Clergy Alignment vs. God Alignment [Archive]

A_dark

06-27-2002, 11:43 AM

I cannot say I disagree more :)

Cuiraecen, was your example. He is the god of change, personification of Chaos. His priests are not interested in promoting law, but simply wage wars in order to glorify and praise Cuiraecen. The god himself is allied to Eloele who is considered evil by most.

The priests don't follow a doctrine of "fight for good" but simply "fight for war" that leaves no room for them to judge which side they will join.

Aside from that, the gods in Cerilia don't really care about mortals. They don't take active interest in them, with a few exceptions. Haelyn did not save Michale Roele, did he? :)

Finally, the fact that a priest of a certaing deity is not obligated to follow the deity's alignment makes the game much more realistic and intriguing. Not all priest of Haelyn are good. Was the real-life Rasputin a good man? Richelier? An LE priest of Haelyn is Richelie. Puppet master who wants to gain worldly power and dominate on others. Cleanse the world of the impure and anyone not following his decress to the letter is impure. This is in no way directly contradictory to Haelyn's idea of the world. Haelyn wants order and Justice. The LE priest enforces it with his laws. Wether that laws are good or not, is irrelevant, as long as they keep order.

With Cuiraecen, the case is similar. He wants wars and change. The battle priests in Aftane are doing just that, wage war against Ariya and others just for the sake of waging war at them.

The fact that a good god can have evil priests makes everyone uneasy and intrigues and plots are harder to locate. If all priests of Haelyn were good, then things would be rather boring in Anuire. One has to be the concealed evil in order to cause the war here, spring the plot there, anc generally move the campaign towardsa direction. Otherwise, if it was crstal clear that all Haelynites are good, I cannot really see any political bickering in the whole of Anuire.

Ariadne

06-27-2002, 11:50 AM

I think youre right; Azrai. But this problem is not only one for Cuiraécen, also Healyn (LE), Belinik (LE) and Erik (LG, CG) have it. I think the only gods, where the alignment problem is o.k. are Laerme, Avani and Sera. This is another argument for more different gods (different discussion).... ;)

One argument against that theory (only for lesser gods) is, that they must get as much worshippers as they can! The alignment is not extremly compatible, but whom interests that if there ARE worshippers?

Hmmm..., but what has Haelyn for argument???

Ariadne

06-27-2002, 12:04 PM

Orginally posted by A_dark

I cannot say I disagree more :)

Cuiraecen, was your example. He is the god of change, personification of Chaos. His priests are not interested in promoting law, but simply wage wars in order to glorify and praise Cuiraecen. The god himself is allied to Eloele who is considered evil by most.

I don't think, Cuiraécen is only interested in wage war and chaos. He is CG and his doctrines (o.k. can wary) are to PROTECT the defenseless and declare war their traitors. By the way, Cuiraécen is also allied to Laerme (goddes of love)!

The priests don't follow a doctrine of "fight for good" but simply "fight for war" that leaves no room for them to judge which side they will join.

May be, some CN and CE priests are. There are several more who fight definitively for good and choose the side!!

Finally, the fact that a priest of a certaing deity is not obligated to follow the deity's alignment makes the game much more realistic and intriguing. Not all priest of Haelyn are good. Was the real-life Rasputin a good man? Richelier? An LE priest of Haelyn is Richelie. Puppet master who wants to gain worldly power and dominate on others. Cleanse the world of the impure and anyone not following his decress to the letter is impure. This is in no way directly contradictory to Haelyn's idea of the world. Haelyn wants order and Justice. The LE priest enforces it with his laws. Wether that laws are good or not, is irrelevant, as long as they keep order.

With Cuiraecen, the case is similar. He wants wars and change. The battle priests in Aftane are doing just that, wage war against Ariya and others just for the sake of waging war at them.

Do they? Are you sure all of them join this?

A_dark

06-27-2002, 03:55 PM

Their leader is one of the Red Kings :)

Good and evil in the game of Birthright are totally relevant. Cuiraecen wants to help the defenseless. Agreed, (for some doctrines, cos as you said, and I said, some simply say, war for war)

Let's take a look in Aftane.

Why is Aftane not the defenseless and Ariya is? If you would realistically look into the history books of each country, it would be obvious that Aftane says Ariyans are evil and Ariyans would say that the Red Kings are evil, each one with his own arguments.

