially the Heath Ledger version) could follow this code admirably. He would go the extra step of willfully refusing to recognize that anyone had proven any physical superiority, instead just moving goalposts and changing the rules so he's never under anyone else's thumb any longer than he wants to be.

I would like to argue that "sowing" death and destruction is referencing the act of sowing seed. You don't have to necessarily produce death and destruction directly (growing the harvest) at every opportunity, rather that with every given option, you are setting into motion events most likely to result in death and destruction (sowing seeds of potential).

Sure, you could kill your party members, but you could do that any time you want later. Wouldn't it create far more death and destruction to use them to kill countless others as long as possible before they are destroyed? There isn't even a need to be the one to kill them. Just keep having them do as you do and their luck is sure to run out eventually, or else they'll keep killing and destroying forever and what else can you hope for?

The moment they cross you, make an example of them, but so long as you have them doing your dirty work, that's all that much more dirty work for you to revel in.

[ShurikVch]

Actually, Paladins of Slaughter are pretty viable - as long as they're in the Abyss...

[KillianHawkeye]

I just think it's weird that an always-Chaotic class even has a strict code of conduct. I mean, I understand that it's only because it's a palette-swap of the standard Paladin, and they clearly didn't put a lot of thought into it. And it's not that a Chaotic person can't have a general code of conduct, but they should be a lot more willing to bend the rules (even their OWN rules) than a Lawful character.

This goes for the Paladin of Freedom, as well.

[Luccan]

It's right in the oath: any living paladin of slaughter not constantly on the run has been beaten into submission by a superior... There's a redemption story line in there for the right group, come to think of it. Anyway, they won't respect authority that hasn't shown superiority. But if their boss (who has to have done so to be their boss) wants them to stay in line until it's time to "release the beast", they do. Not because they respect the laws of the town or kingdom, but because the person holding their leash can make them. They're probably still rude to authority figures, though again they'll stay in line to their superior's orders (probably their exact orders. They are still CE and murderous).

[Luccan]

I just think it's weird that an always-Chaotic class even has a strict code of conduct. I mean, I understand that it's only because it's a palette-swap of the standard Paladin, and they clearly didn't put a lot of thought into it. And it's not that a Chaotic person can't have a general code of conduct, but they should be a lot more willing to bend the rules (even their OWN rules) than a Lawful character.

This goes for the Paladin of Freedom, as well.

To be fair, a Paladin of Freedom probably has the loosest code. They can lie, cheat, kill an unarmed villain, use poison, etc. The real problem with these oaths is parsing what "your assistance lead to chaotic/lawful ends" means. Too much room for lose-lose scenarios.

[hamishspence]

To be fair, a Paladin of Freedom probably has the loosest code. They can lie, cheat, kill an unarmed villain, use poison, etc.

They're still saddled with "no Evil acts" and a lot of these are brought up in BoVD as Evil (lying, at least, is called out as Not Always Evil).

[Cosi]

The alignment system is nonsensical. Expecting things defined off it to be any better is foolish at best.

[HouseRules]

Worst, only lawful have code of conduct. Thus, Paladin of Slaughter having a code of conduct makes it Lawful at the same time as Chaotic.

[Particle_Man]

I remember a dragon article that had alignment based paladin types for all except lg and ce as they were covered, the last in another dragon article. This was 1st ed, and had the hilarious feature that the true neutral ones would try to murder people of extreme alignments to keep the balance, killing paladins and antipaladins alike.

I see heath ledger’s joker as some kind of god that antipaladins would worship. He even got a follower that would kill people based on a coin toss.

[Pleh]

Worst, only lawful have code of conduct. Thus, Paladin of Slaughter having a code of conduct makes it Lawful at the same time as Chaotic.

Hm. Not really. There are tons of brigands and chaotic types who follow a personal code. The reason it's not usually mechanically enforced is that it's not consistent between members of chaos.

But Paladins of chaotic alignment have to demonstrate some special dedication to the elements of chaos. This isn't a lawful act, just a practical one.

[KillianHawkeye]

Worst, only lawful have code of conduct. Thus, Paladin of Slaughter having a code of conduct makes it Lawful at the same time as Chaotic.

I'll just quote myself, I guess.

And it's not that a Chaotic person can't have a general code of conduct, but they should be a lot more willing to bend the rules (even their OWN rules) than a Lawful character.

A Chaotic character could totally have a code that they follow, they're just more willing to make exceptions on a case by case basis. Blindly following a set of rules should be something that only a very Lawful person would do.

[Yogibear41]

People take codes way to seriously, just play your CE paladin the same way you play your CE cleric.