How Far Does Rationalization Go?

[C.Penguin]

Awhile ago one of my players was faced with an order he really didn't want to follow, and I am wondering what my fellow forum-lurkers think of the call that I made as DM.

The Situation: a city of ~40,000 people had possibly been infected with a plague that killed it's victims and reanimated them into vicious undead (think 28 Days Later), and the PC's commanding officer (the prince of the nation he was a soldier for) commanded that he, along with the other PCs and the prince's men slay every member of the city's populace, to ensure that the plague did not spread to other places. As might be expected the PCs (who were all x/Good or x/Neutral leaning towards Good) were appalled at the idea and immediately abandoned the prince, along with several hundred like-minded soldiers. This particular PC on the other hand, didn't see following the order as such a cut-and-dry decision.

The Choice: This PC decided to follow the prince's order and proceeded to participate in what I termed "genocide (he didn't agree with that label)." As a result, his alignment was changed from L/N to L/E, a decision I viewed as perfectly reasonable, as he did it because he was commanded to while ultimately displaying a total lack of regard for life. In addition he didn't once think that maybe some people weren't infected or, even worse, that none of the populace was infected, and that the prince (who had displayed a remarkable tendency to act impulsively without thinking of the consequences) may have just been acting selfishly. Coincidentally the prince, who was a paladin, was stripped of his paladin powers and later fell to evil and usurped his father's kingdom.

The Issue: This PC was convinced that his actions were not evil, and that he was only following orders "for the greater good," which to me and the rest of the players sounded awfully similar to the thought pattern of some Nazis (Hitler was, IMO, the definition of L/E), but maybe that was just an unfair generalization. Also before the question of "why did he care so much" comes up, our party was, and still is, a group of players who frown upon evil actions to the extreme, and so that "E" in his alignment was sort of a great big target, especially in the case of the highly zealous paladin in the party.

So my fellow forum-lurkers, my question is this: were his actions a.) justified and b.) evil? I have formulated my own ideas on this, I'm just curious as to what other people think.

Secondarily if anyone has stories similar to this one (significant moral issues with dubious (or not so dubious) alignment repercussions, share those as well.

[Rothen]

This is just a great basis for an alignment discussion. Essentially the question you have to ask yourself here is:

"If you're trying to be good, but messed up somewhere and did something that is ultimately evil, are you still good?"

It's hard to find a conclusive answer here, and I think you have to go with what you think as a DM. There is something to be said for calling the PC evil. But you could argue that he's still good because he tried - especially here, considering that if he'd done nothing, it would've had far worse results.

Personally, I think you did a good job of calling him neutral. He's still a PC, so I suppose he also did some good acts that might balance out whatever evil there was in that act.
And you're still giving the player a good chance to attone for his crime and get a good status again.

[Yora]

So my fellow forum-lurkers, my question is this: were his actions a.) justified and b.) evil? I have formulated my own ideas on this, I'm just curious as to what other people think.

Does it matter?
What might matter is what other NPCs think about his choice, and they could be right or wrong.

[Excession]

I lean toward thinking that in this case Arthas was justified, but that he didn't have to be such an ass about it. The culling was the start of his fall, not the end. His later decisions were fully evil, but in a twisted way it all made sense.

Warcraft 3 had good writing.

Or were you talking about something else?

(As a side note, I always wondered what happened to the gluten intolerant citizens of Strathholm. Acceptable losses?)

[Shpadoinkle]

Sometimes you have to do what you have to do. Even if it sucks.

I'm sure Typhoid mary was a wonderful person, but if she'd been quarantined (possibly for the rest of her life) a lot of people wouldn't have died when they did.

In this case you don't have the option to quarantine, so you have to make do with what options you DO have. Yeah, it sucks that these innocent people have to die, but they're freaking dangerous! True, it's through no fault of thier own, but sometimes a few individuals have to be sacrificed to keep the rest of society safe.

He didn't kill out of spite, or anger, or hatred, or just to be an *******. He killed them because it was a dire situation and it seemed like the only reasonable course of action- these people had already died, been reanimated, and were now a threat to the still living. Yes, it would have been ideal if he could have found a way to help them somehow, but did he have the resources or time to do that?

