Was Redcloak evil since the beginning?

[Post-human]

Was he Evil aligned since his youth as Whitecloak? If not, what is the precise moment when he crossed the line into Evil?

[dancrilis]

Was he Evil aligned since his youth as Whitecloak? If not, what is the precise moment when he crossed the line into Evil?

Unknown - he was a cleric to an evil god when he was a youth so there is a good chance he was evil in alignment, but likely no more so then the average hobgoblin or soldier in Tarquin's army.

[Quizatzhaderac]

I don't believe OotS observers the one step alignment rule. For example, Durkon is the lawful follower of a chaotic god. Redcloak at the start of his whitecloak ceremony is pretty clearly supposed to be Innocent, which is hard to shoehorn into D&D mechanics, but would often be interpreted as true neutral.

I would say the moment Redcloak became lowercase evil was some off the screen moment between donning the mantle and meeting Xyklon where he didn't have some big dramatic reason for violence/ cruelty, but did it because it was simpler.

As for capital E Evil, I'd say the climatic moment of start of darkness.

[Peelee]

I don't believe OotS observers the one step alignment rule. For example, Durkon is the lawful follower of a chaotic god. Redcloak at the start of his whitecloak ceremony is pretty clearly supposed to be Innocent, which is hard to shoehorn into D&D mechanics, but would often be interpreted as true neutral.

I would say the moment Redcloak became lowercase evil was some off the screen moment between donning the mantle and meeting Xyklon where he didn't have some big dramatic reason for violence/ cruelty, but did it because it was simpler.

As for capital E Evil, I'd say the climatic moment of start of darkness.

I agree with this almost entirely, there's just one minor quibble:
Redcloak never met Xyklon.

[Metastachydium]

I agree with this almost entirely, there's just one minor quibble:
Redcloak never met Xyklon.

I agree with this almost entirely, there's just one minor quibble:
nothing indicates that Redcloak has ever established contact of any sort with Xyklon the Consequential, and therefore it is safe to assume that the two never met.

[Peelee]

I agree with this almost entirely, there's just one minor quibble:
nothing indicates that Redcloak has ever established contact of any sort with Xyklon the Consequential, and therefore it is safe to assume that the two never met.

Totally fair! I shall live with the shame of my hubris displayed for eternity.

[Metastachydium]

Totally fair! I shall live with the shame of my hubris displayed for eternity.

As you should! Seriously, what were you thinking? Does this place look like some silly online forum to you where anonymous people talk about stick figure drawings or what?

[Doug Lampert]

I don't believe OotS observers the one step alignment rule. For example, Durkon is the lawful follower of a chaotic god. Redcloak at the start of his whitecloak ceremony is pretty clearly supposed to be Innocent, which is hard to shoehorn into D&D mechanics, but would often be interpreted as true neutral.

I would say the moment Redcloak became lowercase evil was some off the screen moment between donning the mantle and meeting Xyklon where he didn't have some big dramatic reason for violence/ cruelty, but did it because it was simpler.

As for capital E Evil, I'd say the climatic moment of start of darkness.

Minor quibble:

There are allowed exceptions in the rules to the one-step rule, so the existence of exceptions does not prove that the rule isn't being followed (but this is a minor quibble because this means that Redcloak could be any alignment if there is an exception for it).

Saint Cuthbert in the PHB does not follow the one step rule. And there is a published example of a NG deity with LE clerics. OotS probably follows the one step rule to the same extent as a RAW campaign does (aka, the rule is there, but there can be specified deities that are exceptions).

It would not surprise me at all if Thor allowed all LG dwarf clerics and maybe even LN dwarf clerics specifically to help make up for the bet forcing an extremely honor-bound culture onto dwarves.

And I would actually EXPECT that the dark one would allow any goblin clerics to worship him regardless of alignment. He's the racial god created in part out of their lack of any patron deity. For him to exclude goblins strikes me as unlikely/counterproductive.

