Taking a Good thing too far

[Trekkin]

I am attempting to produce a character so Good it drives the rest of the party mad, just as a theoretical exercise. Thus far, I'm thinking human paladin (of something like Hieroneous) 20 with Sacred Vow and Vow of Poverty at first level, using all the bonus exalted feats to take every other Vow in addition to subdual strike and holy subdual so he can actually deal damage with what would presumably be a quarterstaff. What else can I add to make this character either more restricted/"Good" or more effective in combat?

[Private-Prinny]

Thus far, I'm thinking human paladin

Depending on how you play it, you don't need any more than that. Trust me, my party's paladin is a huge buzzkill.

[Trekkin]

Well yes, but I want to make it an even bigger buzzkill; a buzz massacre, if you will (using only nonmasterwork simple weapons, dealing no lethal damage, and penalizing the rest of the party for doing any killing of their own during said massacre of course) so I was wondering if there were any other vows or anything in other sourcebooks.

[Adrayll]

possibly a race that's almost exclusively good-aligned? The rest is just roleplaying...

[Trekkin]

What, like Aasimar?

[sonofzeal]

Vow of Peace / Nonviolence. Saint template. Dip Marshal - marshal auras involve giving directions to people, so it's pretty safe to only actually give the bonuses to people who do what you say.


That said, any "Good" character who's sufficiently annoying for your purposes is necessarily going to have some non-good personality traits. Here's a list of possible virtues to consider: kind, courageous, nurturing, fair, instructive, just, loyal, selfless, productive, obedient, dependable, supportive, forgiving, pure, temperent, honest.


I think we can agree that someone who captures all of those to a decent degree would actually be a pretty decent travelling companion in general, at least personality-wise. Traditional for the Lawful Stupid Paladin, though, are a serious lack of kindness and forgiveness. They're rarely if ever nurturing or supportive either. You can mix it up, though, by choosing a different set for him to be deficient in.

[ryzouken]

nah, you can play the ultimate martyr and good guy and still be bloody irritating. Just be an idiot.

"We can't attack those goblins that are attacking that village! They're just trying to feed their families!"

"If the king is trying to kill us then it's because we're bad people. I'm going to turn us all in."

"We can't go off and loot the tomb of X, we have to stay in town and feed the orphans. If we aren't here to feed them, who else will?"

Start promising random NPCs your party's entire wealth and future earnings, defend every monster and brigand (non violently if possible, they've got abilities to redirect attacks in most games, use em!), and generally make every sickly sweet stupid argument you've ever heard in anime, movies, or games.

They'll be hating you before you finish uttering your fifth "Give Peace a chance!"

PS: Guess what kind of character I'm playing. That's right. Sickly sweet frenzied berserker with a heart of gold and brains of lead.

[Narmoth]

After the group complained about my less than good fallen paladin (and we were waiting for him to be raised) I made a very good paladin of the same order.
The group was taking down a group of thieves/burglars/highwaymen. Since their treasure and equipment was initially stolen or financed by stealing, my paladin insisted that all the loot should be given to the victims of the thieves, and the weapons confiscated in benefit of the kingdom.

That made the group really prefer my fallen, brawling, notoriously drunk paladin / blackguard / trying to redeem himself paladin

[2xMachina]

Apostles of peace?

[Volkov]

Don't let your party kill anything, and whine if they swat a fly.

[OverdrivePrime]

PS: Guess what kind of character I'm playing. That's right. Sickly sweet frenzied berserker with a heart of gold and brains of lead.

Hah! It's always fun to channel the spirit of Ryouga Hibiki, from Ranma 1/2. He'd make a great fist of the forest / frenzied berserker.

[Kaiser Omnik]

"We can't attack those goblins that are attacking that village! They're just trying to feed their families!"

"If the king is trying to kill us then it's because we're bad people. I'm going to turn us all in."

"We can't go off and loot the tomb of X, we have to stay in town and feed the orphans. If we aren't here to feed them, who else will?"

Seriously?

The first two have nothing to do with goodness in D&D. Of course, a good character could be that stupid, but there's nothing inherently good about refusing to protect village folk (letting goblins attack a village is neutral at best) or following the laws without questions (which is lawful).

The last one doesn't make the character stupid. It wouldn't be an adventurer at all, however, so I don't see why someone would be playing such a character in D&D.

[Starbuck_II]

What, like Aasimar?

Nah, be a Lumi: they want to kill people who lie. hey are LG outsiders who have laws that lying/cheat/stealing is a crime worth capital Punishment.

[Grommen]

I am attempting to produce a character so Good it drives the rest of the party mad, just as a theoretical exercise. Thus far, I'm thinking human paladin (of something like Hieroneous) 20 with Sacred Vow and Vow of Poverty at first level, using all the bonus exalted feats to take every other Vow in addition to subdual strike and holy subdual so he can actually deal damage with what would presumably be a quarterstaff. What else can I add to make this character either more restricted/"Good" or more effective in combat?

Talk the DM into letting you use the Pathfinder Palie. and then smite the BBEG every week. Will not take long....Not at all.