If you allowed a god to actually make the choice, then all the human realms that were evil, would be forced to rely on Kriesha and Belinik for their spiritual guidance, even in Aftane, where Kriesha with the snow and all is ridiculous, and the barbaric Belinik has no relation to the sophisticated Khinasi.

I don't like the idea that the priest must be so close to the alignment of the deity, because an alignment cannot interprete all the aspects of the deities characteristics. Haelyn wants order as I said and an evil tyrant can bring order.

Aside from that, the fact still remains, that the BR gods don't really care about their followers, only the priests do, just like Richelie or Rasputin :)

Azrai

06-27-2002, 06:03 PM

Orginally posted by A_dark

Aside from that, the fact still remains, that the BR gods don't really care about their followers, only the priests do, just like Richelie or Rasputin :)

The gods give out spells to their followers - so they do care about.

Alignment is an important category (in D&D sense per definition). it covers
the doctrines of the god. can't be that a paladin-like god (rg) supports a
le-tyrant.

Azrai

06-27-2002, 06:07 PM

Orginally posted by A_dark

If you allowed a god to actually make the choice, then all the human realms that were evil, would be forced to rely on Kriesha and Belinik for their spiritual guidance, even in Aftane, where Kriesha with the snow and all is ridiculous, and the barbaric Belinik has no relation to the sophisticated Khinasi.

Yes, thats the logical result. And indeed, that is exactly my point of critism as I already pointed out
in the "more god" thread.

kgauck

06-27-2002, 08:21 PM

> Azrai wrote:
>
> Alignment is an important category (in D&D sense per definition). it
covers
> the doctrines of the god. can`t be that a paladin-like good (rg) supports
a
> le-tyrant-

That is typically true in D&D, and as a result we see a good deal of the
Heironeous/Hextor dualism. In BR, however, Haelyn represents not only the
LG slice of the divine sphere, but really occupies the roles of Heironeous,
Hextor, St Cuthbert, and Pelor. So instead of seeing little sects to each
of these gods, we have instead, different sects of Haelyn, each in dispute
with the others. Looking at Haelyn`s priests in the BoP, they can be any
Good, or any Lawful. So a CG and a LE priest can both represent Haelyn.
Instead of being exclusive, priests must be lawful *and* good, BR is
inclusive, priests must be lawful *or* good.

This serves a purpose that is specific to BR, as well as creating a setting
theology different from the norm, and that specific BR purpose is to
facilitate the realm temple system. Fewer gods makes bookkeeping simple. A
Temple of Haelyn (4), rather a temple of Heironeous (1), Hextor (1), St
Cuthbert (1), and Pelor (1).

Further, while alignment is one way to gauge the doctrines of a god, it is
not the only way. Portfolio and the divine histories are another way.
Consider the notion of Cuiraécen as foe of Laerme. Under the BoP entery for
Cuiraécen, Laerme is listed as a sometimes foe, but they have the exact same
CG alignment. This is because some other issues are more important than
their agreement about right conduct. Namely that complication of a love
triangle.

Alignment is important, but its only one tool, and it should not trump
setting information.

Kenneth Gauck
kgauck@mchsi.com

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kgauck

06-27-2002, 08:50 PM

> Azrai wrote:
>
> Yes, thats the logical result. And indeed, that is exactly my point of
> critism as I already pointed out in the "more god" thread.

Medieval theologians used to argue that if you encountered this kind of
contradiction concerning the nature of god, you had made false assumptions.
Since, as A_dark has already pointed out, the requirement that lawful evil
Aftane must worship the only available lawful evil diety (Kriesha) is
ridiculous.

The reason that Cuiraécen is a the prominent god that he is in Aftane has
more to do with his portfolio of battle than it does with his alignment of
CG. He priesthood can be of any non-lawful, and Herad, ruler of the Chosen
of Khirdai is NE. He fits within the non-lawful constraints, and he
presumably can teach the glory of combat to a large number of NE followers.
While the realm as a whole tends to be a little more lawful than the temples
and their glory-in-battle seekers, an alliance between NE and LE, is hardly
difficult to justify.

