85 réponses à ce sujet

[marshalleck]

Ulrik the Slayer wrote...

Hahaha. Bickering over Baldur's Gate 2 spoilers? Hilarious. Seeking argument for argument's sake, I see.

You claim the "black and white"-side of things to be stupid, but its how old-school DnD alignment works - and that's what the topic is about. Not your own moral values.

Actually you're wrong. Sten's behavior doesn't fit lawful evil.

Alignments overview

Lawful Neutral
Lawful Neutral is called the "Judge" or "Disciplined" alignment. A Lawful Neutral character typically believes strongly in Lawful concepts such as honor, order, rules and tradition, and often follows a personal code. A Lawful Neutral society would typically enforce strict laws to maintain social order, and place a high value on traditions and historical precedent. Examples of Lawful Neutral characters might include a soldier who always follows orders, a judge or enforcer that adheres mercilessly to the word of the law, a disciplined monk. Characters of this alignment are neutral with regard to good and evil. This does not mean that Lawful Neutral characters are amoral or immoral, or do not have a moral compass; but simply that their moral considerations come a distant second to what their code, tradition or law dictates. They typically have a strong ethical code, but it is primarily guided by their system of belief, not by a commitment to good or evil.

Lawful Evil
Lawful Evil is referred to as the "Dominator" or "Diabolic" alignment. Characters of this alignment see a well-ordered system as being easier to exploit, and show a combination of desirable and undesirable traits; while they usually obey their superiors and keep their word, they care nothing for the rights and freedoms of other individuals. Examples of this alignment include tyrants, devils, undiscriminating mercenary types who have a strict code of conduct, and loyal soldiers who enjoy the act of killing. Like Lawful Good Paladins, Lawful Evil characters may sometimes find themselves faced with the dilemma of whether to obey law or evil when the two conflict - however their issues with Law versus Evil are more concerned with "Will I get caught?" vs "How does this benefit me?"

Modifié par marshalleck, 29 novembre 2009 - 12:33 .

[SHUGABELUGHA]

Well ,i think the D&D aligment system is just a pratical way to translate and simplify the beliefs and motivations of a character in game... its not perfect , its impossible to cover all aspects of human personality. When u have a characters with a complex and rich background like Sten its to difficult to fit him in this system but i believe he is Lawfull Neutral ( but with variations as i said).



lol , forgive the bad, self learned english

[Taritu]

4th edition changed it, eh? Wow, that's a fairly fundamental change. Haven't picked up 4th ed. yet, don't know if I'll bother (hearing things like there being an agro system makes me fairly ill. If I want to play a computer game...)

[Ulrik the Slayer]

Inarai wrote...

And, hardly.  That's only the case for paladins and exalted characters, really.

Nope. The system that gives you evil or good, lawful or chaotic points doesn't care what class you are. It has more effect and is of higher importance to characters such as Paladins and Assassins who must no stray from their path, its true. But it treats all characters equally when it comes to handing out the points.

Modifié par Ulrik the Slayer, 29 novembre 2009 - 12:35 .

[DaeFaron]

Huh, one would wonder then, what do you call an assassin who always does after tyrants and cruel people, and never intentionally harms a civilian or bystander not related to the target?

[Ulrik the Slayer]

Lawful Evil, naturally.

You thought you had me there, but as luck would have it Assassins can only be of Evil alignment.

[Raxxman]

Ulrik the Slayer wrote...

Evil acts are always evil, no matter the justification. Killing Connor to save the lives of people is both an evil deed as well as a good deed. You might be redeemed in the eyes of people because you intentions were good, but it does not change the fact that you killed a child.

Problem you have is you're working in absolutes. Killing him is evil, saving him is good. Your logic fails hard, because neutral character. Again this a naive viewpoint as it only accepts two possible points of view. The world does not work in the hard extremes you're trying to put it in.

And yes; a Paladin who does evil, even if he does so unwittedly, does evil and is to be treated as such. For example Baldur's Gate 2 has a quest where you are to save a village from marauding monsters, only to find that the monsters were fellow Paladin initiates disguised as monsters by illusion magic in order for you to fall from grace. And indeed you have to work very hard to redeem yourself in the eyes of yourself, your god and your order.