[Tinydwarfman]

Talk the DM into letting you use the Pathfinder Palie. and then smite the BBEG every week. Will not take long....Not at all.

Whats wrong with the pathfinder paladin? It's a huge improvement over the old one.

[hamishspence]

Nah, be a Lumi: they want to kill people who lie. hey are LG outsiders who have laws that lying/cheat/stealing is a crime worth capital Punishment.

Wrong.

Check MM3- Lumi are from the Positive Energy plane. They have no alignment subtype. And the alignment given in the entry is "Often Lawful Neutral" (with the advanced Lumi Crusader, being Usually Lawful Neutral).

[Myou]

Wrong.

Check MM3- Lumi are from the Positive Energy plane. They have no alignment subtype. And the alignment given in the entry is "Often Lawful Neutral" (with the advanced Lumi Crusader, being Usually Lawful Neutral).

Killing all liars sounds more like lawful evil.

[magic9mushroom]

Take Vow of Poverty and Vow of Peace, make everyone sit around while you strain your water, give them mechanical penalties for not honoring surrenders, give away lots of party funds to the poor, etc.

Your character will likely wind up dead, but that's the idea, right?

[Vaecae]

Why are you thinking paladin? A Lawful Good Monk can be just as annoying if not more so, and very effective with Vow of Poverty. Of course imo a Chaotic Good character can be far more annoying then a Lawful Stupid one. The LG can be predicted and lead around pretty easy. The CG might deside that a cut purse they just captured should be killed from his crimes where as the LG will carry him around till there's a proper guard to turn him in to.

CG can be hell for a party if they truely are goody good guys. They deal judgement their own way, and that behavior can get the party in a heck of alot more trouble then the lawful annoying can. They're not all robin hoods, cause their chaotic sometimes they're more judge jury and executioner. Typocally cities don't like that, and if they are goody good they're still just as likely to take the side of the enemy if they see any member of the enemy group as weak or in need of aid.

Say the group is going off to kill a group of marading orcs that have set up camp somewhere. What if it's not just warrior orcs there? What if goody good guy sees a child/baby/helpless female in their band? CG is just as likely to try to stop the fight as they are to finish slaughtering the band, and then adopt the now orphaned brat as their own in penance for the death of it's parents.

Good of either flavor is all about moral codes, but I gotta say if you wanna screw with your party be CG. CG has the freedom to deside they want to go after X person because of Y wrong they did, even when X happens to be the lord of the land and would never be threatened by a LG character. True the party might abandon said character to their 'insane' plan, but that's only if they know about it before hand. Imagine the chaos if your party was attenting a public event where a known figure was speaking, and suddenly the CG never harm a fly guy goes for the kill on the presumably 'evil' politician. What's the party to do? Attack, flee, turn their own guy in, or something else entirely? Let the chaos flow, it'll be hilarious.

[Flickerdart]

Why are you thinking paladin? A Lawful Good Monk can be just as annoying if not more so, and very effective with Vow of Poverty.

Haha, no. The Paladin will at least have full BAB and thus PA and thus damage, the Monk won't even manage that.

[Sleverin]

Uh, why not the Miko path. I mean, they're all conspiring against you right? I mean, what sort of beings do whatever it is you think is wrong, THEY must be crazy and need to be stopped.

[nargbop]

Vow of Poverty does not work well for Paladin. Even if your fellow PCs don't kill you in your sleep, a proper enemy will come and kill your non-armor-wearing, non-horse-riding, non-sword-swining self.

Yes, I know you get deflection bonuses, saves, and extra feats from VoP, but your HP are still limited.

[DragoonWraith]

Why on earth would you want to do this to the people who are presumably your friends?!

[Flickerdart]

Why can't the Paladin ride a horse? He doesn't own the mount that he summons, same way that a VoP Sorcerer who casts Summon Monster doesn't violate the vow. He just "gains its services". The Vow doesn't forbid services.

[Taelas]

The first two have nothing to do with goodness in D&D. Of course, a good character could be that stupid, but there's nothing inherently good about refusing to protect village folk (letting goblins attack a village is neutral at best) or following the laws without questions (which is lawful).

"Letting" someone do something is a non-action. It does not have an alignment.

[hamishspence]

"Letting" someone do something is a non-action. It does not have an alignment.

Cheesgear's take on this made more sense to me:

"Standing by, while evil happens, is not Neutral. It's Evil."

It also fits with BoVD, where the "naive fool" sample character (a teacher who does nothing while children he teaches are kidnapped) is considered Evil.

Still- he actually accepts gold donations from the people he suspects to be the kidnappers- telling himself he hasn't done anything wrong, so he's in the clear.

[Narmoth]

Vow of Poverty does not work well for Paladin. Even if your fellow PCs don't kill you in your sleep, a proper enemy will come and kill your non-armor-wearing, non-horse-riding, non-sword-swining self.

Yes, I know you get deflection bonuses, saves, and extra feats from VoP, but your HP are still limited.

There's a rather nice (although a bit unbalanced) modification of this one. Let the VoP keep one magical weapon, but loose all attack bonuses from VoP.
Then you can have a weapon that gives non-lethal dmg, or actually play an ascetic, but powerful warrior that can do great dmg