If a kingdom is ruled legitimately and fairly (enough) by a lich?

[Nightcanon]

How do we "know this"? Because a confused and repeatedly mind-magiced old man says so?

~1200 murders every day in the real world, and we know from the books the process requires a killing for every Horocrux... but that's somehow the detail that JKR is so reluctant to explain, and comparable to something that almost made her editor vomit? Really?




It's made out to be far more evil and repulsive than just the act of murder...




In both cases, it's made out to be a remarkably evil act, and treated as "unspeakable". In both cases, the "mystery" doesn't make the act seem more evil, it's just eye-rollingly cliched.

In both cases, if it were just killing someone as part of the ritual, then that could be said, but it's clearly not just killing someone.

Not sure if anyone has raised the point yet, but up to this point in the thread I don't believe anyone has. There is apparently at least one case in which the act of murder alone is sufficient in itself to create a Horcrux: when Voldemort kills Lily Potter a fragment of his soul lodges in Harry, creating a Horcrux that Voldemort never intended to make. It's possible that this is an effect only seen in souls that have already been multiply damaged by being split several times (it is implied that no previous wizard has attempted to make more than one Horcrux, and stated that only the most depraved would even consider making one), but that murder didn't result in the soul-fragment created by it latching on to any pre-prepared object that (as per Dumbledore's speculation) was intended to become the final Horcrux with Voldemort's planned murder of Harry.
As to whether 'any' murder is enough I would suggest no, but by definition, murder by a wizard powerful enough to make a Horcrux, for the purposes in making a Horcrux, is the premeditated and deliberate murder of a weaker individual motivated purely by personal gain.

Edit:
Having caught up with the rest of the thread, I'm not really sure what your problem with the concept of unspeakable acts is. Someone mentions that the Holocaust isn't unspeakable, and thus nothing else should be: well, yes and no. We speak of it because it was a historical event, and so that people do not forget about it, but prior to 1930 it would have been unspeakable to propose carrying it out; and even now as someone without direct involvement (ancestors of WW2 generation all British, none active combatants in European theatre at the end of the war) the monstrosity of it (as opposed to the numerical and logistical facts) is almost impossible to articulate. It is possible that at some future point, some crime worse than the Holocaust might be perpetrated, but it would be inappropriate for a number of reasons to speculate what form such a crime would take, and one of those reasons is that it would be sickening to me and to anyone reading if I were to try to do so. To change tack slightly, I have personally given medical evidence in court that led to a man's conviction for the murder of his girlfriend's 3-month-old baby, and in a separate case had cause to investigate whether a 6-week-old that was bleeding to death in front of me from a lacerated tonsil might have sustained that injury from the mother's boyfriend forcing something down its throat the first time she left the two of them alone. I'm not sure whether these are appropriate things to share on a message board about a humorous comic and a game; I am concerned that the mention of them might cause offense and, yes, damage to people that read about them; I'm certainly mildly worried about what effects seeing such things might have had on what I might refer to as my soul. Certainly I would not want to create them from my own imagination to satisfy someone's desire for me to 'think of something really evil'. I'm therefore puzzled by your apparent stance that use of the phrase 'unspeakably evil' in books aimed at the teenage market is in some way a cop-out. As to the detailed description that made JK Rowling's editor turn green, I doubt it was much more graphic than the ritual described at the end of Goblet of Fire, which is told from the point of view of Harry, who has his eyes closed and is sensibly trying not to pay any more attention than he can help. Clearly they decided, as the editors of D&D did, that 'unspeakable evil' suited their purposes better.

