Druid Alignment

UnknownQuantity

I always wondered why druids have to be true neutral in D&D 2nd edition. It seems in Baldur's gate the Druids you run into are either good or evil. I haven't seen any that seem true neutral. I'd like to play a fighter druid that is neutral good alignment. So far this is the only thing stopping me, but I am also thinking it might be fun to play a neutral charater as you can do both good and bad things. Still chaotic neutral would probably be more enjoyable then true neutral.

TJ_Hooker

I find that trying to understand why anything is the way it is in 2E is an exercise in futility. Also, just in case you didn't know, your character's alignment has basically no effect on the game, so you will still be able to be as good or evil as you want regardless of what alignment you choose.

UnknownQuantity

Very true

Thanks

VoidSorcerer

You have to understand that the rules for D&D have long since been elaborated, explained and corrected for the later versions. Baldur's Gate, however, was developed for 2nd edition and you know, some things just didn't make a lot of sense without explanation. In the end, as @TJ_Hooker described above, wondering about it is pointless and truely, your alignment has almost no impact on the game.

Yeah it's obnoxious, and true, the druids inside of the game itself don't really follow those rules, but hey, you can still kick their faces in or let them live as the tree-pansies they are. Just as long as you enjoy yourself.

UnknownQuantity

Oh well. I'm going to play a fighter/druid then. I'd play a cleric/ranger, but I don't like using blunt weapons. It's weird because I know there are great blunt weapons in BG2, but I just prefer swords. I especially like scimitars as they seem to make sense for duel wielding. The only thing that would make more sense is short sword and dagger.

VoidSorcerer

@UnknownQuantity - Try using a spear sometime. It's what I run w/ on my Avenger and it's turned out to be a lot of fun. You don't get a decent one for quite some time....but there are work arounds.

Kamigoroshi

@UnknownQuantity Sounds like you may enjoy Divine Remix. The mod makes Druid to loosen the bounds on their neutrality requirement: rather than being restricted to True Neutral, druids with Divine Remix installed are now allowed to become any of the Neutral alignments, be it NG, LN, CN or NE. It's sadly not yet compatible with BG:EE though.

Pantalion

In theory, Druids concern themselves solely with Nature, and natural concerns. This, ADnD decided, was True Neutral, and that Druids would constantly work to maintain nature's balance by siding with different teams every week.

Since that implicitly means every Druid is insane, it helps to picture alignment as a threshold, with Druids having their own alignment chart inside True Neutral, and falling anywhere in that alignment normally, just to lesser extremes than those who aren't in touch with the forces of Balance.

ZanathKariashi

Using the same logic that rangers MUST be good only (They're good-only because the creators were Aragorn fanboys...true story). Aka, none at all.

And things got really murky since Ranger/Druids are able to be Neutral Good (though they have a lot of specifics involved to work out correctly, and are half-elf multiclass only).

With 3rd edition of course, things finally stopped being retarded and let them be any part neutral.

That said, an Mythos priest of an evil nature diety is basically a druid, just without shapeshifting and a ridiculously complicated order structure for levels 14-16.

baaddare

odd i have never seen good or evil behaving druids in the game just ones that behave neutral. They might do a good deed and then what is perceived as evil when in fact that have just behaved neutrally both times. They are not concerned with what is perceived as good or evil by society just what is best for mother nature.

Dazzu

baaddare said:

odd i have never seen good or evil behaving druids in the game just ones that behave neutral. They might do a good deed and then what is perceived as evil when in fact that have just behaved neutrally both times. They are not concerned with what is perceived as good or evil by society just what is best for mother nature.

Nobody goes around thinking or saying "I'm evil."

Even the greediest people IRL don't think of themselves as evil.

TJ_Hooker

baaddare said:

odd i have never seen good or evil behaving druids in the game just ones that behave neutral. They might do a good deed and then what is perceived as evil when in fact that have just behaved neutrally both times. They are not concerned with what is perceived as good or evil by society just what is best for mother nature.