I eh, don't remember that quest. But it sounds like it's not one of Biowares finest. Bioware made BG and BG2 impossible to play as LE because any lawful action always had good concequences. Anyhow that scenaro has multiple logic flaws. 1. The Paladin is acting in self defense, self preservation is not an evil act, the actual evil in this case is the use of illusionary spells 2. The initiates should be rezable, thus making the act very correctable.

The very black and white view of do evil, be evil, is a very flawed view set, but one that people have a really really really  hard time addressing. The alignment system itself is perfectly fine, the utterly warped view people have of alignment causes all the problems.

[DaeFaron]

Har har, but what I speak of is not the ingame or book rules.



What I speak of is the general viewpoint of them, like marshalleck stated.

[fro7k]

The limitation of the D&D classifications is that they view good and evil as actual causes and ideals.

[Inarai]

Ulrik the Slayer wrote...

Inarai wrote...

And, hardly.  That's only the case for paladins and exalted characters, really.

Nope. The system that gives you evil or good, lawful or chaotic points doesn't care what class you are. It has more effect and is of higher importance to characters such as Paladins and Assassins who must no stray from their path, its true. But it treats all characters equally when it comes to handing out the points.

There's no point system - have you ever actually played DnD, or is Baldur's Gate all you have to go off of?

[Inarai]

*Sorry, double post*

Modifié par Inarai, 29 novembre 2009 - 12:46 .

[Raxxman]

Ulrik the Slayer wrote...

Lawful Evil, naturally.

You thought you had me there, but as luck would have it Assassins can only be of Evil alignment.

The Assassin class can only be of Evil Alignment, as luck would have it I can create 100's of characters perfectly capable of acting out assassinations without the need of a prestige class

[marshalleck]

Ulrik any desire to acknowledge my last post in this thread with the link to the AD&D alignment overview?

[DaeFaron]

Inarai wrote...

Ulrik the Slayer wrote...

Inarai wrote...

And, hardly.  That's only the case for paladins and exalted characters, really.

Nope. The system that gives you evil or good, lawful or chaotic points doesn't care what class you are. It has more effect and is of higher importance to characters such as Paladins and Assassins who must no stray from their path, its true. But it treats all characters equally when it comes to handing out the points.

There's no point system - have you ever actually played DnD, or is Baldur's Gate all you have to go off of?

I shall admit, I have never read any of the rulebooks, and Neverwinter Nights is where the 'rules' mostly showed up for me. However, I don't remember us ever saying, according to this rulebook about classes and races...

Heres one for you, Lawful good Tiefling monk. Can it exist?

edit: Raxxman, yep, I was never talking about the assassin class. I'm talking the thoughts/action.

Modifié par DaeFaron, 29 novembre 2009 - 12:49 .

[Inarai]

DaeFaron wrote...

Inarai wrote...

Ulrik the Slayer wrote...

Inarai wrote...

And, hardly.  That's only the case for paladins and exalted characters, really.

Nope. The system that gives you evil or good, lawful or chaotic points doesn't care what class you are. It has more effect and is of higher importance to characters such as Paladins and Assassins who must no stray from their path, its true. But it treats all characters equally when it comes to handing out the points.

There's no point system - have you ever actually played DnD, or is Baldur's Gate all you have to go off of?

I shall admit, I have never read any of the rulebooks, and Neverwinter Nights is where the 'rules' mostly showed up for me. However, I don't remember us ever saying, according to this rulebook about classes and races...

Heres one for you, Lawful good Tiefling monk. Can it exist?

Yes.  Tieflings tend towards evil, yes, in part due to the whole fiend heritage thing, and in part because of the way society treats them.  But they aren't all evil.

[simpatikool]

I am also of the opinion that Sten is Lawful Neutral.



He abides by the structure of his society. Failure to comply with the strict caste society is alien, unheard of, unfathomable. This seems to me to fit the Lawful category.



Neutral. Sten does not seem motivated by good or evil. He is motivated by fulfilling his military obligation, following orders. The orders moral decision is not in question. Just the quickest, most efficient way in completing those orders.

[DaeFaron]

Inarai wrote...

DaeFaron wrote...

I shall admit, I have never read any of the rulebooks, and Neverwinter Nights is where the 'rules' mostly showed up for me. However, I don't remember us ever saying, according to this rulebook about classes and races...

Heres one for you, Lawful good Tiefling monk. Can it exist?