[Snake-Aes]

It's evil. Think Arthas in warcraft 3 if you want an example that doesn't have to call nazis(for some reason people always overreact to that).

"Obeying orders" is not the "point" of a lawful alignment. A Lawful person is just comfortable with the concept. But if obeying orders would imply something he doesn't agree with, he will act to the best of his ability not to obey such orders (even to the point of -oh my- DISOBEYING).
Neutral people do not like to inflict harm on innocents. "Cull the city" is evil by any measure.

If he really showed no qualm in doing that, he's being evil.



Also remember, Good, Evil, Chaos and Order are absolute concepts, above identities or in-universe interpretation. It doesn't matter if in the person's mind it's justified, or makes sense. If it's an evil deed, it's an evil deed regardless of what he or others think about it.

[Excession]

Well, if this is about Arthas in Warcraft 3, he didn't kill a horde of evil undead. He (or in fact you, as the player) killed a city full of city people who were infected with a disease that he believed to be incurable and was going to turn them into a horde of undead. He was, if it matters, correct in that belief. The disease was contracted by eating infected grain, I'm unsure if it was contageous person to person, or undead to person, at that stage.

This act in itself did not make him fall, but it seems that falling isn't something that happens to Warcraft paladins. They can, like Arthas, become Death Knights, who are living but thoroughly evil servants of the undead BBEG. It's like falling and becoming a Blackguard, but there also appear to be evil paladins who retain paladin-like powers in WoW at least.

[Yora]

I think it Arthas case, it was not just the killing people who became zombies, but his unwillingness to listen to his friends, kicking them out of his army in anger, and thinking he could deal with the entire situation all by himself without needing anyones help or approval.
While his actions were justified, he did it for all the wrong reasons.

[Serpentine]

Did he do it because he was told to, or because he genuinely believed that it would be better to stop the disease there, with a relatively low loss of life, than to let it spread and kill unknown numbers of people, or a combination? Also, did he reasonably believe that there was no other, or no other likely-to-succeed, option?

If the former, I'd declare that a definitely Lawful Evil action, though not necessarily enough to push him all the way to Evil from Good or Law from Chaos, but possibly from Neutral.
If it was because he genuinely believed it to be the best way to prevent future greater carnage, I would say it depends on his other behaviour. It would put him at risk of slipping into "greater good" Evil behaviour, but I wouldn't make it enough to cause a change in alignment unless he was already slipping.
If it was a combination, well, somewhere in between depending on emphasis. I'd definitely make it a Lawful act, though.
If there is another reasonable option, these all slip significantly, but not completely, to the Evil side of things.

[olentu]

Well all in all I would say that the act was most likely evil.

Then again this is D&D where sometimes keeping evil from crushing all that is good in the multiverse is an evil act of the blackest sort.

[Snake-Aes]

Well all in all I would say that the act was most likely evil.

Then again this is D&D where sometimes keeping evil from crushing all that is good in the multiverse is an evil act of the blackest sort.

Indeed, and it's one of the main evil archetypes, the guy who does evil to save the world. There are a few variations to that. There's the crazed fanatic(pre-dk arthas), there's the pragmatist(Baron Klaus Wulfenbach), and there's even the trickster(Clerics of Hynnin -trickery- have a very popular sect that supports the church of Justice through underhanded methods to uncover trickery and keep the paladins from being thrown in situations they're helpless)

[Thieves]

Does it matter?
What might matter is what other NPCs think about his choice, and they could be right or wrong.

Unarmed swordsage'd the whole discussion! So refreshing to see appreciation / recognition of the subjective in the world.

Unfortunately, this is not what D&D supports, as Snake Aes points out. It supports only objective values that do not listen to justification, but to forms (best example of this is that atonement is a freakin' spell). If you want resolution in game terms, go with this and anything written down in PHB or DMG; remember that gods are real and will screw you up if you cross their views. All written above sounds quite reasonable to me... in D&D only, though. If you want resolution in moral, real-world terms, The Last Thing you should try to do is rely on others' interpretation. Just for the future.

