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randomhero00
2010-02-21, 05:58 PM
So an interesting/annoying situation has cropped up in one of my D&D (4e if you care) games. I'm roleplaying a good aligned freedom fighter type.

Here's the situation. We were fighting duergar and orc slavers. Basically the worse types as far as my character is concerned. We're in the middle of the underdark, and very aware we're surrounded by enemies.

1st situation: the last orc of a dead group (but his other allies minutes away) surrenders. My character doesn't trust it at all but several of my party seem to think they can get useful information out of it so I don't kill it outright. The lawful good shaman of our party says he'll let the orc go if he gives him useful info. They agree, the orc (sort of, not really IMO, but my party members disagreed) gave "useful" info. The whole time the orc is completely insulting my character and pissing him off quite a bit. So the lawful good shaman agrees to let the orc go...ok, stupid move, but he is lawful and that is roleplay accurate, so OK...

But here's where we have a problem. My character never agreed, or gave his word (and is chaotic to boot), so I move to shoot the orc, after they let it go (thereby fulfilling his word) the shaman says he'll kill my character if I shoot the orc...in my head I'm like wtf? Roleplay wise there is no way my character would let this orc go. The shaman isn't just threatening either, he's always proven to follow through on his word as far as that goes.

My problem is, how is this even accurate roleplay? In a way it is player fiat. If I roleplay a completely logical and normal character I will most likely have to reroll. First off, the shaman never vowed to protect the orc. Second, how is that realistic? These two characters are war-buds, you suddenly threaten to kill your friend because he wants to kill the enemy? Huh?! Am I crazy here?

2nd situation. Very similar, except its duergar slavers. They say they surrender, this time no party members even accept or give their word. My character of course doesn't trust these treacherous enemies so he keeps firing. The freaking unaligned (neutral) mercenary barbarian readies a charge to attack me if I continue to attack. Again, wtf? The person playing the shaman was getting a drink at that moment, I'm sure he would have threatened something similar as well.

Oh, and no PCs are half-orcs or duergar or anything like that. They are all fairly "goodly" races and most of them (besides me and the shaman) are unaligned. None of them are honorable paladin types.

In our character history there is no beef at all between any of these characters. My character has saved their butts and gotten them resurrected before. Neither of these people in question is particularly good at roleplay and I have no idea what's going through their heads. They are essentially forcing me to stop roleplaying my character or reroll if I stay true to his backround.

Am I missing something? I thought I'd ask you guys first before I bring anything up to the DM or the players. I'm debating on how to handle this. I'd prefer roleplay solutions. I'm thinking of making a speech in character saying pretty much "I'm killing these swine, you can attack me if you want, but I won't fight back."

Starbuck_II
2010-02-21, 06:03 PM
I assume they assumed in the 1st scenerio that when most of the party agreed, you did as well (basically they wwre acting communist: the good of many agrees then you do).

In the 2nd: They assume good accepts Surrenders I guess.

The 2nd isn't logical. No one gave word this time. I'd bring this up and ask why the guy threatened you.

Melamoto
2010-02-21, 06:07 PM
In the first incident, you are justified in wanting to kill the orc, although it seems more of a CN act to me. But the shaman was also justified - in character - for wanting to stop you. Although I would have RP'd it as grabbing your arm and telling you "No". It is not "Player Fiat" at all, that doesn't even exist. DM Fiat is when the DM uses his infinitely godly powers to just say that something doesn't work. Your example is just a case of a character RPing well (Besides the threat to kill; maybe to incapacitate, but not kill).

In the second incident however, while your actions were (Debatably) justified from a chaotic good point of view, a true neutral character should not have reacted like that. Not like that at all. Lawful (Or any other kind of) Good makes sense, but True Neutral characters are defined as selfish, looking out for themselves above others, not attacking team-mates to save the lives of some random evil slavers. And that's not even including the fact that you can't ready a charge action.

Saph
2010-02-21, 06:09 PM
Difficult problem.

The shaman and the barbarian are acting pretty badly IMO; having a strict moral code against harming prisoners is fine, but attacking a party member at the drop of a hat isn't. On the other hand, pointing out that they're acting badly isn't likely to help.

