Wizard Hypocrisy Towards Sorcerers

[mjasghar]

Well he says benevolence is for the harmless then turns around and says killing non combatants is lawful good
And when this sort of stuff is called out he says I don’t want to get involved with a discussion.
Like I said he doesn’t reflect the game in the Oots era in terms of the lore - Eldath was a perfectly acceptable goddess to follow despite her absolute pacifism which he regards as something to be despised.
In fact I’d say his attitude is what the Oots comic parodies and comments upon, especially SoD.

[hamishspence]

Personal vengeance is, IMO, Chaotic. "They wronged me, I'm getting even. That's all there is to it." Even if the system says you personally should not be involved (in The Once And Future King, for instance, Arthur was not allowed to champion Guinevere because he had a personal stake in the outcome of her trial).

Up to a point, yes. But duels (one way of having personal vengeance against someone who has wronged you) can be Lawful, as The Giant points out:

To think that Lawful always means "obeying the written law" is a gross misunderstanding of the D&D definition of the term.

For example, think of formal duels—the "pistols at dawn" kind. Such events are undoubtedly Lawful affairs—they have strict codes, elaborate rules, and concern themselves mostly with symbolic honor. All hallmarks of Lawful behavior when contrasted with, say, a drunken brawl. However, at the time Aaron Burr shot Hamilton, they were illegal in the United States. People who participated in such duels were abiding by a formal code of ethics and behavior that was in opposition to democratically passed law. Lawful behavior can be made illegal in a given jurisdiction, but that doesn't spontaneously change the nature of the act in a cosmological sense.

I've used this example before, but if a paladin walks into the orc's swamp to do battle, he is not suddenly bound to obey the Orc King's laws or lose his paladinhood. It is entirely possible to have a code that you believe supersedes the written law wherever you are and still be considered Lawful.

I've often said that a lot of confusion would have been avoided if they had simply called it Ordered instead of Lawful. "Ordered Good" leaves a lot less room for misinterpretation.

[Keltest]

Well he says benevolence is for the harmless then turns around and says killing non combatants is lawful good
And when this sort of stuff is called out he says I don’t want to get involved with a discussion.
Like I said he doesn’t reflect the game in the Oots era in terms of the lore - Eldath was a perfectly acceptable goddess to follow despite her absolute pacifism which he regards as something to be despised.
In fact I’d say his attitude is what the Oots comic parodies and comments upon, especially SoD.

Frankly, i think he has a point. If youre an adventurer, and youre trying to be a pacifist, you either have a really poor grasp of what your life will entail, or youre insane. If you dont like that kind of violence, actively avoid being an adventurer. Be a farmer, or a temple servant, or join the local government, or something else along those lines. Dont swing a sword for a living and then complain about how you have to use it so often.

Also, again, where does he say that its Lawful Good to go around killing random people because they ping as evil?

[KorvinStarmast]

We see yet again that attempts to gamify various moral systems with this two axis alignment tool fall short ...

[mjasghar]

I’d say it’s more a difference in how some people view certain classes
Is a paladin simply a high born knight with all the impunity to do what he wants? Gygax seemed to argue that (the first quote was about being able to kill a dwarf for a slight to his honour) and then extrapolated that to mean that since a paladin is good that behaviour is also good
Whereas the modern era has defined good and then applies to Paladins (btw I’m not a fan of the whole evil paladin oaths - just have a blackguard class and be done with it)

[Worldsong]

Is a paladin simply a high born knight with all the impunity to do what he wants? Gygax seemed to argue that (the first quote was about being able to kill a dwarf for a slight to his honour) and then extrapolated that to mean that since a paladin is good that behaviour is also good

Wait, are you serious?

[mjasghar]

Wait, are you serious?

That is wasn't the paladin's warhorse makes the matter less serious, but only marginally so. the paladin's honor was besmirched by the dwarf, and as the DM I would call that to the attention of the player of the paladin if there was less than great umbrage taken. To allow the incident to pass without punishing the offending dwarf would be a dark stain on the honor of the paladin.

That’s a direct copy of the post
I’ve not included the next sentences as it would likely be against forum rules - even more so when he goes back to the repellent phrase and adds a racial swear.

[Keltest]

For context, the dwarf had just murdered the Paladin's horse specifically to impede him on both staying in the party and pursuing his quest to help some town elsewhere.

[hamishspence]

Dwarf's attitude is basically "You murder one of my prisoners, I kill your horse and give you a stern warning". And yeah, by real-world standards, I'd call that murder - no trial of any kind, even an informal one, was held.

