Sir Sarles, or the Mace of Disruption
Maurvir
Member Posts: 1,090
Since these ethical debates are popular, I'd like to pose one.
I generally get both the real and the fake illithium in the Sir Sarles quest, give him the fake stuff, then upgrade the Mace of Disruption. I figure spending all that coin on another worthless object for the church is pointless when that illithium can be used to pound the undead back into the ground.
However, it is the dishonest choice, and I am playing with a primarily good party (Jaheira being the sole neutral). In everyone's opinion, is the mace worth screwing the temple over? (There is also the slight matter of getting vastly less XP)
I generally get both the real and the fake illithium in the Sir Sarles quest, give him the fake stuff, then upgrade the Mace of Disruption. I figure spending all that coin on another worthless object for the church is pointless when that illithium can be used to pound the undead back into the ground.
However, it is the dishonest choice, and I am playing with a primarily good party (Jaheira being the sole neutral). In everyone's opinion, is the mace worth screwing the temple over? (There is also the slight matter of getting vastly less XP)
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It turns into a discussion about the ethics of the situation near the middle of the first page.
Basically, it's very easy to turn this into a "for the greater good" thing. In fact, it can even be argued to be more of a "we're just trying to make sure everybody survives" thing, especially if your PC has enough lore/Int to know about the potential uses of illithium ore.
plus Sir Sarles is Neutral for his alignment, so its not like he is "good" to begin with anyway, so there is no guilt into giving him the actual stuff, plus ironically enough i think the alloy fits better for the church anyway, showing that; even if flawed, something can still be beautiful, or some philosophical jargon of that sort
Hmmm... Will Sarles accept the fake illithium if you take this route? According to the Wiki giving Sarles the alloy results in him spotting the fake and refusing to work for you, but the church mistakes the unworked alloy for being the "sculpture" that Sarles created and completes the quest anyway. You still get a nice chunk of XP, although less than if you had delivered the real illithium.
@sarevok57 You think people deserve naughty treatment if their alignment is neutral? I am flabbergasted.
The real question here: the improved mace of disruption weighs 8 pounds, including its illithium coating. You gave 200 pounds of pure illithium to Cromwell for that. What did he do with the rest of it?
hahaha, its not necessarily the fact that he is neutral that he deserves naughty treatment, because for me, im mostly a "power gamer" aka whatever team combo i make ( whether it be a strong team or an intentionally weak team, usually the latter ) i always try and make them as efficiently powerful as possible and i have absolutely no moral compass for 1s and 0s
( with that being said, my attitudes towards the game world, in no way reflect on how i act in real life )
i just mentioned the neutral thing because i didnt want people to feel bad RP wise thinking that they are screwing over someone who doesnt deserve it, plus sir sarles kind of acts like an ass with the stereotypical "noble people treat those lesser than them like garbage attitude" so i feel no guilt of not giving him the illithium, plus the church likes it anyway, so win win
Cromwell now has a solid illithium bathtub, of course.
The entire quest is a bit weird. The quest item is called Illithium Ore, but they treat it like it is pure Illithium metal instead (i.e. you can put the ore directly into an alloy). Otherwise I would have tried to explaining it by saying that the Illithium Ore only contains a bit of Illithium metal.
I ended up going with the fake stuff, because the mace of disruption should come in handy in chapter 6. That, and Sarles is a jerk. The only reason he wants the stuff is so that no one else's fingerprints will appear on his work. The church is happy with imperfect "work", Sarles likely will never return to Amn, and my party gets a kick ass weapon. Sounds like a win to me.
You want me to fool the church, or give the church a cheap knockoff for reasons of greed? That's even worse. Helm sees all. Know that, and be judged.
You can't know before that the Helmites like the fake ore.
The Mace of Disruption is already powerful enough without the upgrade. (says the Undead Hunter because she doesn't need Negative Plane Protection ?)
That clown just rubbed me the wrong way, and since my PC is a magic user, she wouldn't have been uptight even if the church had hated the lump.
After playing again after 15 years, I had forgotten about the mace, went along with the Sarles quest, did what I thought was right (playing a paladin) and gave him the real ore. I never had any problems where I missed the upgraded mace.
Then, on the second run, I had remembered, got greedy and tempted for a moment, offered the fake illithium to Sarles, but Keldorn saved my soul by blurting out the truth to Sarles. I was very ashamed for trying and have never, ever upgraded that mace again. It's still possible to beat the game without lots of the extra stuff.