I see two likely explanations. One is that they've got an OOC problem with you. The other is that they're just nuts and have no concept of proportion (lots of players think that trying to kill someone is an acceptable way of resolving differences for some reason). Either way, I'm not sure if there's a good IC way of resolving it.

tyckspoon
2010-02-21, 06:13 PM
The first incident makes sense to me- often, when a Good character accepts a surrender and promises to let the prisoner go, it carries an unspoken promise of "and my associates won't hurt you either." This goes especially if you are using 4E's alignment scale, where Lawful Good is the step beyond being merely Good and the Shaman is operating on near-Paladinic morals. Interfering with your attempt to execute the orc seems natural, although a sincere death threat is not.

The second situation is a WTF to me as well. There could be a suitable character reason for it, but without more information it looks like the barbarian's player just jumped on a flimsy excuse to engage in a little PvP.

ryzouken
2010-02-21, 06:13 PM
Shift your alignment to evil (unnecessary, but useful for the resulting #%&$storm the next action will provoke), kill the offending characters in their sleep, lie about it to any that survive assuming you let any unoffending (but complicit) party members live, and move on.

When immediately confronted by the victims OOC, identify your character did only what he could expect the victims to have done in his situation and ask to move on. Enjoy the next couple of attempts at revenge, then, once your character finally does bite it, create anew.

You're playing your character a certain way, they're playing theirs a certain way. Not all outcomes are good.

Also, it seems your group needs a lesson in "what comes around, goes around."

randomhero00
2010-02-21, 06:19 PM
I assume they assumed in the 1st scenerio that when most of the party agreed, you did as well (basically they wwre acting communist: the good of many agrees then you do).

In the 2nd: They assume good accepts Surrenders I guess.


I specifically protested and did not give my word, they all knew. They were all clear on that. We also aren't a good party, more of a mercenary party (except me). The way my good character got in was almost by accident but not a story for this thread.



The lawful good shaman has also gone in taverns and spent hours gambling and drinking with our enemies for no particular reason (the town we're in has a reeeall serious prohibition against fighting) when he was supposed to be on a mission to help save some town's people that were stolen by slavers. So I have no idea what the heck he is roleplaying. He acts like a lawful stupid paladin one minute, then an evil mercenary rogue the next.

My problem isn't with him even trying to stop me from killing orcs that have surrendered, its the fact that he's threatening to kill a friend. And I don't see how this isn't really fiat. Its reroll or I don't get to roleplay. That's basically the same as saying, "No." Yeah, I know, not literally DM Fiat, but still, you get what I mean.

Saying, "I'll kill you if you don't do what I say" just ends roleplay. And I don't know how to handle it.

Starbuck_II
2010-02-21, 06:23 PM
Wait, you don't have to kill in 4th: you can do nonlethal (instead of killing knock unconscious) so there is no reason to kill youl.

Foryn Gilnith
2010-02-21, 06:27 PM
Saying, "I'll kill you if you don't do what I say" just ends roleplay. And I don't know how to handle it.

Just ignore it. Cite the shaman's alignment (IC or OOC), claim he's bluffing (IC), and deal with the aftermath (OOC). If your character dies, rerolling is better than suppressing your RP. And besides, if the shaman actually kills you, that's awfully dickish.

randomhero00
2010-02-21, 06:40 PM
starbuck- he either doesn't know that or doesn't care.
foryn- that's what I'm thinking of doing but even if I don't get killed by my own party member I'll almost certainly be fired from the team and have to reroll anyway.

Same result, and I'll likely make another character with a similar alignment and outlook (because that's what I like to roleplay) who will have the same problems. Not really fixing anything. Might be funny though, to keep going out that way :)

Haha, so tempting to go evil like ryzouken said..."That's a nice hat." coup de grace, he wakes up dead. I'm wearing the hat, "What?" But I think that'd piss off too many people OOC.

RebelRogue
2010-02-21, 06:55 PM
Shift your alignment to evil (unnecessary, but useful for the resulting #%&$storm the next action will provoke), kill the offending characters in their sleep, lie about it to any that survive assuming you let any unoffending (but complicit) party members live, and move on.

When immediately confronted by the victims OOC, identify your character did only what he could expect the victims to have done in his situation and ask to move on. Enjoy the next couple of attempts at revenge, then, once your character finally does bite it, create anew.

You're playing your character a certain way, they're playing theirs a certain way. Not all outcomes are good.

Also, it seems your group needs a lesson in "what comes around, goes around."
Responding to people acting like jerks by being a bigger jerk is not exactly a good way to handle things! Also, the "it's what my character would do" excuse to justify killing other PCs at random is pretty bad style as well.