Even in Gygax's heyday, not every D&D writer would have agreed with him. In Eric Holmes's Basic D&D rulebook "killing prisoners" is called out as being out-of-character behaviour for Good aligned characters.



Even setting morality aside, and looking at it purely as a player/player issue, IMO the paladin player is fundamentally in the wrong.

When another player has taken a prisoner, you do not kill that prisoner without their permission. It's discourteous and high-handed in the extreme.

Even if it's "the party took the prisoner, and the dwarf only had responsibility for interrogating the prisoner" - so what? Again - not the sort of thing to do until the whole party has agreed it should be done.

[Edea]

IMO, no wizard worth their salt would get their panties in a twist over sorcerers having innate magic, any more than they would a fiend or fey having innate spell-like abilities. They would approach that realization the same way they would any other 'rule' in their world; ask tons of questions, make empirical observations, experiment, and approach the resulting knowledge with a goal of practical application and 'bending' said rule (or breaking it entirely).

"How are they doing this? From where does this power originate? When does it usually manifest? Why does it require a forceful personality? DOES it require a forceful personality? Is it possible to distill that spontaneity into prepared magic? Can we use sorcerous casting methods to extrapolate how to hold onto the echo of a prepared spell in order to cast it repeatedly? Can we extend that extrapolation further and learn how to transmute prepared knowledge of one spell into another within a reasonable time frame? Is it possible to do the reverse for a sorcerer? Does preparing magic really require analytical finesse, or is it just because that's the way we've always done it and gotten complacent?"

My absolute favorite prestige class from 3.5 was the Ultimate Magus; it's not the most powerful PrC in the world, but lord I loved its flavor (I fully admit to using Beguiler to get in over Sorcerer, but really even a straight Sor/Wiz entry piques my interest).

[Keltest]

Dwarf's attitude is basically "You murder one of my prisoners, I kill your horse and give you a stern warning". And yeah, by real-world standards, I'd call that murder - no trial of any kind, even an informal one, was held.

Even in Gygax's heyday, not every D&D writer would have agreed with him. In Eric Holmes's Basic D&D rulebook "killing prisoners" is called out as being out-of-character behaviour for Good aligned characters.

What kind of trial are they supposed to do? They were attacked. The post explicitly said they didnt have the resources to deal with him in any way between letting him go and killing him, and since he's functionally a big, stupid dangerous bandit, letting him go isnt acceptable.

At the absolute worst, this is a problem of communication between players, which has nothing to do with the alignment until the dwarf starts dragging completely innocent animals into it and murdering them.

I fail to see how the paladin is the bad guy in this scenario.

[hamishspence]

Killing an animal is never murder. It might be unjustified, it might be cruel, but it's never murder.

A "informal trial" amongst themselves, in which they decide together whether or not the bandit deserves to die, and where the bandit gets a chance to defend themselves and explain why they do banditry, is IMO the absolute minimum.

As The Giant pointed out a while back, those who "raid the civilised nations" aren't necessarily even Evil:

I mean, you can still describe the goblins' place in the world and how they usually live by raiding civilized nations without passing a personal moral judgment on all of them. Let alignment be something assigned by the DM when he places that creature in his campaign. If he wants them to be amoral slavers, he gives them and Evil alignment; if he wants them to be scrappy survivors making the best out of their lot in life, he might give them True Neutral or even Chaotic Good (especially if the civilized nations are Evil Empires). DMs already do that for every human that appears, is it so difficult to imagine doing it for the other races, too? Leave inborn alignment to the overtly supernatural—if it exists at all—and away from biological creatures.

And Robin Hood is the classic CG bandit.

So yeah, I'd call one player executing a party-captured bandit without any trial, and without discussing it with the other players beforehand, "in the wrong" . Them being a paladin makes no difference whatsoever.

And, as those who've read How the Paladin Got His Scar will know:

Spoiler

Show

O-Chul, of all people, was a bandit once. An underage bandit who did what his parents told him - but a bandit.

He got shown mercy - and it paid dividends.

I’d say it’s more a difference in how some people view certain classes
Is a paladin simply a high born knight with all the impunity to do what he wants? Gygax seemed to argue that (the first quote was about being able to kill a dwarf for a slight to his honour) and then extrapolated that to mean that since a paladin is good that behaviour is also good

Since all this is something of a thread derail though - shall we move back to discussing Wizards and Sorcerers and how they see each other?

[Keltest]

I had a big, drawn out response written up, but about two thirds of the way it occurred to me that i dont actually want to have a conversation with somebody who takes the stance that its acceptable or non-immoral to kill innocent and unrelated animals to spite another person, whether its "technically" murder or not. So if you want to clarify that remark to show thats not your stance, please do and i might continue to engage with you (time permitting), but otherwise i dont see any way that talk is going to continue.

