Btw, did you seriously just recommend that they hire someone like Vox Day? Tell me you're not serious.
I like Vox, before you dismiss him you might want to buy his book, 'Summa Elvetica' or the later 'A Throne of Bones' on Kindle. Seriously superior fantasy.
Actually, I am going to dismiss him right away. In fact, I am going to scour the internet looking for every negative thing that is said about him and then write a review on his book.
Sounds on par of what you accomplished with this review.
So is Keldorn racist? I'd say yes. He's perpetuating the fear and animosity that prevents drow from learning about less evil cultures than their own. He makes no effort to ask why Viconia is evil, or whether she can learn to be otherwise, in spite of the fact that he clearly demonstrates a willingness to explore and understand the reasons for immoral behavior in humans. She's a drow, and so while he consciously understands that not all drow are evil (see Drizzt), he just doesn't think about redemption as something drow do. This, in spite of the fact that there are enough good drow that the goddess of good drow is the second most powerful deity in their pantheon. That sounds like racism to me. It doesn't make Keldorn evil, and it doesn't mean he'll never accept a drow as being good, but it does mean he's less than the impartial inquisitor he's called to be.
The problem then is that paladin powers are granted through their faith and discipline to good gods (or ideals if your DM allows that). Paladins who aren't Lawful and Good lose their powers. In a lot of cases, moral grey areas make characters interesting - Is it acceptable to steal from the rich to give to the poor? Is it OK to kill rather than disable your enemies?
But for paladins there aren't any grey areas. They are Lawful Good, or they lose their powers. They don't even have to turn fully evil to lose their powers - sometimes it's just not being quite good enough. And these powers are granted by the forces of good. So we must conclude that any action a paladin takes that doesn't make them fall is either 1) a lawful good action 2) so meaningless morally it doesn't have any affect on their standing - like deciding to snack on apple instead of an orange.
So therefore the killing of Viconia, which does not cause Keldorn to fall is either a good action, or a morally meaningless one. I'm going to discount the second for the time being - I hope we can agree killing is an action with significant moral weight no matter who the victim is.
Now, it may be in your game it's a pretty cut and dry case - if you've been making Viconia kill innocents and steal from beggars and such like, it could be a justifiable killing. But if she's not committing any evil while in your party, or at least no more than Keldorn himself or any other party member, then the only way the action can be good is if killing a drow is an inherently good act.
So that leads to me to two possible conclusions:
While good and evil exist in Forgotten Realms, they don't fully correspond to good and evil in the real world moral sense, especially not at the divine power level - individual mortals are capable of good and evil, but to the gods, there's a Good side and an Evil side and there is always war between them
DnD morality is a little bit silly as it boils down incredibly complex moral decisions to 9 simple alignments. But who cares? It's fun.
Actually, I am going to dismiss him right away. In fact, I am going to scour the internet looking for every negative thing that is said about him and then write a review on his book.
Sounds on par of what you accomplished with this review.
You'll need a bit of time to find all the negative stuff said about him. He's openly racist, sexist, and homophobic - even other far-right cranks consider what he says to be a bit too extreme.
@feersum_endjinn, an interesting point. I would offer two counterpoints. First, that I don't necessarily agree that there's no moral gray area for paladins. They are called upon to be as good as a person can be, but frankly, I don't believe moral perfection exists. If paladins were required to be utterly flawless, I don't think there would be any paladins.
Second, I kind of agree with your conclusion 1, based on the fact that as far as I can tell, there is only one god in FR who's actually a good person, and he's lawful neutral. That would be Kelemvor, Lord of the Dead, who is the only god who actually stood up for justice and fair treatment of mortal souls. The rest of the gods, good and evil, forced him to perpetuate a stats of affairs where evil is rewarded just as much as good, and the ultimate punishment (having your soul ground to mortar over the course of centuries in the Wall of the Faithless) is inflicted on those who don't submit themselves utterly to the service of a god. No god but Kelemvor was willing to stand up and say that threatening mortals into service was wrong. Which means that all the other gods are, at best, complicit beneficiaries of the largest organized slave ring in the Realms. Not exactly a group I would want the gods of justice and self-sacrifice to belong to, and yet they do.
[...] You'll need a bit of time to find all the negative stuff said about him. He's openly racist, sexist, and homophobic - even other far-right cranks consider what he says to be a bit too extreme.
I always preferred to see paladins more in the mode of knights of the round table, defenders of the weak, poor and standing against injustice, being merciful to their enemies and offering quarter, fighting in defence of themselves or the defenceless etc, basically an idealized code of chivalry attempted to be lived out in practice.