[PinkysBrain]

Morality isn't really nailed down in core ... but BoED goes a long way towards doing just that. I'm going to speak here from the BoED perspective. The underlying assumption is that the universe itself is moral ... so in the long run only more evil comes from evil acts, no matter what the short term results seem to be.

Even if the town turns into undead, even if those undead go on to wipe out all live on the planet ... even if the only way to stop that would be for a good man to commit an evil act, even then in the long run more evil would come from that single act than simply letting it happen.

[Evard]

I think that is unfair, he had good cause and as bad as it sounds it would have worked. Sure the paladin fell later but even an evil guy can have good ideas (look at non alcoholic beer!)... The greater good was to keep other from being infected, and who knows who is a carrier of the disease

Its like saying

Mayor: "hey adventurers we have a dragon problem, go into the mountains and kill all the evil dragons and you will be rewarded!"

Party screams out "WOO Loot and Death of the Evil Dragons" as they march into the mountains to slay all the dragons. They find an egg (that they keep), a youngling, young adult, and two adult dragons. They slay all the evil dragons and come back to town where they are rewarded.

Now would all the character's go from Good to Evil if those where the wrong dragons? They didn't ask (dragons CAN speak) if the dragons where the evil ones and the fact they dragonnapped a baby and killed a child dragon should cause all of them to go to the "dark side".

I see this scenario to be more damning than the one described above.. And this example is a staple of DnD (charge in and kill everything for money).

(yes OoTS is popped into my head)

[2xMachina]

Hey, go kill the undeads and everyone infected. And those possibly infected, cause we can't let it spread.

What? No! That's evil. I refuse to do so.

I think it's not evil though. It's necessary. Unless you rather have the world overrun with vicious undead. (Or there's a cure. Which doesn't seem apparent)

[PinkysBrain]

In a fundamentally a-moral universe like our own such utilitarian morality makes sense.

It just doesn't make sense in a world with BoED type D&D morality. A truly good person would realise that regardless of the immediate results killing defenceless people is evil and no good comes from evil. To kill them and trying to dress it up as protecting the world is pure rationalization, it's a cowardly decision most likely taken out of the Prince's fear for his own skin.

[Evard]

Intentions are what makes an act evil or not.

If my intentions are to get a dead dog off the road (cause of rotting and such) and kick the dog due to having my hands full, is that a evil act? It is technically desecrating a body (and if that doesn't work change dog to half-ling or some tiny race). My intentions are good yet my actions are less than.

Sure it may make your gut squirm but its not evil.


EDIT: So a CG barbarian with a int:8 wis:8 cha:10 is expected to be able to figure out if someone is lying to them and what they are doing is not good even though they see how it IS good? Not happening anytime soon...

[oxybe]

let's go even more basic:

Mayor McHillbilly: "them dar gobbos are 'a pestering our farmers an 'a takin' 'r aminals! can all y'all kill 'em fer us?"

Adventurers: huzza!

~and thus the group of romanticized thugs proceed to break into the home of the goblins, murder the inhabitants, take their stuff and get the key to the town

this is a proto-typical adventure: thar be goblins, kill them!

rarely have i played such an adventure where the adventurers are given actual proof of goblin wrongdoings, more then "dead cows" and "goblins in the woods".

but what if there were no actual dead animals? the goblins were just peacefully living in their little nook in the woods and the villagers wanted the land (for farming, construction, ect...) and decided to dupe the adventurers to do this bloody job for them.

the PCs honestly thought they were doing good by aiding the farmers from the marauding goblins, and while they did aid them, it's not in the way they thought.

good or evil?

to go back to original topic, depending on how "real" the setting takes itself it could very much be a justified act, whether it's evil or not.

in ye olden thymes, the plague was very "serious business". if it got into the rats & fleas, you could easily have a VERY large amount of casualties. now add in magic to help spread it and you have a recipe for disaster.

depending on the ease of access to "cure disease" type spells, it might be more feasible to kill em all and let the gods sort out the rest, rather then keep them alive and hope for the best.

it might not be the "good" method, but it's definitely the safest.