Yes.  Tieflings tend towards evil, yes, in part due to the whole fiend heritage thing, and in part because of the way society treats them.  But they aren't all evil.

Exactly, I once went onto a NWN rp server, then basicly kicked me out because I said there was a good-aligned drow that had sex with an elf, and my character was the child.

[Naturalus]

marshalleck wrote...

Taking this logic a bit further...if it is evil to kill those farmers, Sten realizes it and submits himself for punishment to atone for his crime. He is seeking balance. That is neutrality.

If you analyze Sten actions very carefully he is seeking balance on all of his actions. His only motivation to get out from the cage is that PC reasons him that combating blight is better way to atone his crime than dyeing for starvation in the cage.

Sten do not care that combating blight don’t give him any personal gain other than chance to atone his crime. He only focuses on that and nothing else. So Sten is Lawful Neutral.

Lawful Evil would never attempted to atone his crime LE would have attempted to find excuses under his moral code why killing farmers was justified. Maybe farmers made a crime by healing his wounds and not allowing him to die the warrior death that his moral code demands. Maybe farmers violated his honor and duty and killing them where justified in qunari honor code etc…  Sten dont do anything to try to show that his case was justified under his violent religion.

Lore says this about qunari culture: “The Qunari follow the philosophy of the Qun (kyoon), a violently evangelical religion. Individual qunari are raised as soldiers from a very young age. They are expected to be strong, disciplined, and stoic, adhering without fail to the tenets of honor and duty as defined in the Qun. Fanatical in this devotion, the Qunari are prepared to wage war throughout their entire lives as part of their attempts to “enlighten” all other races in regards to their philosophy. Even Qunari attempts at trade with other races and nations are done primarily to size up potential opponents, rather than to amass resources or wealth.”

Modifié par Naturalus, 29 novembre 2009 - 12:55 .

[Ulrik the Slayer]

Bah, there's just no point continuing. This thread is about DnD alignment, yet you keep wanting to discuss things about "my logic" when it isn't my logic at all. Its the way the system works, you can argue it to death if you want but it won't change.

As for points; Games based on 2nd ruleset did not have "points" per say, but they simulated the effects of it. In the beforementioned scenario with the disguised Paladins you didn't actually get any "points" but the world reacted to you as if you had fallen from grace. Only with the onset of 3.0 and subsequently 3.5 did they introduce the points system which you'll see in the NwN series of games.

As for the would-be assassin: He'd probably stray towards LN in the end since the evil act of killing people would be somewhat lessened by the fact that he killed evil people, thus saving/helping. However, it is still evil; the good way would be using diplomacy and whatnot to change the, lets say, corrupt taxmaster or baron.

EDIT: Woah, the Quanari sounds like some evil bastards, alright. And Sten agrees with it all... Just because he was raised in this way and doesn't consider his nor the Quanari's actions/plans to be evil - they are.

Modifié par Ulrik the Slayer, 29 novembre 2009 - 12:59 .

[Inarai]

Ulrik the Slayer wrote...

As for points; Games based on 2nd ruleset did not have "points" per say, but they simulated the effects of it. In the beforementioned scenario with the disguised Paladins you didn't actually get any "points" but the world reacted to you as if you had fallen from grace. Only with the onset of 3.0 and subsequently 3.5 did they introduce the points system which you'll see in the NwN series of games.

I will say this again:  There is NO points system, except in video games attempting to simulate the alignment system, which simply cannot work as well as is possible when playing tabletop.

[DaeFaron]

Well, I'm still pointing at the link to the alignment descriptions. Lawful evil does not fit any of Sten's actions at all.

[marshalleck]

I posted the rules of the DND alignments. Why are you ignoring my post?

[Inarai]

marshalleck wrote...

I posted the rules of the DND alignments. Why are you ignoring my post?

Because he's incapable of replying to anything he doesn't think he can refute, it seems.

[DaeFaron]

Also, even with the stereotypes like Drows are always evil aligned, they are those that break the mold.



I personally have always refused to follow the belief that *Tieflings and Drow must be evil*

[marshalleck]

Inarai wrote...

marshalleck wrote...

I posted the rules of the DND alignments. Why are you ignoring my post?

Because he's incapable of replying to anything he doesn't think he can refute, it seems.

Indeed.