Instead of thinking in terms of needing more gods, consider the use of
aspects. An aspect is a focus on one part of the god, rather than trying to
embrace the whole. I typically use three aspects for Cuiraécen: heralds,
battle, and storms. None of these aspects is inconsistant with NE. A god
like Haelyn, disscused previously, might have aspects which reflected
different approaches to Haelyn.

Kenneth Gauck
kgauck@mchsi.com

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geeman

06-27-2002, 10:25 PM

At 01:43 PM 6/27/2002 +0200, A_dark wrote:

>Cuiraecen, was your example. He is the god of change, personification of
>Chaos.

Cuiraecen is the god of battle, "the Stormlord" and Haelyn`s champion, but
he`s not the embodiment of change or chaos. It`s certainly possible to
portray him as a god of change, or to interprets aspects of his character
as being chaotic, but it need not necessarily be that way. The same
aspects of Cuiraecen that could be interpreted as chaotic could also be
interpreted as lawful, which is part of the point. Alignment is a rather
hazy concept, which is one of the reasons it leads to so many debates, and
specific attempts to apply it can always be interpreted and reinterpreted
in many ways.

Personally, I never bought the idea that worshippers have to have the same
alignment of their god. First of all, I don`t think the gods should
necessarily be locked into a mode of behavior as limiting as
alignment. They embody an entirely different emphasis. Alignment itself
only describes the good/evil, law/chaos dichotomies, but there are an
infinite number of other oppositions possible, and the gods often embody
one side or the other of those pairs. Life/death, Nature/civilization,
honor/expedience, war/peace, love/hate, chastity/eros, health/pestilence,
day/night, ice/fire, winter/summer, etc. One could assign a good/evil or
law/chaos association to any or all of those dichotomies, but different
interpretations of those concepts are possible and perfectly sensible. The
gods (and by association their worshippers) should hold that aspect of a
dichotomous relationship that they embody as more significant than the
alignment system. Will alignment overlap in many circumstances with that
embodiment? Sure. Law (in the lawful alignment sense rather than the
legal/legislation sense) and civilization could often overlap, but many
aspects of civilization aren`t necessarily lawful, just as many aspects of
nature aren`t necessarily chaotic.

Is love good? Well, yeah, generally. Anybody who`s been in love, however,
would probably admit that certain aspects of it aren`t all that "good" if
they can manage to get past their infatuation and look at the condition
objectively, and some aspects of love are downright "evil." Love/hate
don`t really exist on the same axis as good/evil or law/chaos and, in fact,
good/evil and law/chaos probably aren`t the perpendicular axis that the
alignment system portrays them to be. If one were going to come up with a
real "alignment" system it would probably have to include many more axis,
and even then one would have to take into consideration that many of them
will sometimes conflict with one another in a way that really supports the
"reality" of individual choices and situations.

Gary

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A_dark

06-27-2002, 10:30 PM

I agree with all Gary :) You just said it better than I did :)

geeman

06-27-2002, 11:35 PM

At 12:30 AM 6/28/2002 +0200, A_dark wrote:

> I agree with all Gary :) You just said it better than I did :)

Yeah, I probably should have noted that I just glommed onto one particular
sentence in your post on the subject and that we weren`t really disagreeing
with each other....

Gary

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Birthright-L

06-28-2002, 09:52 AM

To me, this indicates that the gods of Birthright are weak and distant; they
simply cannot keep track of all their worshippers, or keep them in line.

Such is the lot of mortals who have accidentally become [low-powered] gods.

/Carl

brnetboard@TUARHIEVEL.ORG <brnetboard@TUARHIEVEL.ORG> wrote at 02-06-27
12.47:

> Azrai wrote:
> A thing I dislike in the setting is that the alignment of the gods may be
> different from their worshippers. Not only one alignment-category (as proposed
> in
> the 3.Edition rules), also complete different alignments are possible.
> For example cuiraecen himself is chaotic good but has chaotic evil
> worshippers. Why
> should cuiraecen tolerate such an ethos in his own ranks ? Why should he
> give spells to them ? Ok, one could find some reasonable aspects which
> explains the previous -
> but I still have problems to make it plausible.
>
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Lord Eldred

06-28-2002, 10:16 PM

Why couldn't an evil person worship a good god? Perhaps that person sees the god as something it wishes they could be and thus worships. Whether or not that god would grant spells to a follower that is evil would be a different question. Perhaps it would if it felt that even though the person was evil, they are somehow furthering their cause. Another would be by keeping these evil followers in their camp, they keep the truly evil gods from gaining strength through increased followers. Come on these are gods they are smarter and more mysterious than we can think. Thus there are probably a million reasons a good god would keep evil followers.