And that's not even including the fact that you can't ready a charge action.
This is 4e, so you can.

ryzouken
2010-02-21, 07:17 PM
Responding to people acting like jerks by being a bigger jerk is not exactly a good way to handle things! Also, the "it's what my character would do" excuse to justify killing other PCs at random is pretty bad style as well.

And yet, said actions are specifically equivalent to what the OP's opponents are doing, except without even the rp justification.

The absolute best method of resolving the situation is the method that is swift and effective. This differs by group temperment and the particulars involving the situation, none of which are better judged by any except the principles involved (the OP and his group).

So: assess the situation rationally, talk it out, if your group is unresponsive, generate what entertainment you can until either they become responsive or you kick them to the curb. Key to pursuing this strategy is removing your feelings about the issue. It's fine to discuss the problem, but check any attitude at the door.

Asheram
2010-02-21, 07:18 PM
Well... as a "good aligned freedom fighter type." you're not doing well.

1. Not to rain on your parade, but I think it perfectly resonable that a Lawful Good (or anyone not evil or chaotic neutral) person would be upset by the notion of killing prisoners.

2. Now, I would be somewhat surprised to hear that from a barbarian, but it's the same here. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth unless you have an obligation to clear the road once it topples over dead. The Durgear are yielding, there's tons of information (and treasure) you can get out of a living prisoner. The reaction is a bit more intelligent than I would suspect from a barbarian, but it's there.

I think what the party is trying to tell you is: "Dude, don't mess up the party karma due to short temper. We can use them alive!"

Foryn Gilnith
2010-02-21, 07:27 PM
1) LG fellow would be upset, yes. "Upset" doesn't mean "I'm'a kill you" for any definition of "good" I've heard.

2)

My character of course doesn't trust these treacherous enemies so he keeps firing

It's less of a gift horse and more of a "random-gift-left-on-the-porch" from a known enemy. Which could very well be some manner of IED. So yeah, I'd look the "horse" in the mouth.

Again, to the OP, just follow through with it. Some people just throw around the word "kill" OOC. Some instinct (which could be horribly wrong) tells me that they won't follow through with the threat, especially if you respond with nonviolence.

absolmorph
2010-02-21, 07:29 PM
I assume they assumed in the 1st scenerio that when most of the party agreed, you did as well (basically they wwre acting communist: the good of many agrees then you do).

In the 2nd: They assume good accepts Surrenders I guess.

The 2nd isn't logical. No one gave word this time. I'd bring this up and ask why the guy threatened you.
Actually, I'd say the first situation was more like democracy. The majority agreed, so the minority must follow.
In both situations, threatening to attack your character was much further than they should have gone.
In the first situation, the shaman should have stopped your character (his friend, for boop's sake!) from attacking by grabbing his arm or something. Not threatening to kill you. Maybe followed it up with something about becoming like the slavers. Whatever.

In the second, the barbarian could have, for example, put his hand on your fighter's shoulder and said something along the lines of "give them a chance to surrender". Not "stop shooting or I kill you".

I would suggest talking with the players about the stupidity of in-party conflict, and try to explain why your character has consistently been willing to kill when it's unnecessary. Also, ask them to explain why they decided on their course of action, and try to understand it. It may end up with an argument about RP, and someone may even end up rolling up a new character. In the end, though, it should end up making things run smoother, help all of you RP better (and not prevent each other from RPing well arbitrarily) and just make the whole thing more fun for all of you.

Lycanthromancer
2010-02-21, 07:29 PM
It's less of a gift horse and more of a "random-gift-left-on-the-porch" from a known enemy. Which could very well be some manner of IED. So yeah, I'd look the "horse" in the mouth.The reason you don't look a horse in the mouth is because the damned thing will bite your face off.

Also, perhaps you should start making investigations into your party members' affiliations; sounds like they might be of questionable loyalties.

rockbeast
2010-02-21, 07:30 PM
Are you sure the shammy is LG and not CN and I dont know what to say about your barbarian problem, but when did babarians start turning down chances to kill an enemy.

RebelRogue
2010-02-21, 07:31 PM
And yet, said actions are specifically equivalent to what the OP's opponents are doing, except without even the rp justification.
And that's when you ought to be the wiser one and realize you'll only upscale the conflict by doing so. Wars start that way, you know :smallwink:

randomhero00
2010-02-21, 07:56 PM
Well... as a "good aligned freedom fighter type." you're not doing well.

1. Not to rain on your parade, but I think it perfectly resonable that a Lawful Good (or anyone not evil or chaotic neutral) person would be upset by the notion of killing prisoners.