[Snake-Aes]

it might not be the "good" method, but it's definitely the safest.

Yes, it's what I'm trying to pass here. The best method isn't necessarily the Good method.

[Evard]

Still making the guy evil due to the scenario is a bit harsh, I could see myself having a cleric or clergyman coming up to the character sometime and saying that he seems to be getting darker... Give him a few warnings that as a DM I think he is starting to be evil. Now if he decided to kill all the innocents for no good reason then that would be auto-evil alignment.

[oxybe]

Yes, it's what I'm trying to pass here. The best method isn't necessarily the Good method.

sometimes you need to say "shut up Good".

the PC did what he thought best, alignment be damned. instead of hoping for the best and doing nothing at all he followed orders based on the information given to him and killed what he thought was a threat to the land.

we're only hearing your side, but from my view his intention was good, even if his actions weren't.

[Snake-Aes]

I think what made his case worst is that he obeyed just to obey. A neutral character could indeed come to the conclusion that a culling would be the best alternative, but he'd not exactly like the idea. The fact he agreed so easily shows that he doesn't really care about the innocents who will not be infected and still die. That's evil in his personality. And the deed itself is evil, but you seem to agree to that.

we're only hearing your side, but from my view his intention was good, even if his actions weren't.

Well, as I said the deal with alignments is that they're above people(and even gods), so regardless of he having all the great and selfless reasons to do it it's still an evil deed.

[Cespenar]

The correct call should have been:

1- Infiltrate the city and find out the truth about the plague.

2- If there is indeed a plague, run a quarantine.

Drastic measures should only been taken when there absolutely isn't any other choice. Not looking for other options equals to not caring enough, which equals to "not good".

[C.Penguin]

Wow I did not expect this big of a reaction over this, kudos to all of you.

Rothen: Sorry if i was unclear, I changed his alignment to L/E, not L/N. His character was one of the x/N characters that leaned towards good. My apologies if I was unclear with that, but I do agree with what you said about there being a hard-to-find answer; I agonized for quite a while before I decided obeying the prince's command would cause him to change to evil.

Yora: Believe me, I totally understand what you are getting at. As a general rule, I hate the concept of alignment as a concrete label, and for the most part, the PCs went with the "I don't care what is in your alignment bracket, you killed tons of people" route. This thread is purely to gauge what people besides myself think about the situation.

Excession: You have pin-pointed my source of inspiration. To be honest, I always found Arthas a bit of a whiner, and I never saw his fall as something that should have shocked the player. I wanted to take his fall a step further though, so I added the idea that he didn't actually know that the people of "Stratholm" (not my name for the city but you get the idea) were infected. As a matter of fact, his two scraps of proof were the word of the general leading the undead army, and the fact that the first person they saw when they entered the city had the flu (which manifested similar symptoms). The reason I decided it was such an evil act was that they did it not "because it had to be done" as some of you say, but because the prince panicked and ordered it done without any real proof. Also I've never played WoW so that is not a foundation for my decisions.

Shpadoinkle: Again, the prince had no conclusive proof that the people were infected but I get that I didn't make it very clear in the OP so sorry about that. Also to answer your question, no he did not have the time/means to quarantine a city of ~40k people, so I see where you are coming from on that one.

Snake-Aes: This is precisely the angle I took in explaining the reason for the change. Regardless of what he thought, murder, especially of civilians of a questionable danger to others is evil in my book.

Serpentine: This is where the difficulty in my decision came from. He did it because his liege commanded him too, but also because he was scared for his nation and wanted to safeguard his fellow countrymen and his wife and unborn child. He believed it was the best course of action, but he went through with it with little or no reliable information, and while intent matters, the end result was ineffably evil IMO

olentu: I agree wholeheartedly with this one.

Pinkysbrain: The lack of alignment definition pre-BoED always bugged me, and I like to maintain at least a semblance of universal morality when I DM games. There are certain acts that as a human I just can't define as evil or good, but regardless of the intent or the end result, I feel like what he did by itself was an entirely evil act.