blitzmacher

06-29-2002, 03:22 AM

Evil digs itself into everything, from ordinary professions to even the most sacred of priesthoods. It happens in reality, so why wouldn't it happen in fantasy. It makes for good roleplay, route out the evil heretic who is posing as a cleric.;)

Ariadne

06-29-2002, 12:35 PM

But there is the problem one player of us had. He wanted to play someone who can fight, heal AND raise the dead (normal and as undead). Additionaly he wanted to be CN, if possible. We gave him a cleric but we coudn't say him what deity he could serve....

Khiesha (he is a male), Belinik (he want's to raise the dead), Cuiraécen (same problem as Belinik), Ruornil (he can't fight), Nesirie (he don't like water), Healyn (he don't want to be lawfull or good), Laerme (good joke), Eloele (there is something around with thiefs) and Avani (the sun isn't very inviting and he hates the Khinasi). So which god should he serve? There must be something special for him (an additional god with necromancy as portfolio like Azrai)...

(We gave him a demihuman god at last, but we could't solve the problem for human gods)

This points out that you can have serveral alignments to serve a god but still don't find any which you can agree with. May be that some say, evil worshippers can serve a good god, but I don't think the players herself agree with this one. They want to do what they want (if evil), but they must be very carefull not to step on the gods foot...

Azrai

06-29-2002, 02:18 PM

Orginally posted by blitzmacher
Evil digs itself into everything, from ordinary professions to even the most sacred of priesthoods. It happens in reality, so why wouldn't it happen in fantasy. It makes for good roleplay, route out the evil heretic who is posing as a cleric.;)

According the to rules in "Hallowed Ground" 2. Edition each spell costs a god "energy". I still cannot see the point why a good god should give out spells to an evil worshipper. Further I don't think you can compare a fantasy pantheon to our real-world-theology. Priests may pretend they are loyal followers to a god - but the god himself knows the real intentions and
attitudes of his clergy. There is no way to misinterpret the doctrines of a god.

Maybe one should think in small dimensions. the paladin for example is a loyal follower and knight of a certain god. and he would never tolerate an evil minion in his own ranks. his detect evil sense would quickly reveal the intentions of the infiltrator. why should the god himself react differently than his own loyal agents ?

Lord Eldred

06-29-2002, 02:55 PM

I agree that the Paladin of a good god would eradicate the evil followers. However, that is the paladin eliminating them not the god. The god can see the bigger picture that the paladin can not and thus can see a purpose of having the evil follower.

As for what Ariadne said, I don't see a reason as to why there has to be a perfect fit. Choose the god that fits closest and go with it.

A_dark

06-29-2002, 03:44 PM

LOL Ariadne, SERA :P She actually fits ALL of what you want. Can fight, can raise, can heal and CN is the BEST for a priest of hers. She is CN herself

also, as Lord Eldred said, you cannot want everything from a god. You serve him, not the other way around.

As for the gods knowing the true intentions of the people, I will point out the description of the Commune spell in the PHB. It clearly states that gods are NOT omniscient. Aside from that the follower of the god, could worship a god, even in an preversed manner, but that would not mean that the god would not give spells to him.

The paladin of the good god, would eradicate evil followers, but only if he knew they are evil. Is it not much cooler if the paladin gets an order to do something not very noble from his head priest while the priest has magically concealed himself from the detect evil? It would make an excellent villain. :)

Aside from that, as I have already said and it is widely known the gods in Cerilia don't care enough for humans. They rarely send avatars down on earth or take active interest. If they cared, would they not simply come in Anuire and say. NIT iw right, everyone should obey his dcotrine? Or if as you say they punished those with a slightly misguided view of the deity with not granting them spells, why would they keep granting spells to all the various doctrines? They simply don't care enough, or as it was said, they prefer to allow a multicultural approach to what they teach and prefer to have people following them, rather than forcing them to follow only one doctrine.

Azrai

06-29-2002, 03:52 PM

Orginally posted by A_dark

SERA She actually fits ALL of what you want. Can fight, can raise, can heal and CN is the BEST for a priest of hers. She is CN herself

Huuh, don't let their priest hear that you declare Sera as a godess of necromancy.