2. Now, I would be somewhat surprised to hear that from a barbarian, but it's the same here. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth unless you have an obligation to clear the road once it topples over dead. The Durgear are yielding, there's tons of information (and treasure) you can get out of a living prisoner. The reaction is a bit more intelligent than I would suspect from a barbarian, but it's there.

I think what the party is trying to tell you is: "Dude, don't mess up the party karma due to short temper. We can use them alive!"

1. Upset, yes. blowing your friend's head off upset? no way

2. Except the party isn't keeping them prisoner (for more than 2 minutes) or even searching them, nor have we gotten any useful intell. They're letting them go free. In a situation previous to this, it has already nearly killed the party because they let a bunch go free and they went ahead of us and warned our enemies. The dm has flat out told us we lost 1/3 of our treasure reward for doing this on one particular encounter. For some reason my character is the only one objecting. I seriously have no idea what's going through their heads as most of them are fairly veteran DnDers.

Bad tactics I can stomach if its in the name of roleplay, but I just can't see how any of this is really justified, even through roleplay.

Right now I'm leaning toward asking them OOC before the game why we're letting them go when its bitten us in the butt before, and then in game just follow through on my roleplay, consequences be darned.

Umael
2010-02-21, 08:23 PM
1st situation: the last orc of a dead group (but his other allies minutes away) surrenders.

Okay, orc surrenders, orc is Evil or Chaotic Evil (forget which), knows that either the "good guys" will keep their word or is too stupid to think they won't, got it. Then he starts insults people.

Um... what did you guys do then?

Seriously, this is an issue. Prisoners should not go around insulting their captors. Even if their lives have been assured, they can still be threatened, abused, and damaged.

It makes me think that the DM either wasn't RPing a prisoner very well or was RPing a prisoner who is too stupid or who knows too much. Then you/your character got upset with the insults, which the DM/orc prisoner thought was very amusing and kept it up. For whatever reason, the rest of the players/PCs didn't step in.

More detail maybe?



But here's where we have a problem. My character never agreed, or gave his word (and is chaotic to boot), so I move to shoot the orc, after they let it go (thereby fulfilling his word)

Sounds like the party decided that majority rules, you were in the minority (as someone mentioned already). That and attempting to kill someone or letting someone in your party kill that person after saying you would let them go is not keeping your word.

I see no problem yet.



the shaman says he'll kill my character if I shoot the orc...in my head I'm like wtf? Roleplay wise there is no way my character would let this orc go. The shaman isn't just threatening either, he's always proven to follow through on his word as far as that goes.

Even if the shaman is a war buddy of your PC, that doesn't mean the shaman can't be a hard one with a granite heart. He gave his word, it might mean more than you being a war buddy. I see no problem with the shaman's RP here.

RP-wise, about you and letting this orc go - I disagree. You play your character, not your character plays you. Look up Rich's article about that kind of thing. "That's what my character would do" is used too often as an excuse. Try to think why your character would allow the orc to go - besides, you can let the orc go without letting the situation go - turning to your teammates and getting pissed with THEM in-character can work too.




2nd situation. Very similar, except its duergar slavers. They say they surrender, this time no party members even accept or give their word.

Could be something implied. Don't have to always explicitly say "I agree" or words to that effect.



The freaking unaligned (neutral) mercenary barbarian readies a charge to attack me if I continue to attack. Again, wtf?

Did he give his reasons IC? Or OOC?



Neither of these people in question is particularly good at roleplay and I have no idea what's going through their heads. They are essentially forcing me to stop roleplaying my character or reroll if I stay true to his backround.

If they are not very good at RP, are they aware of that? Have you (subtly) questioned them on this issue?

As for them "forcing" you, I'm not buying that, or at least, no yet. It sounds like their preferred style is getting in the way of your preferred style, but that doesn't mean you have to stop RPing your character if you want to stay true.

(Ugly as it sounds, maybe they aren't the only ones who aren't the best at RPing. Don't know, don't know you, but you might want to think about the possibility that you can do more.)



I'm thinking of making a speech in character saying pretty much "I'm killing these swine, you can attack me if you want, but I won't fight back."

Maybe. It does have some charm to it. Here's how I would do it though (making a few assumptions here, bear with me):

"Okay, jay-whos, I want some answers. First, (shaman) gets upset with me for trying to kill that one orc. Fine, you gave your word, I get it. But you didn't promise that the orc gets out with all his tusks. Next time we take a prisoner and it starts mouthing off, I'm busting some heads.