No no, no fooling. You can be upfront with Sarles and say, "Hey, the merchant says she doesn't think she can get that much illithium." He gets angry and leaves, and you take it to the church and tell them that you offered Sarles the alloy and he refused to work it. An amusing bit of dialogue happens where the quest giver is like, "Well, you tried, we will take the alloy and find a use for it, thank you." At which point the head priest walks in and goes, "Holy crap, that schulpture is awesome! We'd be proud to display it here!" You can be completely honest with all parties, and ot have to put up with Sarles' ridiculous demands. Its a win-win.
@Arvia The thing is, the merchant doesn't tell you she will get you Lithium, she tells you that she hasn't gotten any lithium for awhile, and she should have. She offers to get you in contact with her supplier, with no promise of Illithium. So the you are only guranteed the alloy, and offered a chance of maybe getting some illithium. We only know you actually get illithium due to meta knowledge. So its not evil or even unlawful to get the alloy (its not fake, just not pure) and offer it to Sareles honestly.
@ThacoBell , I don't know who is usually in your party, but most NPCs comment on the ore merchant's offer to create an alloy.
I still think a lawful good character would either try to look for the real thing, or just go back and say the didn't get anything, and *not* just create a fake. Okay, we can disagree if it's a fake or a reasonable substitute, but still, the Helmites have said very clearly that he refuses to work with anything than *pure* illithium.
Creating an alloy because the merchant says he won't know the difference is still cheating.
Also, I work for Lathander, a deity that represents "good" far better than Helm. Actually, is Helm even good? He strikes me as True Neutral.
I so agree with that statement. As a huge Star Wars fan, I usually roleplay a disciple of Yoda, and adjust the specifics to whatever setting I'm in.
"How will I know the good side from the bad?"
"Trust your feelings."
"You will *know*. When you feel calm. Centered. At peace. Anger, Aggression, Fear. (And I would add for this discussion, Greed, Covetousness, Ambition to Power.) These lead to the Dark Side."
In the world which D&D often tries to emulate from a metaphysical standpoint a person with zero negative traits becomes stale and stagnant, unable to grow. Lucas and Tolkien would have you believe things like "the good folk of Rohan could detect any lie simply because they speak only truth". History, on the other hand, will tell you just how ridiculous that thought actually is.
Frankly IMO, perhaps the only reason the "truly righteous" exist in real life is because someone else is/has gone out of their to commit "mistakes", deliberately or otherwise, in their stead... a thought which is actually pretty apropos for Star Wars given how the light side of the force is so intertwined with the dark side that neither will cease to.exist while the other survives and vice versa.
If even the concept of the light side of the force can't extricate itself from the dark, then you are expecting too much from the galaxy's mortal races to definitively know the difference.
I like to make Sir Sarles eat his hat because he's a jerk, though.
@Nuin , do you really think that Star Wars is more black and white than a setting with fixed alignments?
I didn't think of Yoda when I wrote my own post (@BelgarathMTH , you have a talent to find the right examples) , but it's exactly what I meant.
And nobody says that lawful good types, or those trying to be, don't make mistakes and learn from them. But they know directly if it was a mistake. Because it feels wrong.
"Expecting too much from the galaxy's mortal races" ?
No. Expectations and ideals don't need to be adapted to the actual situation, it's the other way round.
The Jedi, Starfleet, the good ones in Lord of the Rings, whoever else. Trying to be better than what we are is what makes them change fate, and the world, and themselves, too.
Hmmm I wonder if my kids are old enough for Star Wars (the "old" movies).
If they decide that something is a mistake based on how they feel about it, they are more chaotic than lawful.
Lawful is about following a explicit code that does not require you to trust your feelings.
"Thou shalt not lie" So we will not pretend we got pure illithium when we did not. (also, and completely unrelated, we cannot finish Baldur's Gate 1, which forces us to lie when we work for the Flaming Fist)
What sort of commandment do you envision that would forbid you from compromising with the apparent realities at hand and buying the best material the ore merchant can offer us?
I don't need to envision a commandment here. "Do your best to do the right thing."
I get the chance to contact the merchant's source, the chance to get the real thing. To me, that means I have to try it.
I'm not judging anyone for taking the alloy, because as you said, you can offer it to Sarles without lying.
But I fail to understand where following my conscience in this context qualifies as chaotic.
When I say "what feels right", I don't mean "okay this seems to be a useful decision, let's try this".
I mean *knowing* in your heart of hearts that your conscience knows right from wrong. I don't think that means I make my own laws. It only helps to balance the Lawful with the Good.