[Worldsong]

I think he more means that killing an innocent animal ranks below killing an innocent person (aka murder) in the ranking of things you shouldn't do.

Anyway, back to the actual topic of the thread... Haven't read the entire thread but my perspective is that wizards see themselves as working hard for their magic (lots of studying) while sorcerers just wave their hands and stuff happens. Not entirely surprising that wizards would be a bit miffed at the idea that what takes them years of studying a sorcerer achieves by being born lucky, and that their response is to look down on sorcerers.

EDIT: also as Vaarsuvius and Eugene have both so nicely demonstrated wizards just tend to be elitist snobs who look down at non-wizards regardless of whether it's justified or not (leaving alone the question whether it's ever justified...).

[dancrilis]

Killing an animal is never murder. It might be unjustified, it might be cruel, but it's never murder.

Dragons likely feel the same way about humans - but the fact remains that Speak with Animals is a spell you can use to communicate with animals who do have different personalities so there is no real difference between killing one and killing a person from a different culture who you can't understand.
A Druid might have a point when they kill a hunter's children after the hunter kills a bear's cubs.

[Worldsong]

I'm not really a fan of the eye for an eye mentality. It's the kind of thing which causes blood feuds which result in odd dance routines and couples committing mutual suicide.

[Keltest]

Irrespective of the usefulness of eye for an eye as a moral code, if I, as a lawful good character, see somebody going around killing animals to antagonize other people, this guy is probably a menace. If i, as his (soon to be former) party member see him doing this, im going to know he is absolutely a dangerous and violent individual, and apparently indiscriminate in his choice of victims. If i, as a paladin, am playing in AD&D, im actually forbidden by my code to continue traveling with him at this point due to the offenses against my morals he has committed here unless there is some extreme circumstance that necessitates his help in particular.

[Fyraltari]

Just so I'm clear, the hypothetical here is that a party captured a bandit after a battle, the pladin summarily executed said bandit and in resposne the dwarf killed the paladin's horse? My reaction to that would be asking what's wrong with both of these people!

Also, in the post linked above, Gygax said that a Paladin could freely executed prisoners of an Evil alignment that had just reounced said alignment in favor of LG so that they could enjoy their reward in the afterlife before backsliding. What the hell? People can renounce alignment? So a corrupt tyrant bleeding out on the floor can jsut say "I am Lawful good now" and go to Celestia? And the paladin can kill Lawful Good people because they were evil just before? What?

[Worldsong]

Irrespective of the usefulness of eye for an eye as a moral code, if I, as a lawful good character, see somebody going around killing animals to antagonize other people, this guy is probably a menace. If i, as his (soon to be former) party member see him doing this, im going to know he is absolutely a dangerous and violent individual, and apparently indiscriminate in his choice of victims. If i, as a paladin, am playing in AD&D, im actually forbidden by my code to continue traveling with him at this point due to the offenses against my morals he has committed here unless there is some extreme circumstance that necessitates his help in particular.

I mean, apparently he is discriminate in his choice of victims, since he's only killing animals.

Also there's a multitude of options which don't involve killing him. Such as, for example, leaving the party.

And aside from that it's a bit inaccurate to say he's killing the horse just to antagonize people. He specifically killed the horse of the paladin because, from his perspective, the paladin went over the line first by killing the captured bandit. We're not talking about a character whose behaviour can be described as "Well, it's 5 o'clock, time to chop some horse heads."

Also, as a wise (or just very stubborn) man once said: "It was only one king! It wasn't a habit!"

And to make matters worse, the way you guys explained it the justification the paladin had for attacking the dwarf wasn't killing the horse: it was the fact that it was the paladin's horse, which made killing it an attack on his honour. Regardless of our opinion on whether the lives of animals are equal to the lives of people the explanation ignores all that in favour of an interpretation of Lawful Good which is very egotistical.

Not that killing the horse is OK but I'm going to oppose the idea that the valid response to every bad deed is murder.

Just so I'm clear, the hypothetical here is that a party captured a bandit after a battle, the pladin summarily executed said bandit and in resposne the dwarf killed the paladin's horse? My reaction to that would be asking what's wrong with both of these people!

Also, in the post linked above, Gygax said that a Paladin could freely executed prisoners of an Evil alignment that had just reounced said alignment in favor of LG so that they could enjoy their reward in the afterlife before backsliding. What the hell? People can renounce alignment? So a corrupt tyrant bleeding out on the floor can jsut say "I am Lawful good now" and go to Celestia? And the paladin can kill Lawful Good people because they were evil just before? What?