The should lead potentially to some interesting character situations and conflicts, as someone with this code might in some scenarios have indicate difficult choices to make and decisions on their actions, trying to remain chivalrous, honourable and merciful in a complex situation where things are not easily black and white seems to me to be interesting, as is dealing with personal interests, desires etc over what is the best for all (Lancelot would be a classic tale of this sort, but there are other, more developed that could be conceived).
The other more common in DnD version sadly sounds like a very unstable personality to say the least (though perhaps interesting stories could be written about that to ).
On another note, I'm guessing Vox Day is some kind of author then with extremist views?
1) Paladins are, by their very nature, uncompromising extremists. The pretty much have license to shoot first and ask questions later. And some rough approximation of "good intent" is what controls. Consider that Keldorn doesn't fall even if he murders a bunch of other paladins, even his own protege, as long as he doesn't realize that's what he is doing. Theoretically if a paladin is deluded enough, he could act quite evil and not fall. They could even group together to implement a horrible evil autocracy, as long as they were collectively convinced that they were doing the right thing. Then the PC could use the weapons of reason and truth to bring the whole thing crashing down. That would make a pretty cool campaign.
I disagree. It's the judgment of the gods, not good intent, that determines whether a paladin falls. If Keldorn tragically kills the paladins, including Ajantis, Torm would know that Keldorn was deceived by magic and that the conflict was (apparently) unavoidable, not that Keldorn's judgment or morality had faltered. If a paladin is deluded to the extent that he is committing evil atrocities, then the god from which the paladin's powers were derived is not beholden to the paladin's supposed good intent. Being deceived is not the same thing as being deluded.
@feersum_endjinn, an interesting point. I would offer two counterpoints. First, that I don't necessarily agree that there's no moral gray area for paladins. They are called upon to be as good as a person can be, but frankly, I don't believe moral perfection exists. If paladins were required to be utterly flawless, I don't think there would be any paladins.
I don't think Paladins are supposed to be 100% good - but the grey area is very small for them. I used them as an example not because they are supposed to be totally perfect, but because their powers are given and taken away by a god - so therefore there's a divinely sanctioned line on what is good.
One alternative way to look at it is to assume the Forgotten Realms gods are like ancient Greek or Roman gods, not like the Christian god or similar. These ancient gods were like humans but with superpowers - they lie, cheat, steal, murder, but also love, protect, and inspire mortals.
So if the Forgotten Realms gods are actually more like mortals with really cool superpowers, then we can assume that they are not infallible (unlike the Christian conception of god). That opens up the possibility that the gods are wrong. Which removes a lot of headaches.
Btw, did you seriously just recommend that they hire someone like Vox Day? Tell me you're not serious.
I like Vox, before you dismiss him you might want to buy his book, 'Summa Elvetica' or the later 'A Throne of Bones' on Kindle. Seriously superior fantasy.
@feersum_endjinn, that's certainly how I would view the FR gods, and in my opinion, it's the view most supported by the information we have about them. I mean, just look at Bhaal. You think it's a coincidence that his plan for his resurrection involves sleeping with as many women as possible? Even the ones belonging to immortal or very long lived races, when he needed all his children to die? Doesn't sound like the best possible plan to me...
But honestly, I think the problem comes from the alignment system. Everything is morally complex. Paladins are restricted, but whether their restrictions bring about the most good is highly debatable. The problem is that people want to write complex, interesting characters, with human emotions and values and conflicts and flaws, and the alignment system isn't nuanced enough to deal with that (especially when, as in the case of many of the gods, the alignments are decided before a lot of the writing). That's how we end up with "good" gods who champion highly questionable values, and "evil" characters who don't really do anything wrong. The Greek gods worked because no one came along and said "Zeus is a god of good, Hades is a god of evil." FR doesn't have that freedom, and I think that lack introduces a lot of contradictions.
I think the problem is when the alignment system becomes a straight-jacket rather then just part of a description of the character during character creation (so a general disposition, orientation and system of values etc) but instead becomes this law governing what your character does or doesn't do (which can come into sharp relief with classes like paladins).
That's part of it, but I think even having to describe a character as good, neutral, or evil necessarily makes us pass definitive judgment on complex moral issues. Which, frankly, removes everything I find interesting about morality. The ambiguity is where the meat is.
@feersum_endjinn, that's certainly how I would view the FR gods, and in my opinion, it's the view most supported by the information we have about them. I mean, just look at Bhaal. You think it's a coincidence that his plan for his resurrection involves sleeping with as many women as possible? Even the ones belonging to immortal or very long lived races, when he needed all his children to die? Doesn't sound like the best possible plan to me...