Evard: Normally I would agree with you on this one but to be honest, I always considered "classic" DnD to be a bit, dare I say the word...unrealistic. I know that if a world existed like the standard Phb world that the find the monster, get the treasure approach would work, but I feel like reality would go one of two ways: the monsters would overbreed and wipe out humanity (elfmanty, dwarfmanity etc), or the adventurers would eventually get rid of the monsters, since I can't imagine why people would leave any living to cause trouble. Comparing what this PC did to standard DnD concepts like that is, IMO, not very possible though, because it's a world entirely removed from the style of game I run (where monsters are a limited and dangerous situation, after all, the ones that have survived the adventurers must be the most deadly). I definitely get what you are saying though.

2xMachina: Yeah I don't think something evil cant be necessary though. Killing a person very well might be the only answer but it's still killing a person which is, at it's heart, an evil act, though there might be mitigating circumstances.

Keep it up, this is good stuff. Also feel free to contradict me, I am probably totally wrong about most of the stuff I am saying so correct at will.

[Kylarra]

Did the deserters get moved over to C away from L and N based alignments?

I'm just curious, because while it's true that the lone guy did something horrendous, running away from your problems and letting them happen aren't all that bright and spiffy either.

[onthetown]

Lawful good means upholding the law as long as it is for the good of the people, and to oppose the law when it is clearly unjust so that people can live in peace.

If the character truly thought that the entire city was infected, then they thought they were doing a good thing and knew that killing the people (or quarantining the city) before they became infected would be better for them than to have to die and become creatures of darkness. That still isn't really good, but the character obviously thought it was. If they weren't so sure but just decided to **** all and follow orders anyway because it was easier than investigating... that's an ignorant lawful neutral minion. If they suspected that the prince might be lying but gleefully went about killing everybody with the excuse that they were ordered to, then happened to kill the prince as well because he was a part of the city and the paladin was, after all, ordered to kill the city's populace... and throw in some other backstabbing and plotting... that's lawful evil.

I'd say the paladin just had a temporary lapse of judgement and should be allowed to repent without falling. If he falls, he's not going to automatically change to an evil mindset, so lawful neutral with a chance to be redeemed would be nice for him.

[C.Penguin]

Did the deserters get moved over to C away from L and N based alignments?

I'm just curious, because while it's true that the lone guy did something horrendous, running away from your problems and letting them happen aren't all that bright and spiffy either.

They did not get changed/ The PCs were not sworn to serve the prince, they were envoys of the king and ultimately answered to him alone. They were above the rank-and-file soldiers that the prince was commanding and they didn't break any laws or rules that the king imposed, so I didn't think that side of their alignment deserved changing.

Also before I say anything else that might make me look like a fool I want to ask another question:

Would you consider what this PC did genocide?

[Nerdanel]

Incidentally, when I played Warcraft 3 I waited a few seconds for every citizen to transform before I killed them. It is possible to win the level that way, without killing a single innocent (non-undead) human.

[C.Penguin]

Incidentally, when I played Warcraft 3 I waited a few seconds for every citizen to transform before I killed them. It is possible to win the level that way, without killing a single innocent (non-undead) human.

I bow to your patience, I saw it as a tactical liability to not kill them ASAP. Maybe I'm cold hearted, who knows.

[Kylarra]

Incidentally, when I played Warcraft 3 I waited a few seconds for every citizen to transform before I killed them. It is possible to win the level that way, without killing a single innocent (non-undead) human.

I did that as well.

They did not get changed/ The PCs were not sworn to serve the prince, they were envoys of the king and ultimately answered to him alone. They were above the rank-and-file soldiers that the prince was commanding and they didn't break any laws or rules that the king imposed, so I didn't think that side of their alignment deserved changing.

Also before I say anything else that might make me look like a fool I want to ask another question:

Would you consider what this PC did genocide?

By a strict reading of the word "genocide", no, because they weren't chosen for racial, political or cultural reasons, but rather an issue unrelated to any of the above, unless you choose to read political as "living in the same city", which is fair to an extent I suppose, but it could qualify as mass murder.

I'd like to hypothesize that your deserters are equally culpable, as letting evil happen when you're aware of it, is nearly as bad as accomplishing it for good reasons in the first place.