I believe the correct term for these people is murderhobos.

Also the more I hear about Gygax the more I think he and I wouldn't have agreed on very many things alignment-wise. From what I heard he also had a hand in promoting Lawful Good as the best and Chaotic Evil as the worst.

[Dr.Zero]

Just so I'm clear, the hypothetical here is that a party captured a bandit after a battle, the pladin summarily executed said bandit and in resposne the dwarf killed the paladin's horse? My reaction to that would be asking what's wrong with both of these people!

Also, in the post linked above, Gygax said that a Paladin could freely executed prisoners of an Evil alignment that had just reounced said alignment in favor of LG so that they could enjoy their reward in the afterlife before backsliding. What the hell? People can renounce alignment? So a corrupt tyrant bleeding out on the floor can jsut say "I am Lawful good now" and go to Celestia? And the paladin can kill Lawful Good people because they were evil just before? What?

This scenario reminds me of a movie, "Nell'anno del Signore" (literally: "In the year of our Lord...") where, near to the end, a friar was trying to convert two revolutionaries... so that they didn't end up in hell once executed. And the execution couldn't happen before conversion. Funnily enough, the friar, as the paladin here, was totally in good faith about that. And obviously the two revolutionaries refused conversion as long as they could, still in some way respecting the friar. (Spoiler: the authorities got fed up by the whole thing and the two ended up executed anyway, with the friar trying, when they were already on the scaffold, to absolve them from their sins anyway even if they didn't convert, to save their souls, saying: "I take personal responsibility of this before our Lord!")

If one thinks about it, it makes sense, logically speaking.

[Fyraltari]

snip

Forcing conversions of people to "save their souls" before killing them is a historical practice, yes. And really not one you would expect from someone cosmologically recognized as "good".

EDIT: Yes, it makes sense "logically" but the problem with logic is that you nedd a good premisse to reach a good conclusion, if you think logically but start with garbage you'll still end up with garbage.

[dancrilis]

Also, in the post linked above, Gygax said that a Paladin could freely executed prisoners of an Evil alignment that had just reounced said alignment in favor of LG so that they could enjoy their reward in the afterlife before backsliding. What the hell? People can renounce alignment? So a corrupt tyrant bleeding out on the floor can jsut say "I am Lawful good now" and go to Celestia? And the paladin can kill Lawful Good people because they were evil just before? What?

Consider it like this - Gygax seemed to regard the Paladin is not merely someone who is blessed with powers by the gods, they are 'The Law' in the sense that there are actual laws that they are bound to uphold.
So when the Paladin encounters a kidnapper who is sacrificing children to a demon lord to bring about eternal darkness - if the party captures the cultist alive the paladin can kill them and it is not vigilante justice because the Paladin is 'The Law' and assuming that the crimes committed allow for the death penalty (within the legal framework).
Now the paladin cannot work as 'The Law' for corrupt or evil laws the laws they uphold must be fair - but they are not out of line for killing good, neutral, lawful, chaotic or evil people who break those laws if the laws allow for death as a punishment.
As for our child killer - they could be offered atonement before death, which would absolve them of their sins (and shift the alignment) but that does not mean they get to escape mortal justice - the paladin has now saved their soul - but their crimes must still be paid for.

[Keltest]

Consider it like this - Gygax seemed to regard the Paladin is not merely someone who is blessed with powers by the gods, they as 'The Law' in the sense that there are actual laws that they are bound to uphold.
So when the Paladin encounters a kidnapper who is sacrificing children to a demon lord to bring about eternal darkness - if the party captures the cultist alive the paladin can kill them and it is not vigilante justice because the Paladin is 'The Law' and assuming that the crimes committed allow for the death penalty (within the legal framework).
Now the paladin cannot work as 'The Law' for corrupt or evil laws the laws they uphold must be fair - but they are not out of line for killing good, neutral, lawful, chaotic or evil people who break those laws if the laws allow for death as a punishment.
As for our child killer - they could be offered atonement before death, which would absolve them of their sins (and shift the alignment) but that does not mean they get to escape mortal justice - the paladin has now saved their soul - but their crimes must still be paid for.

Exactly this. In AD&D, fighters (including paladins) had actual literal ranks and holdings as a class feature at higher levels, and even at low levels Paladins were still beholden to and agents of some authority (or authorities, as they were, like clerics, powered by the Good gods). 3.0 changed this to have paladins be just fighters with some cleric powers, and took away the holdings and titles as class features. The implicit assumption was that the DM would play the authority they served straight instead of using it as a Gotcha for the paladin, and they would genuinely be a bastion of order and goodness to the extent that they were capable of.