Hahahaha, I never thought about Bhaal's choice of mothers for his children like this before, but you've got a very good point. If he just needed them to die, why wouldn't he just create a lot of gerbil children - then it'd be really easy to kill them all to regain his essence. You could just put them all in one big room and go crazy stamping on them.
But, like you say, as soon as you want to write interesting and multi-dimensional characters, the system falls apart pretty quickly.
That's part of it, but I think even having to describe a character as good, neutral, or evil necessarily makes us pass definitive judgment on complex moral issues. Which, frankly, removes everything I find interesting about morality. The ambiguity is where the meat is.
I agree the ambiguity is good for story-telling, but then DnD isn't just a story-telling exercise (well, for some people it is, but I don't think they are the majority). The alignment mechanic is sometimes just that - a mechanic to make the game work. For all that paladins have weird morality if you put it in real world terms, sometimes I just want to raid the orc fortress, slaughter the bad guys, and take the loot. Grey areas be damned!
I am a long standing fan of Baldur's Gate. I have taken the time to play through and give a fair opinion rather than parrot others. This is my review -
To chip in on this. Unlike most folks here, I don't really like SoD and I think it could have been much more than it is. But, to give a fair opinion - your review is awful.
Hahahaha, I never thought about Bhaal's choice of mothers for his children like this before, but you've got a very good point. If he just needed them to die, why wouldn't he just create a lot of gerbil children - then it'd be really easy to kill them all to regain his essence. You could just put them all in one big room and go crazy stamping on them.
Actually, gerbils were involved in the original plan, but Bhaal - ahem - lost all of the gerbils during the mating ritual. This will be explored in Beamdog's BG1 prequel, "Baldur's Gate - Asscape from the Bhaals of Doom." The gameplay will be a cross between BG1 and Lemmings.
Hahahaha, I never thought about Bhaal's choice of mothers for his children like this before, but you've got a very good point. If he just needed them to die, why wouldn't he just create a lot of gerbil children - then it'd be really easy to kill them all to regain his essence. You could just put them all in one big room and go crazy stamping on them.
Actually, gerbils were involved in the original plan, but Bhaal - ahem - lost all of the gerbils during the mating ritual. This will be explored in Beamdog's BG1 prequel, "Baldur's Gate - Asscape from the Bhaals of Doom." The gameplay will be a cross between BG1 and Lemmings.
Boo shall be the champion, and it will explore how he and Minsc were united together in the first place, which will be revealed to be an event of plane-shaking significance (and that Boo was the real champion, and CHARNAME's journey and battles were just an amusing sideshow the real battle ).
It does my heart good to see that this wonderful forum of ours has turned this hate mongers post into a very lively and interesting discussion on Gods, Paladins and good and evil in FR. Well done forum!
Actually, gerbils were involved in the original plan, but Bhaal - ahem - lost all of the gerbils during the mating ritual. This will be explored in Beamdog's BG1 prequel, "Baldur's Gate - Asscape from the Bhaals of Doom." The gameplay will be a cross between BG1 and Lemmings.
Boo shall be the champion, and it will explore how he and Minsc were united together in the first place, which will be revealed to be an event of plane-shaking significance (and that Boo was the real champion, and CHARNAME's journey and battles were just an amusing sideshow the real battle ).
Twist ending: Boo is a Bhaalspawn, and steals the divine essence from CHARNAME at the Throne of Bhaal and ascends to become a god?
But when a deity like Helm is making the decision about whether cold-blooded murder constitutes an evil act or a righteous act and you realize that Helm doesn't represent some kind of universal truth, but is merely a powerful being with an agenda... well, some of the shine comes off his paladins IMHO.
I'm mostly in agreement with you, but... gods have portfolios which are the areas of existence over which they have some relationship with; power over, duty to protect, affinity with. And one of those portfolios is "good", which suggests that even though gods might be creatures much like any other, just immensely more powerful, some do have a significant connection with the wider concept of goodness, and their actions could be considered acting in the interests of that concept - in fact, by definition, must be. There is of course an evil counterpart domain...
Does depend on what edition you're playing though...
So if the Forgotten Realms gods are actually more like mortals with really cool superpowers,
Most of them were mortal in some form or other at one point. Or they were devils/demons (many evil god/goddesses); Asmodeus is a prime example: http://forgottenrealms.wikia.com/wiki/Asmodeus
Comments
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Summa-Elvetica-Theodore-Beale/dp/0982104928
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Throne-Bones-Arts-Dark-Light-ebook/dp/B00I6H0J7S
Sounds on par of what you accomplished with this review.