"Next, what was with the duergars, you mind telling me that? They said they surrendered, but when was the last time you remember them keeping their word? If they want to surrender, I expect to see weapons thrown down, on their knees, hands on their heads, or I'm not stopping the killing, 'kay?

"I got your guys' back, so how about you guys getting mine for a change?"

Vitruviansquid
2010-02-21, 08:36 PM
Like normal people, DnD characters have values and beliefs that they would resort to violence to uphold. However, also like normal people, DnD characters shouldn't always use violence to solve all of their problems (no matter how tempting it may be), and should learn to express their disapproval in other ways (aka being petty or passive aggressive) or compromise to get things done.

From a purely roleplaying point of view, I could see the justification in the group members' conflict. After all, alignments exist to create conflict, but there's positive conflict, those that will flesh out the party's character and make the game more interesting, and negative conflict, which causes the game to slow to a grinding halt as the characters come to an impasse in-game and the players feverishly argue over the meaning of alignments out of game.

Oracle_Hunter
2010-02-21, 08:45 PM
(1) A LG character threatening to kill if you kill a prisoner is odd. It would be IC to point out "So, you're willing to kill me - a trusted ally - if I kill a sneaky orc that I never promised safe passage?" If he said yes, you may want to say "some loyalty!" and go home - or at least mistrust the hell out of the LG in the future.

I would agree that it is not LG to threaten to kill someone for a Non-Evil act. Technically killing in cold blood isn't "Good" but I can see a CG deciding that killing this prisoner was important enough. That said, killing prisoners isn't Good - you should have talked this through with the others and, if you couldn't convince them, argue that you need to keep him prisoner until his information can be "checked out."

(2) If the Neutral Mercenary thought you were going to start a dangerous fight for no good reason then preparing to stop you from starting said fight is very much IC. Also - refusing to accept surrenders is Not-Good. You can mistrust the surrendering types, but unless you have excellent evidence that they are lying, that's a no-no.

EDIT: Calling the LG character's bluff is very much IC. If he does attack you, run away - he's done a very Not-Good thing by attacking a defenseless ally. And the LG should immediately become LN - Good people do not attack their allies without extremely good reasons.

RagnaroksChosen
2010-02-21, 09:17 PM
I may have missed it but have you brought up your concerns with the player? Ask him to justify why hes ready to just kill a good friend like that?


I would sugest calling him out about... ask him to justify why hes doing what hes doing..

Devils_Advocate
2010-02-22, 03:52 AM
1. A lot of adventurers are rather opposed to murder and are willing to use lethal force to prevent it. There's nothing terribly unusual about that. And killing a surrendered prisoner is murder.

Obviously, your character is the hot-headed guy would happily murder people because they're The Enemy and so has to be threatened with violence by the rest of the group so that he doesn't do that. That's a viable if formulaic relationship dynamic that doesn't necessarily rule out them being long-standing allies.

Indeed, it seems to me that it's refusing to back down in such a situation that would be unrealistic roleplaying on your part. If these guys have been together for a while, then if that were going to happen, it would have already happened a long time ago.

Basically, it seems that the other players want to play more Saturday morning cartoon sorts of heroes, who only use lethal force in response to lethal force, and you want to play more of a traditional Dungeons & Dragons sort of hero, who kills evil people for being evil. Confusingly, the phrase "black and white morality" can be used to describe either of these mutually incompatible paradigms. Really, what makes morality black and white is that everyone agrees on what's right. Neither of these approaches makes a story gray so much as giving different characters different approaches of their own does.

2. There are things that a character can do that will get him killed. You may roleplay your character doing such things, but it should be done with the understanding that this might get him killed. Not allowing your character to get away with something isn't "fiat". The dude who moons the king doesn't get thrown in the dungeon because of fiat; he gets thrown in the dungeon because the king has lots of guards. Actions have consequences. This is what makes choices meaningful.

Basically, what you want is an environment where there aren't negative consequences for your character behaving in a manner that you prefer. The rest of your group is not obligated to provide such an environment.

3. Why the heck aren't they taking prisoners?

BigBadBugbear
2010-02-22, 04:15 AM
In adition to the last post I have only one add to that..

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0669.html

GoodbyeSoberDay
2010-02-22, 04:23 AM
Next time, kill the slaver and then immediately surrender. Apparently he'll defend you to the death.

absolmorph
2010-02-22, 05:28 AM
Next time, kill the slaver and then immediately surrender. Apparently he'll defend you to the death.
Even if the rest of the party tries to kill you.