My personal theory is that TDO is LE, but I note that bugbears are Usually Chaotic Evil. I'd be mildly shocked if TDO would not allow a Chaotic Evil bugbear cleric and mildly surprised if he did not allow Chaotic Neutral bugbear clerics, as not allowing a common bugbear alignment would compromise the pan-goblinoid narrative and that's 2 or 3 steps off. If he lets in a bugbear that far off his own alignment, then why not a goblin?

Basically, I could see the early Red Cloak as nearly any alignment without worrying about 1 step, and even if one step is used, he could still have been LN if I'm correct about TDO's alignment.

[hamishspence]

I'm wondering if Redcloak swaps domains occasionally (or the cloak allows him 3 domains instead of the usual 2).

He uses Hold Monster in Start of Darkness (the Circus scenes) - clerics normally only get that via the Law domain.

He uses Disintegrate a lot (Destruction domain).

And recently, during the fight with Durkon, he used Unholy Blight (Evil domain).

https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1212.html

One possibility - he started out LN or LE, and recently switched to NE. Switching from LE to NE would cut off access to the Law domain. Might make sense that there's a "if you lose access to a domain, pick a new one" houserule in play.

[Jason]

Do we know that the OOTS version of Thor is definitely Chaotic Good?

[Psyren]

I'd be wary about assigning alignment to children. Even staying purely within the fiction of the comic, the Watsonian explanation is that morality of childhood actions is de-emphasized or disregarded to some degree, and the Doylist was provided (to an extent) by the Giant. There's certainly an age cutoff there somewhere, but pinpointing exactly where isn't as valuable as simply noting that the Redcloak we have today has unambiguously crossed that line. He is an adult and his choices should be judged as such.

[Peelee]

I'd be wary about assigning alignment to children.

Redcloak was an adult as a whitecloak.

[Fyraltari]

Redcloak was an adult as a whitecloak.

Pretty sure he was a teenager.

[Mike Havran]

Was he Evil aligned since his youth as Whitecloak? If not, what is the precise moment when he crossed the line into Evil?

He was Evil aligned as soon as he decided to worship the Dark One, an Evil god. I mean, is it not that you need to align yourself with the God you want to share spiritual energy with? The one-step rule is just a window dressing to put some fun into Detect X spells. You are a Cleric of a God, you align your soul with them and you do end up in their Realm after you die, come hell or high water. Is it not how it is supposed to work?

[Fyraltari]

He was Evil aligned as soon as he decided to worship the Dark One, an Evil god.

That's an interesting question. Is it impossible for someone to align themselves, or serve, an evil entity without being evil themselves? Can one do wrong for the right reasons? Or right for the wrong reasons? The Dark One is the only god who at least pretends to care about the goblins. Is it wrong for a goblin to want to help this protector of their people?
What reasons does Redcloak give for joining the church, in the first place?

Spoiler: Start of Darkness, page 9

Show

Previous bearer of the Crimson Mantle: I expect great things of you, young man.
Teenage Redcloak:Oh, I just want to serve the community in some small way, Revered Master.

This seems like a good reason to join the church, after all goblins need healing spells as much as anybody else and this is an excellent way to get some.

Also, how much did Redcloak choose to join? He lived in what appears to have been a small secluded community, one that housed the leader of the church, and his entire family was present for his ordination. It seems to me that, much like Durkon, he was raised to believe in his community's particular god and joined the church as a natural consequence of that faith and his temperament and abilities.

[Synesthesy]

In my headcanon this setting respect the one-step aligment rule, but with some exception based on race and geography. Some God seems to have entire races in their portfolio, for example every Dwarf may be a follower of Thor not caring about the aligment, but only a CG/CN/NG northern human can. In this case, the Dark One can be the deity of every Goblinoids in the world.

And following the Giant's view of the world, I think that young whitecloak was LN, and that free goblin's society range from LN (for this, see O-Chul's spinoff story) to CE.