Azrai

06-29-2002, 04:00 PM

Orginally posted by A_dark
Or if as you say they punished those with a slightly misguided view of the deity with not granting them spells, why would they keep granting spells to all the various doctrines?

the difference from LG to LE is not "slightly misguided". it defines a complete different approach. Haelyn is described as a pure, holy god similar to a paladin. Imagine an evil worshipper which prays to a good paladin for spells.

blitzmacher

06-29-2002, 04:41 PM

Not everything should be black and white. Instead, use shades of gray. The difference between LG and LE is methods they use to enforce the L. The LE character would not believe that he is evil, and would worship Haelyn as the God of Justice, and do his best to uphold justice.

kgauck

06-29-2002, 08:03 PM

Saturday, June 29, 2002 7:35 AM
Ariadne wrote:

> But there is the problem one player of us had. He wanted to play
> someone who can fight, heal AND raise the dead (normal and as
> undead). Additionaly he wanted to be CN, if possible. [...]
>
> This points out that you can have serveral alignments to serve a god
> but still don`t find any which you can agree with.

Well, there is some setting information that gets in the way of this one.
The same would be true if you wanted to be an astral traveling kind of guy.
BR has made undead tricky to deal with from a character creation standpoint.
Many of the gods` clerics cannot even turn them, let alone command them.
However, a solution may be found in the Shadow World. Perhaps the Cold
Rider is a god and grants spells like the player wanted. I would prefer any
Cold Rider worshiping character originally come from the SW, but that isn`t
hard and fast. Perhaps he mentor was a SW being, or even a fiend.

> [It] May be that [as] some say, evil worshippers can serve a good
> god, but I don`t think the players herself agree with this one. They
> want to do what they want (if evil), but they must be very carefull
> not to step on the gods foot...

If you want to engage in evil for evil`s sake (unrestrained by other
ideology) you don`t have unlimited choices. Azrai would be your natural
choice as a diety, but what his fate is remains unresolved. If the DM
allows it, Azrai is still out there and can grant spells. According to
setting information, the great force of evil has been knocked down from the
over-arching divininty of Azrai to a more temporal level as the many
awnsheghlien. This has the advantage of making evil more immediate. The
Magian, Rhuobhe, and the White Witch are political rivals to local rulers
and can be involved in day to day dangers the way remote dieties often
aren`t (unless they manifest in state-like organizations like the Zhent
have). The draw back for this condition is that there is no over-arching
god of evil in a broad sense. This is one of the reasons that the designers
never settled completely what the fate of Azrai was.

Kenneth Gauck
kgauck@mchsi.com

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kgauck

06-29-2002, 08:03 PM

Sent: Saturday, June 29, 2002 9:18 AM
Azrai wrote:
>
> According the to rules in "Hallowed Ground" 2. Edition each
> spell costs a god "energy". I still cannot see the point why a
> good god should give out spells to an evil worshipper.

The rules of Hallowed Ground are not binding on BR. You don`t need to
accept this cosmological explanation. Gods may have unlimited energy, and
apportion out only a limited amount for some divine purpose unknown to
followers. Perhaps, its a lesson from the War of the Shadow and the gods
don`t want a second Diesmaar.

> Further I don`t think you can compare a fantasy pantheon to
> our real-world-theology. Priests may pretend they are loyal
> followers to a god - but the god himself knows the real intentions
> and attitudes of his clergy. There is no way to misinterpret the
> doctrines of a god.

But who knows what the real doctrines and intentions of a diety are?
Perhaps it is only simple-mindedness to limit the divine to alignment
restrictions. Just as any ideology will have adherents who radically
differ, so can priesthoods. One of the things I really liked about the 2E
priesthood book was there were a large number of ideological foci for any
diety. Consider Haelyn. He`s more than just a god of law and goodness.
He`s a god of kingship, justice, the state, the Anuirean people, war,
commanders. As such, perhaps the philosophies of statecraft are more
binding on Haelyn`s priesthood than are the philosophies of ethics and moral
behavior.

