Int Magic Item Using Evil Spells

[unseenmage]

If a non evil Intelligent Magic Item uses Animate Dead or a similarly aligned spell will its alignmemt eventually change?

What of normally neutral Constructs with evil aligned SLAs built in?

Can Spellscribed undead become good by being forced to use good aligned SLAs?

Is it different for say the Spellsong Nightingale because it is listed as actually casting its stored spells?

[Necroticplague]

If a non evil Intelligent Magic Item uses Animate Dead or a similarly aligned spell will its alignmemt eventually change?
Yes, if it makes a bad habit of it.


What of normally neutral Constructs with evil aligned SLAs built in?
Assuming that it's intelligent, then yes. Mindless things can't be anything except neutral.


Can Spellscribed undead become good by being forced to use good aligned SLAs?
Nope. Can't rise for things you were forced to do.


Is it different for say the Spellsong Nightingale because it is listed as actually casting its stored spells?
Spellsong nightgales are mindless, and so lack the understanding of their actions to be anything but neutral.

[Crake]

Assuming that it's intelligent, then yes. Mindless things can't be anything except neutral.

Those Neutral Evil mindless zombies beg to differ

[Necroticplague]

Those Neutral Evil mindless zombies beg to differ

The SRD itself is very clear on this point.

Animals and other creatures incapable of moral action are neutral rather than good or evil. Even deadly vipers and tigers that eat people are neutral because they lack the capacity for morally right or wrong behavior.

[Jeraa]

The SRD itself is very clear on this point.

Also very clear on the zombie template:


Alignment: Always neutral evil.

So mindless things are always neutral. Except when they aren't. Mindless things can be something other than true neutral. If nothing else, it is a case of Specific vs General rules.

And there is justification for it. It is more accurate to say that mindless things can't choose to be evil. That doesn't mean they can't be evil. Being sustained evil magics (like skeletons/zombies), being made from literal evil (evil outsiders), or somehow otherwise connected to evil (like by having multiple evil spells it can use) are all justifiable reasons for mindless things to be evil. They don't choose to be evil - they are programmed that way. (The same would apply to any other alignment as well.)

[Necroticplague]

And there is justification for it. It is more accurate to say that mindless things can't choose to be evil.
Not able to choose to be evil is the same as not being evil. Morality requires a choice. A choice that, arguably, a tiger is more qualified to make than a skeleton.


Being sustained evil magics (like skeletons/zombies), being made from literal evil (evil outsiders), or somehow otherwise connected to evil (like by having multiple evil spells it can use) are all justifiable reasons for mindless things to be evil. They don't choose to be evil - they are programmed that way. (The same would apply to any other alignment as well.) That only makes even the smallest bit of sense if you completely and utterly divorice the concept of alignments and morality so far apart that what's on your sheet gives almost no indication of anything of import other than 'which form of Holy Word do I need to worry about?'. A tiger killing people is a biological program for murder, and that's not on its head, because it's doing a Neutral act of following it's programming, not the Evil one of choosing to harm people.

[unseenmage]

If it helps I am more concerned with the RAW than with the real world definitions of good and evil.

[Jeraa]

If it helps I am more concerned with the RAW than with the real world definitions of good and evil.

By RAW, casting evil spells might lead to an alignment shift. That is the entirety of the rules - there are no guidelines at all. It is entirely up to the DM.

[Duke of Urrel]

Not able to choose to be evil is the same as not being evil. Morality requires a choice. A choice that, arguably, a tiger is more qualified to make than a skeleton.

The "specific trumps general" principle can solve the problem of zombies and skeletons that are both Mindless and Evil.

Another solution is to think of these creatures as creations of a spell that has the Evil descriptor: Animate Dead. These creatures are Evil because the Animate Dead spell is Evil.

Zombies and skeletons are perhaps analogous to magic items that can also be Evil despite being inanimate. Zombies and skeletons are just as mindlessly Evil as inanimate Evil magic weapons.

I agree with Necroticplague that non-intelligent Undead are incapable of changing their alignment. The same is true of Evil weapons that are wielded by Good characters. The weapons never change just because they are used for Good purposes.

[Deophaun]

Not able to choose to be evil is the same as not being evil. Morality requires a choice.
In a universe where you can be made out of Good or Evil, or Law or Chaos, this is not true.

[Necroticplague]

In a universe where you can be made out of Good or Evil, or Law or Chaos, this is not true.

Being physically made out of something is not the same as having moralities that align likewise. An [evil] fiend can still be good. Likewise, humans are not of destructive personality just because they are of destructive form.

[DrMotives]

Being physically made out of something is not the same as having moralities that align likewise. An [evil] fiend can still be good. Likewise, humans are not of destructive personality just because they are of destructive form.

It's pretty much both though. For a mindless being made of an alignment, they are treated as that alignment for all purposes. For an intelligent creature, like that Lawful Good Succubus paladin that WotC statted up, worst of both worlds. If hit by an Holy Word and an Unholy Word spell in the same round, they take each one as the worst effect.

[Deophaun]

Being physically made out of something is not the same as having moralities that align likewise. An [evil] fiend can still be good. Likewise, humans are not of destructive personality just because they are of destructive form.
Bolded the fundamental source of your error: you are anthropomorphizing the universe. Solars are not humans. Orcs are not humans. Zombies are not humans. What is true for humans may or may not be true for them.

At best, on a real-world philosophical standpoint, you can argue that choice is important for a human being--and only human beings--to be good or evil. Keep in mind, there are plenty of moral systems out there that very much do have good and evil, but have no choice; where Lucifer fell because God willed him to fall. You have others where goodness is defined in relation to God. If God is always good, then God must never be good, because God has no choice in the matter, being that He is defined as good. So, good is not good because it has no choice but to be good.

Now, you get into D&D, and the rules throw your choice theory of morality out the window. Atonement specifically calls out evil deeds done under compulsion as still having weight. Sanctify the wicked can force someone to be good. The moral universe doesn't care about your character's choices. They only care about what your character did. That something else was pulling the strings doesn't much matter.