[Keltest]

Not sure if anyone has raised the point yet, but up to this point in the thread I don't believe anyone has. There is apparently at least one case in which the act of murder alone is sufficient in itself to create a Horcrux: when Voldemort kills Lily Potter a fragment of his soul lodges in Harry, creating a Horcrux that Voldemort never intended to make. It's possible that this is an effect only seen in souls that have already been multiply damaged by being split several times (it is implied that no previous wizard has attempted to make more than one Horcrux, and stated that only the most depraved would even consider making one), but that murder didn't result in the soul-fragment created by it latching on to any pre-prepared object that (as per Dumbledore's speculation) was intended to become the final Horcrux with Voldemort's planned murder of Harry.
As to whether 'any' murder is enough I would suggest no, but by definition, murder by a wizard powerful enough to make a Horcrux, for the purposes in making a Horcrux, is the premeditated and deliberate murder of a weaker individual motivated purely by personal gain.

Its heavily implied that this is sufficiently unexplored magical territory that they don't know what actually happened. Keep in mind that not only was Voldemort's soul splintered and broken, but he also died.

[Nightcanon]

Its heavily implied that this is sufficiently unexplored magical territory that they don't know what actually happened. Keep in mind that not only was Voldemort's soul splintered and broken, but he also died.

True enough.

[Max_Killjoy]

Its heavily implied that this is sufficiently unexplored magical territory that they don't know what actually happened. Keep in mind that not only was Voldemort's soul splintered and broken, but he also died.

And there's the aspect presented in-story of Lilly's selfless love for Harry and the inherent protective magic thereof.

If I had to speculate, I'd say that was more of a unique situation given all the elements that came together, and had more to do with Voldy's soul already being a mess at that point, rather than revealing anything useful about the Horocrux magic in general.

[Simetra Irertne]

If I had to speculate, I'd say that was more of a unique situation given all the elements that came together, and had more to do with Voldy's soul already being a mess at that point, rather than revealing anything useful about the Horocrux magic in general.

I agree. There are too many variables for the murder to be the only factor. Potential other factors:
Voldemort's soul being messed up already
Lily's protection imbuing the rebounding curse with "love magic"
The target of the spell being powerful (or potentially powerful) already

[halfeye]

Having caught up with the rest of the thread, I'm not really sure what your problem with the concept of unspeakable acts is. Someone mentions that the Holocaust isn't unspeakable, and thus nothing else should be: well, yes and no. We speak of it because it was a historical event, and so that people do not forget about it, but prior to 1930 it would have been unspeakable to propose carrying it out; and even now as someone without direct involvement (ancestors of WW2 generation all British, none active combatants in European theatre at the end of the war) the monstrosity of it (as opposed to the numerical and logistical facts) is almost impossible to articulate. It is possible that at some future point, some crime worse than the Holocaust might be perpetrated, but it would be inappropriate for a number of reasons to speculate what form such a crime would take, and one of those reasons is that it would be sickening to me and to anyone reading if I were to try to do so. To change tack slightly, I have personally given medical evidence in court that led to a man's conviction for the murder of his girlfriend's 3-month-old baby, and in a separate case had cause to investigate whether a 6-week-old that was bleeding to death in front of me from a lacerated tonsil might have sustained that injury from the mother's boyfriend forcing something down its throat the first time she left the two of them alone. I'm not sure whether these are appropriate things to share on a message board about a humorous comic and a game; I am concerned that the mention of them might cause offense and, yes, damage to people that read about them; I'm certainly mildly worried about what effects seeing such things might have had on what I might refer to as my soul. Certainly I would not want to create them from my own imagination to satisfy someone's desire for me to 'think of something really evil'. I'm therefore puzzled by your apparent stance that use of the phrase 'unspeakably evil' in books aimed at the teenage market is in some way a cop-out. As to the detailed description that made JK Rowling's editor turn green, I doubt it was much more graphic than the ritual described at the end of Goblet of Fire, which is told from the point of view of Harry, who has his eyes closed and is sensibly trying not to pay any more attention than he can help. Clearly they decided, as the editors of D&D did, that 'unspeakable evil' suited their purposes better.

Speaking for myself, I'm saying that copping out of describing bad things can be the correct choice. However, as a matter of philosophical truth, to claim that "unwise to speak of" is the same as "cannot be spoken of" is untrue.