But for paladins there aren't any grey areas. They are Lawful Good, or they lose their powers. They don't even have to turn fully evil to lose their powers - sometimes it's just not being quite good enough. And these powers are granted by the forces of good. So we must conclude that any action a paladin takes that doesn't make them fall is either 1) a lawful good action 2) so meaningless morally it doesn't have any affect on their standing - like deciding to snack on apple instead of an orange.
So therefore the killing of Viconia, which does not cause Keldorn to fall is either a good action, or a morally meaningless one. I'm going to discount the second for the time being - I hope we can agree killing is an action with significant moral weight no matter who the victim is.
Now, it may be in your game it's a pretty cut and dry case - if you've been making Viconia kill innocents and steal from beggars and such like, it could be a justifiable killing. But if she's not committing any evil while in your party, or at least no more than Keldorn himself or any other party member, then the only way the action can be good is if killing a drow is an inherently good act.
So that leads to me to two possible conclusions:
Second, I kind of agree with your conclusion 1, based on the fact that as far as I can tell, there is only one god in FR who's actually a good person, and he's lawful neutral. That would be Kelemvor, Lord of the Dead, who is the only god who actually stood up for justice and fair treatment of mortal souls. The rest of the gods, good and evil, forced him to perpetuate a stats of affairs where evil is rewarded just as much as good, and the ultimate punishment (having your soul ground to mortar over the course of centuries in the Wall of the Faithless) is inflicted on those who don't submit themselves utterly to the service of a god. No god but Kelemvor was willing to stand up and say that threatening mortals into service was wrong. Which means that all the other gods are, at best, complicit beneficiaries of the largest organized slave ring in the Realms. Not exactly a group I would want the gods of justice and self-sacrifice to belong to, and yet they do.
The should lead potentially to some interesting character situations and conflicts, as someone with this code might in some scenarios have indicate difficult choices to make and decisions on their actions, trying to remain chivalrous, honourable and merciful in a complex situation where things are not easily black and white seems to me to be interesting, as is dealing with personal interests, desires etc over what is the best for all (Lancelot would be a classic tale of this sort, but there are other, more developed that could be conceived).
The other more common in DnD version sadly sounds like a very unstable personality to say the least (though perhaps interesting stories could be written about that to
On another note, I'm guessing Vox Day is some kind of author then with extremist views?
One alternative way to look at it is to assume the Forgotten Realms gods are like ancient Greek or Roman gods, not like the Christian god or similar. These ancient gods were like humans but with superpowers - they lie, cheat, steal, murder, but also love, protect, and inspire mortals.
So if the Forgotten Realms gods are actually more like mortals with really cool superpowers, then we can assume that they are not infallible (unlike the Christian conception of god). That opens up the possibility that the gods are wrong. Which removes a lot of headaches.
But honestly, I think the problem comes from the alignment system. Everything is morally complex. Paladins are restricted, but whether their restrictions bring about the most good is highly debatable. The problem is that people want to write complex, interesting characters, with human emotions and values and conflicts and flaws, and the alignment system isn't nuanced enough to deal with that (especially when, as in the case of many of the gods, the alignments are decided before a lot of the writing). That's how we end up with "good" gods who champion highly questionable values, and "evil" characters who don't really do anything wrong. The Greek gods worked because no one came along and said "Zeus is a god of good, Hades is a god of evil." FR doesn't have that freedom, and I think that lack introduces a lot of contradictions.
But, like you say, as soon as you want to write interesting and multi-dimensional characters, the system falls apart pretty quickly. I agree the ambiguity is good for story-telling, but then DnD isn't just a story-telling exercise (well, for some people it is, but I don't think they are the majority). The alignment mechanic is sometimes just that - a mechanic to make the game work. For all that paladins have weird morality if you put it in real world terms, sometimes I just want to raid the orc fortress, slaughter the bad guys, and take the loot. Grey areas be damned!
Does depend on what edition you're playing though...
Those people exist and hell, Keldorn himself was very prejudiced.
With that said, I wish we could do away with social commentary in games, in general. Or at the very least, it should be in very small portions.
For instance, our very own evil bastard -- Bhaal -- was once an adventurer. http://forgottenrealms.wikia.com/wiki/Dead_Three
Kelemvor (who was important in NWN2: MotB's ending) was also once an adventurer. http://forgottenrealms.wikia.com/wiki/Kelemvor