Kenneth Gauck
kgauck@mchsi.com

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Lord Eldred

06-29-2002, 08:35 PM

kgauck has hit the nail on the head. We are too simpleminded of folk to pretend to understand why a god WE view as good would allow evil doers to follow them!

kgauck

06-29-2002, 08:43 PM

Sent: Saturday, June 29, 2002 11:41 AM
blitzmacher wrote:
> The LE character would not believe that he is evil, and
> would worship Haelyn as the God of Justice, and do his
> best to uphold justice.

This implies that the LE character lacks self awareness. I would not
require LE characters serving Haelyn to be blind to their own action. As
the Stoics wrote, "To act appropriatly means to become aware of the moral
significance of our choices and to accept the consequences of our action."
Under this kind of interpretation a LE character serving Haelyn would argue
like this:

"I fight for the same society that the Paladin does, but there are forces
that goodness cannot combat as well as I am able to. I do things that
society would rightfully shrink from. Would that we could all live in peace
and security, but there is grave evil in the world, and I must combat it for
the safety of the community. In my own town, I live like others, according
to goodness and law. When the community is in danger however, the gloves
come off and I am the brutal violence of vengence. I am like the
executioner who kills the criminal for the community. I value the good and
the just, but I cannot rely on goodness to protect the good. As such,
certain kinds of enemies justify the no-holds barred approach that I
represent. I serve the community, and I am dedicated to Haelyn, but
sometimes I must go outside the community and act as a beast. Would that it
were not so, but this is the sacrifice I make for the town, province and
realm I love. Conform yourself, therefore, with law and goodness, lest I be
summoned to drive you away with the maximum cruelty and violence. I will
leave no weapon unused, no tactic will be abandon by me, for I am not
squeamish."

So, the LE character acknowledges his evil, but does it to serve good, the
community, and Haelyn. Haelyn, acknowledges the need for a Lawful kind of
evil, just as he admits the need for a chaotic Good. Sure Haelyn perfers
Lawful Good, but he allows for any lawful and any good.

Kenneth Gauck
kgauck@mchsi.com

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A_dark

06-29-2002, 11:58 PM

Orginally posted by Azrai

Huuh, don't let their priest hear that you declare Sera as a godess of necromancy.

huh? YOu did not say you wanted a god with a portfolio on necromancy, just a god that has the necormantic sphere, allows healing spells and the CN alignment and can fight well.

Sera has everything. She can have a CN priest, they have the standard weapons for priests and an average armor and they also have the nifty +2 to all saves. She grants necromantic sphere major and healing, major again, I think. So what is your problem with a sera priest? It fits all the requirements you gave us

A_dark

06-30-2002, 12:06 AM

Hey, our LE priest has made a Holy INquisition and is slaying anyone that disagrees with him saying that they are heretics and that they are spoiling the meaning of Haelyn's worship by opposing his words, which as we can guess, are law.

It is a perfect example. he knows that he is doing evil, but he also knows that he is doing it to promote the word of his god and prevent a heressy from emerging. Haelyn would definitely give the man spells. The fact that haelyn is good, does not mean that he would let a heressy of his name be created or let chaos to exist. The LE priest prevents any form of chaos to the extreme.

May I note the LG order of the harmonium in Planescape? Do they really sound good to you people? Killing anyone that is not the epitome of goodness and kindness and harmonious?

kgauck

06-30-2002, 02:12 AM

Sent: Saturday, June 29, 2002 3:35 PM
Lord Eldred wrote:
>
> kgauck has hit the nail on the head. We are too simpleminded of
> folk to pretend to understand why a god WE view as good would
> allow evil doers to follow them!

I do think that focusing exclusively on the good-evil axis is too simple to
explain what the rules describe as possible. Several people have posted
discussions of other kinds of considerations. All of these explanations
have more more complicated than falling back on the G-E axis as the only
means of determining who a god will grant support to.

Also, it was the explanation that was excessively simple, not any people.
Don`t take stuff so personally.