[hamishspence]

I think he more means that killing an innocent animal ranks below killing an innocent person (aka murder) in the ranking of things you shouldn't do.

Indeed. Or even a "guilty but helpless person who hasn't been given any kind of hearing".

Anyway, back to the actual topic of the thread... Haven't read the entire thread but my perspective is that wizards see themselves as working hard for their magic (lots of studying) while sorcerers just wave their hands and stuff happens. Not entirely surprising that wizards would be a bit miffed at the idea that what takes them years of studying a sorcerer achieves by being born lucky, and that their response is to look down on sorcerers.

EDIT: also as Vaarsuvius and Eugene have both so nicely demonstrated wizards just tend to be elitist snobs who look down at non-wizards regardless of whether it's justified or not (leaving alone the question whether it's ever justified...).

The other notable "Wizard who sneers at sorcerers" is Xavion in SoD. Though we only have a sample size of 3 at the moment.

[Worldsong]

That all just makes it sound like Gygax wasn't a big fan of the separation of powers and the trias politica since he assigned both judiciary and executive powers to paladins as a class feature.

The other notable "Wizard who sneers at sorcerers" is Xavion in SoD. Though we only have a sample size of 3 at the moment.

I haven't actually read SoD but I believe that even outside the Stickverse it's a common trope that wizards are elitist pricks.

[Keltest]

Indeed. Or even a "guilty but helpless person who hasn't been given any kind of hearing".

What, exactly, would a hearing accomplish? They dont have the resources or time to turn him over to anybody else, so their options are either "kill him" or "let him go" (im counting "leave him tied up as a subset off killing him). If they let him go, he's going to go back to banditry, so what else can they do with him?

[hamishspence]

That all just makes it sound like Gygax wasn't a big fan of the separation of powers and the trias politica since he assigned both judiciary and executive powers to paladins as a class feature.

Thankfully D&D's moved beyond that.

What, exactly, would a hearing accomplish?

It gives the whole party a chance to hash it out amongst themselves. And not have one party member acting unilaterally in a noncombat situation.

When it comes to player groups, consensus matters.

[Fyraltari]

Consider it like this - Gygax seemed to regard the Paladin is not merely someone who is blessed with powers by the gods, they are 'The Law' in the sense that there are actual laws that they are bound to uphold.
So when the Paladin encounters a kidnapper who is sacrificing children to a demon lord to bring about eternal darkness - if the party captures the cultist alive the paladin can kill them and it is not vigilante justice because the Paladin is 'The Law' and assuming that the crimes committed allow for the death penalty (within the legal framework).
Now the paladin cannot work as 'The Law' for corrupt or evil laws the laws they uphold must be fair - but they are not out of line for killing good, neutral, lawful, chaotic or evil people who break those laws if the laws allow for death as a punishment.
As for our child killer - they could be offered atonement before death, which would absolve them of their sins (and shift the alignment) but that does not mean they get to escape mortal justice - the paladin has now saved their soul - but their crimes must still be paid for.

Yeah, so when someone tells me "judge, jury and executioner" I don't see a pillar of all that is good, I see a rabid cop or a dystopian comic book.

[Dr.Zero]

Forcing conversions of people to "save their souls" before killing them is a historical practice, yes. And really not one you would expect from someone cosmologically recognized as "good".

EDIT: Yes, it makes sense "logically" but the problem with logic is that you nedd a good premisse to reach a good conclusion, if you think logically but start with garbage you'll still end up with garbage.

Don't forget, though, that in D&D Good, afterlife and Good Gods are actually something real and proved.
So much that Good and Evil can be detected, like a normal physic attribute.
The whole problem is not the Paladin, he acts kinda consistently with the premises[1], is the whole system around it.

[1] Technically a force of Good should not snuff life, this is an evil act. But putting in danger your own soul to save another soul is not the most Good act one can think of? :D

[Worldsong]

What, exactly, would a hearing accomplish? They dont have the resources or time to turn him over to anybody else, so their options are either "kill him" or "let him go" (im counting "leave him tied up as a subset off killing him). If they let him go, he's going to go back to banditry, so what else can they do with him?

Have we reached the point where we resort to murder out of convenience? Because that's generally the point where I feel like the argument starts falling apart.

Also, option number three: take the bandit's armour and weapons and tell him that he's better off heading for the nearest town and getting himself a job or something.

Also, as Hamish pointed out, part of the issue is that the paladin apparently acted on his own and didn't bother to get the rest of the party to agree with him first. If you can't convince the rest of your Good-aligned party that murder is the best option maybe that's a sign that murder isn't the best option.