[Peelee]

Pretty sure he was a teenager.

Pretty sure that being an adult is required for class levels.

[Psyren]

Pretty sure that being an adult is required for class levels.

Didn't Xykon have class levels as a teenager?

[Peelee]

Didn't Xykon have class levels as a teenager?

Yes, but "teenager" is a spectrum that includes adults at the high end.

Regardless, though, WhiteRedcloak certainly seems to be an entry-level adult when we first come across him. That's how he read to me, at least, well before I even considered the OP question.

[pearl jam]

"Adulthood" has previously been conferred at younger ages as well.

[Gurgeh]

Do we know that the OOTS version of Thor is definitely Chaotic Good?

We do not, we only know that he is Good-aligned.

[Jason]

We do not, we only know that he is Good-aligned.

In which case we don't really know if Durkon is breaking the "one step" rule or not.

Redcloak's earliest appearance in SoD doesn't show him doing anything definitely evil as far as I can see, other than being ordained to the Dark One's priesthood, and his reason for doing so seems altruistic.

Spoiler

Show

But he's definitely evil when he first meets Xykon 4 years later. He complains he will be upset if he doesn't get to kill a paladin. He hates humans. He eats at "Evil Diner" that serves authentic evil ethnic food. And he even describes The Plan as "an evil Plan" to Xykon to get his interest.

[Mechalich]

Redcloak's earliest appearance in SoD doesn't show him doing anything definitely evil as far as I can see, other than being ordained to the Dark One's priesthood, and his reason for doing so seems altruistic.

It is extremely likely that the training, rites, and rituals necessary to become a priest of the Dark One mandate evil actions. The senior members of the priesthood, and the Dark One himself, would be idiots not to set things up that way such that prospective individuals are groomed properly for the service of an evil deity. If Redcloak wasn't made to murder an innocent at some point prior to or during his ordination, the church is being shockingly lax. It's also highly likely that the various prospective priests competed in a typical horror-fantasy battle royal scenario that encouraged then to brutalize, subordinate, inform upon, and even secretly kill their rivals due to ruthless competition for resources that could sustain only some small fraction of the initial total.

Redcloak may not have been evil when he chose to become an acolyte of the Dark One, but he certainly would be by the time he came out as a priest. That sort of psychological restructuring is necessary for such a society to sustain itself.

[jidasfire]

I'd say young Reddie was always aligned to a cosmic evil force by worshiping the Dark One, and if you consider loyalty to cosmic evil to equate with being evil in and of itself, then yes, he always was. But clerics do have the one step rule alignment-wise, so by the game rules it's not impossible that Redcloak didn't start off an evil person. The text is ambiguous about this, which is probably for the best as it allows for some nuance and interpretation in his origin. I would say based on his actions, Redcloak was always flirting with evil (hiring a killer like Xykon, turning him into a lich, etc.), but he never crossed the line most of us would consider unforgivable until the end of Start of Darkness. I'd say if he wasn't evil before that, and he may well not have been, he for sure was after.

[tanonx]

Redcloak's earliest appearance in SoD doesn't show him doing anything definitely evil as far as I can see, other than being ordained to the Dark One's priesthood, and his reason for doing so seems altruistic.

I'm not sure that'd be sufficient. It's entirely possible to be a humble, faithful, friendly cleric who thinks of nothing but helping their community... by burning all those pesky neighboring communities to the ground.

[Peelee]

If Redcloak wasn't made to murder an innocent at some point prior to or during his ordination, the church is being shockingly lax.

Imean, sure, it's a comic strip, but that doesn't mean they have to be cartoonishly evil.

It's also highly likely that the various prospective priests competed in a typical horror-fantasy battle royal scenario that encouraged then to brutalize, subordinate, inform upon, and even secretly kill their rivals due to ruthless competition for resources that could sustain only some small fraction of the initial total.

Or inepty evil.

[tanonx]

Or inepty evil.