It's been a while, but everything I remember about Jaheira from the last time I played a game with her suggested she should be good-aligned. I think the tweak pack actually included a component to change her alignment because of how many people felt this way. Also, although I've never played a game with her, I've heard Faldorn described as being kinda evil (along with the rest of the shadow druids).

baaddare

see i do not consider Faldorn evil at all in vanilla BG. Now in some of the mods she and the shadow druids might lean more that way. I see the shadow druids are being fanatical towards nature more so than Jaheira's sect. Jaheira's sect believes city dwellers can live alongside nature. While the shadow druids do not. Jaheria's would be ok with someone hunting an animal for food and to provide basic clothing while the shadow druids would not. The shadow druids live in the great oak and have carved a home in it while it still lives and grows but would be against someone chopping down trees inorder to build a cabin.

ZanathKariashi

Shadow druids are just very militant. They actually don't mind people living off the land, as long as they do so responsibly and with the least harm possible, as the druids do. It's only the ones who try to tame nature and upset the nature order that they have no tolerance. And even those that do earn their ire are usually given one chance to leave. But the fanatics of the group, such as the one at that fallen grove, and Faldorn in BG2, have gone too far, even for their standards, because they come to believe that any means will be justified in the end, even if it causes great harm to nature or their brethren in process.

UnknownQuantity

It's true that most Druids in the game are acting with regards to nature in some way, but some appear to try and reason/appeal with people and ask for your help. On the other hand some just attack you outright with little talking or explanation. The shadow Druids seem to fall into the later group and they at least appear evil for that reason. Jaheira often says things that seem in favor of good even though she complains if your reputation is to high. I don't see why you couldn't accomplish the same ends being neutral evil or neutral good.

Dazzu

If not Neutral Evil, then Chaotic Neutral since she is very much in favor of the WILDS. Faldorn is NOT True Neutral... especially when you compare her to Cernd.

and_then_or

"... Since that implicitly means every Druid is insane ..."

@Pantalion Dont't prevaricate about the shrubbery, tell us how you really feel. Holy cow did that crack me up. Actual pistachio spit-take across the keyboard. I commend you on your definitive statement which might well be unpopular with the masses, but one with which I concur.

Merry New Year to you.

UnknownQuantity

I started this thread and am taking it off topic a bit. It still concerns the Druid class though.

I know people like the fighter/cleric and ranger/cleric, but I was doing some math using the experience tables and it appears the dual class fighter/druid is better in some ways.

Clerics need more experience to gain all their top their spell slots. To achieve them all requires you to dual at level sometime before level 13th when you would recieve an extra half attack per round. You would probably have to dual around level 7 to get them all.

On the flip side a Druid gets all it's high level spell slots at 25th level at around 5000000 experience. This means you can get not only to 13th level as fighter, but also to 15th as a fighter before dualing. At 15th level of fighter your thac0 with be 6. After you start getting Druids levels again at 16th druid level you will recieve a further thac reduction of 6 from druid thac0 reduction. That puts you at the maximum thac0 of 0. You will basically have all the benefits of a fighter including grand mastery and an extra 1/2 attack per round over the cleric/fighter. You also get all the benefits of a full Druid maxing out available spell slots. It seems possible the most optimal class combination. You could dual wield scimitars or daggers or a combination of both. I believe you would end up with 4 attacks per round if you dual wield.

Deucetipher

Honestly, I don't think it's worth going beyond fighter13 before dualing. Getting druid from 14 to 15 is a gigantic pain (1.5 million xp), so it's nice to regain fighter before that. Fighter13/Druid is pretty good, though. You sacrifice a bit in terms of raw endgame power, but the difference is miniscule. From a cost benefit standpoint, you're better off dualing at fighter 13, imo.