Kenneth Gauck
kgauck@mchsi.com

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blitzmacher

06-30-2002, 04:42 AM

>"I fight for the same society that the Paladin does, but >there are forces
>that goodness cannot combat as well as I am able to. I do >things that
>society would rightfully shrink from. Would that we could all >live in peace
>and security, but there is grave evil in the world, and I must >combat it for
>the safety of the community. In my own town, I live like >others, according
>to goodness and law. When the community is in danger >however, the gloves
>come off and I am the brutal violence of vengence. I am >like the
>executioner who kills the criminal for the community. I value >the good and
>the just, but I cannot rely on goodness to protect the good. >As such,
>certain kinds of enemies justify the no-holds barred >approach that I
>represent. I serve the community, and I am dedicated to >Haelyn, but
>sometimes I must go outside the community and act as a >beast. Would that it
>were not so, but this is the sacrifice I make for the town, >province and
>realm I love. Conform yourself, therefore, with law and >goodness, lest I be
>summoned to drive you away with the maximum cruelty and >violence. I will
>leave no weapon unused, no tactic will be abandon by me, >for I am not
>squeamish."

>So, the LE character acknowledges his evil, but does it to >serve good, the
>community, and Haelyn. Haelyn, acknowledges the need for >a Lawful kind of
>evil, just as he admits the need for a chaotic Good. Sure >Haelyn perfers
>Lawful Good, but he allows for any lawful and any good.

Exactly what I said, but I used fewer words.:P

kgauck

06-30-2002, 06:00 AM

Sent: Saturday, June 29, 2002 11:42 PM
blitzmacher wrote:
>
> Exactly what I said, but I used fewer words.:P

Perhaps, but those few words left me with the impression that the LE
character was a relativist who might define goodness in terms of what
pleased him

Saturday, June 29, 2002 11:41 AM
> The LE character would not believe that he is evil, and would
> worship Haelyn as the God of Justice, and do his best to uphold
> justice.

I affirm that such a character would in fact believe that he is evil, but
evil by neccesity, not for himself, but for the community, puting the lawful
in his evil. The more conventional definition of lawful evil "dominator" is
self serving. The character I described is self sacrificing, perhaps even
self-loathing. Kant asked if you could generalize an action into a general
rule, you could call it moral. Clearly such a character as I described
would not want society run on the basis upon which he acts. He knows that
he does evil and wants to protect the community from even knowing what he
does.

Kenneth Gauck
kgauck@mchsi.com

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Lord Eldred

06-30-2002, 01:13 PM

In my campaign for example, we have a person who is not the prototypical follower of Haelyn that Haelyn calls on to do work that he knows none of his goody two shoes followers would do. While he is not evil, he could be. He is the example of why an evil follower may be kept around by a God.

blitzmacher

06-30-2002, 04:18 PM

>Perhaps, but those few words left me with the impression >that the LE
>character was a relativist who might define goodness in >terms of what
>pleased him

Yes, that too. I left my comment open as I did, because their are many different ways that an evil character may justify their actions. They may not believe that they are evil, and what they are doing is good. Their perception of good and evil may be completely different to actuality, ie insane, or left or right wing activist type beliefs. There are probably even more ways then my limited intelligence could possibly think of. thats what makes for twisted plots, and RPG's fun, variety. :)

Ariadne

07-01-2002, 08:54 AM

Perhaps they don't know if the do evil, but I think there god does and it is on the gods turn to grant them spells...

An other point is that (especially at Cuiraécens church) serveral priests will turn on each other. A CG priest won't get along very well with a CE. May be they attack each other by sight! Isn't it good (for the god) to let there priests communicate in peace without slaying each other?
(I don't think he can stop them very well, if his doctrine is to protect the weak and to destroy evil!)

A_dark

07-01-2002, 05:07 PM

why would Cuiraecen want to stop his two churches that are fighting against each other, not to mention that I doubt the priests even if they are evil against good would fight each other. There is something called loyalty, and since they are both loyal to a greater cause, they would control themselves. I doubt they would even hate each other or care about the different alignment.

blitzmacher

07-01-2002, 09:46 PM

>why would Cuiraecen want to stop his two churches that are >fighting against each other, not to mention that I doubt the >priests even if they are evil against good would fight each >other. There is something called loyalty, and since they are >both loyal to a greater cause, they would control >themselves. I doubt they would even hate each other or >care about the different alignment.

I doubt different churches of the same god would commit to open combat, it isn't good business for either church to kill off their tythers(spelling?) in support of the same god. Being loyal to the same god but different ways of going about serving their god is why the are different factions of the same god. Their way of combat has been to get the most supporters for their church as they can, ruling and create holding, while disclaiming the other beliefs, Contesting.
I do think they can and do hate each other, even if they are of the same alignment, call it a personality conflict. Especially when their beliefs are different.