It's all a road to producing a few high-level representatives in a world with rolled stats, divinely-induced resource shortages, and power gained primarily through conflict.

Winding roads with no guardrails and some deeply stupid cul-de-sacs tend to work out remarkably well in the long run around here.

[hamishspence]

It is extremely likely that the training, rites, and rituals necessary to become a priest of the Dark One mandate evil actions. The senior members of the priesthood, and the Dark One himself, would be idiots not to set things up that way such that prospective individuals are groomed properly for the service of an evil deity. If Redcloak wasn't made to murder an innocent at some point prior to or during his ordination, the church is being shockingly lax.

The Giant hammered home that attendance of the ordination ceremony had nothing to do with evil, in his comments on Redcloak's little sister.

She had not committed an Evil act.

And it's ridiculous to think that any given six-year-old may have committed a horrible act worthy of being executed unless the text says otherwise, just because that six-year-old has green skin and her parents bring her to their church services. That right there is enough reason for the story to be the way it is. No author should have to take the time to say, "This little girl ISN'T evil, folks!" in order for the reader to understand that. It should be assumed that no first graders are irredeemably Evil unless the text tells you they are.

He also lists Right-Eye, Redcloak's other sibling, as TN:

True Neutral: Gannji, Enor, Julia Greenhilt, Vaarsuvius, Mr. Scruffy, Therkla, Right-eye, The Oracle, Hank.

which raises the possibility that participation in the Evil Plan is not enough to be Evil-aligned. Though an alternative possibility is that Right-Eye changed from Evil to TN by rejecting The Plan. Depends on if you think "Right-Eye was TN all his life" or "Right-Eye became TN" is likelier.

[Mechalich]

The Giant hammered home that attendance of the ordination ceremony had nothing to do with evil, in his comments on Redcloak's little sister.

Attendance of and participation in are not the same thing. Thousands could attend a service in which an innocent being is sacrificed to the Dark One's glory. Only one person wields the knife. Being a member of a religious faith is not the same as being a priest of said faith. And obviously young children whose minds are capable of reasoning sufficiently to even describe what they're supposed to believe can't really be called members of any faith.

The process of being trained as a priest and ultimately being ordained means embracing the practices, rituals, and sacraments of said faith, often for years. If that faith is evil, it's going to have some sacraments and rituals that involve evil acts (if it doesn't why is it evil?). The prospective priest is going to perform those, probably dozens or even hundreds of times, repeatedly before ordination.

Now, it's possible for an evil deity to have non-evil sub-sects outside of the main church in the same way that it is possible for a neutral deity to have evil sub-sects outside of their main church. However, this cannot apply to Redcloak, because of the existence of the Crimson Mantle.

[hamishspence]

An evil god can be "evil in the same way that a human is evil" - they don't have to be "a being of pure evil". It's pointed out in the FRCS that good gods sometimes do evil things and that evil gods sometimes do good things - that their alignment is only "the way they behave most of the time".

The process of being trained as a priest and ultimately being ordained means embracing the practices, rituals, and sacraments of said faith, often for years. If that faith is evil, it's going to have some sacraments and rituals that involve evil acts (if it doesn't why is it evil?). The prospective priest is going to perform those, probably dozens or even hundreds of times, repeatedly before ordination.

The One Step Rule allows for LN clerics of LE gods and CN clerics of CE gods. That would suggest that the LN cleric has not "performed evil acts dozens to hundreds of times" - being a cleric may only require strong faith, not huge amounts of training and ordination.

Sometimes a character may not even be aware they are a cleric. Heroes of Horror had a cleric of the God of Spite who is not fully aware of having become one.

The one-step rule is just a window dressing to put some fun into Detect X spells.

Aside from the aura (Neutral clerics of evil gods "ping as" evil) they gain none of the the other "Evil traits". They don't take a negative level from wielding Holy weapons. Smite Evil doesn't do any extra damage to them. And so forth.