UnknownQuantity

Fair enough. I was just having some fun number crunching. I just wanted to pointed how well the two classes seem to synergize when dual classing. I doubt any other combination could maximize the benefits of both classes. Probably not even the kensei mage/thief. Of course I'm not taking into account the benefits of high level mage spells and cleric/paladin only abilities like turn undead. Ranger/Cleric could also still be more powerful despite having 1 less attack per round and a slightly worse thac0 since they get the spells of both druid and cleric. Still the fighter/druid seems a pretty great class when dueled.

Quartz

Jaheira - Neutral Good
Faldorn - Chaotic Neutral
Cernd - Lawful Neutral

True story.

Dazzu

Cernd Lawful Neutral? Ya sure? Explain your case.

ZanathKariashi

I'd say more true neutral...if he was lawful, he wouldn't have left his pregnant wife to go live amongst the trees with no support at all, but on the other hand, he's devoted enough to the cause that I wouldn't lump him as chaotic.

Quartz

@Dazzu Cernd really is a toss-up between True Neutral and Lawful Neutral. He seems a really friendly sort, but never strict enough to be Neutral Good. For the same reason, you could argue he isn't Lawful Neutral I suppose. I dunno, he's a bit of a toughie there. He is FAR from Chaotic though, which is why I'm somewhat inclined to say Lawful Neutral.

Dazzu

True Neutral is also pretty far from Chaotic as well. Plus he's predictable. I can't see him being a man of the law since a lawful man won't abandon his son.

UnknownQuantity

Neutral alignment, also referred to as True Neutral or Neutral Neutral, is called the "Undecided" or "Nature's" alignment. This alignment represents Neutral on both axes, and tends not to feel strongly towards any alignment. A farmer whose primary overriding concern is to feed his family is of this alignment. Most animals, lacking the capacity for moral judgment, are of this alignment since they are guided by instinct rather than conscious decision. Many roguish characters who play all sides to suit themselves are also of this alignment (such as a weapon merchant with no qualms selling his wares to both sides of a war for a profit).
Some Neutral characters, rather than feeling undecided, are committed to a balance between the alignments. They may see good, evil, law and chaos as simply prejudices and dangerous extremes. Mordenkainen is one such character who takes this concept to the extreme, dedicating himself to a detached philosophy of neutrality to ensure that no one alignment or power takes control of the Flanaess.
Druids frequently follow this True Neutral dedication to balance, and under Advanced Dungeons & Dragons rules were required to be this alignment. In an example given in the 2nd Edition Player's Handbook, a typical druid might fight against a band of marauding gnolls, only to switch sides to save the gnolls' clan from being totally exterminated.[10]
Lara Croft, Lucy Westenra from Dracula and Han Solo in his early Star Wars appearance are neutral.[9] The true neutral outsiders are known as the Rilmani.

Dazzu

Dracula is TN? I thought Vampires were mostly CE... and if you mean the real Dracula, Vlad Tepes... he's definitely Lawful Evil. He had strict and CRUEL laws but overall wanted nothing more than to rebuild Wallachia and destroy the Ottoman empire... no matter who he had to kill.

UnknownQuantity

I believe that it is from the 2nd edition. handbook, but I found it on the wiki. At any rate it didn't say Dracula. It said Lucy from Dracula.

Dazzu

Ah... wow, I misread that.

ZanathKariashi

She's only TN pre-Drac, she's CE by the time they finish her off. The Bram Stoker Drac is very much Chaotic Evil, Technically Vlad would be Lawful neutral, his actions were ultimately for the greater good of the order of his nation , even if he had to do a lot of ruthless things in process. Lawful Evil would do the same, but only for their personal gain and prestige, Vlad was merely doing what had to be done within the nature of the times he lived. Think of him as a Romanian Vhailor.

Arthur = LG
Van Hellsing = LG
Mina = CG
Jonathan = NG
Steward = LN or LG (can't quite decide, definitely lawful though)
Quincy = NG
Renfield = CN
Lucy = TN, CE post-Drac
Drac = CE
Brides = CE