[Max_Killjoy]

Speaking for myself, I'm saying that copping out of describing bad things can be the correct choice. However, as a matter of philosophical truth, to claim that "unwise to speak of" is the same as "cannot be spoken of" is untrue.

I think part of my objection is that just saying "just trust us, it's bad, mkay?" makes discussions like the one intended in the OP of this thread very difficult to have.

[Mordar]

I think part of my objection is that just saying "just trust us, it's bad, mkay?" is that it makes discussions like the one intended in the OP of this thread very difficult to have.

I think as far as the lich goes the idea is that the process of attaining "lichdom" involves something that ranks a 10 on everyone's "Bad-Deeds-O-Meter". The problem is that my campaign Bad-Deeds-O-Meter may be calibrated differently than your campaign Bad-Deeds-O-Meter (or even my Campaign #2 Bad-Deeds-O-Meter). So the "unspeakable" solution sidesteps the need for a placement on a sliding scale, the potential for such a huge spectrum of variability in different perspectives of how bad a given act is, or how a given person perceives evil/wants to be perceived.

It might well have been better to say that vs. "unspeakable evil" or similarly flowered prose, but the intent, I think, is good.

No matter how dark and gritty your campaign, campaign setting, players or characters, to become a lich requires acts so Evil it gives them all pause. I think that does give us the information we need from the OP on one part of the equation...by using the definitional lich descriptor, it includes the characteristic that the lich has done great evil by the standards of that campaign world.

So, I do think we need additional information, but it's on the other side of the equation - the Paladin. Details about the character, the order to which the paladin belongs, the divinity worshiped, how and why they are interacting with the lich/lich's country, et al.

And THEN come the moral conversations:

• Redemption/absolution - can a lich, the very definitional existence of which required a 10 on the Bad-Deeds-O-Meter, ever wipe that stain from their ledger? If so, what would it take and who could do it?
• The relative impact of regicide - if the Paladin and party destroy or otherwise remove the lich from power, do the outcomes and consequences of that action result in a greater net disruption/evil than leaving what appears to be a just (if not Good) ruler in place?
• If the consequences are more grave/Evil, how much blame belongs to the Paladin and party?
• ...and so on.

I like the topic a lot, and think there are probably more interesting conversations and debates in the topic than in the actual playing out of the story...but the moral dilemma is, to me, a lot of fun to unravel.

- M

[Beleriphon]

It might well have been better to say that vs. "unspeakable evil" or similarly flowered prose, but the intent, I think, is good.

No matter how dark and gritty your campaign, campaign setting, players or characters, to become a lich requires acts so Evil it gives them all pause. I think that does give us the information we need from the OP on one part of the equation...by using the definitional lich descriptor, it includes the characteristic that the lich has done great evil by the standards of that campaign world.

I think the defining factor that needs to address for the lich evilness aspect is what does a person have to do to separate their soul from their body in such a way as to make the destruction of their physical body a non-issue? That's moved beyond seeking immortality or eternal life. Not even vampires manage that level of separation.

[Segev]

I see the "unspeakable evil" phrase as less a fig leaf, and more a tacit acknowledgement that it's going to have to be something you and your table find to fit the bill. That no amount of effort at being suitably depraved would be "enough" for every table, and would probably be "beyond okay" to even describe for others.

It tells us the essential part: whatever else is true about the lichification process, there is an act that is evil by whatever standard you care to apply which must be done as part of it.

Not as an excuse, but as simply saying, "come up with it yourself; it must be truly, horrifically evil." All it really does is guarantee that liches are nongood (and all but certainly evil). Because no good person would DO such a thing.

[Velaryon]

If, at your table, an act of incestuous rape and murder is what is required, and you all agree that that is sufficiently evil and not doable without being evil, that works for your table. If your table thinks that's some relatively mundane evil, there, then you can come up with something else. If your table doesn't want to contemplate such things, you can come up with something else.

Same goes for if it takes the betrayal of a close friend, murder and soul-trapping of a random schmoe, murdering your adulterous wife and her lover instead of finishing your quest for redemption, exterminating an endangered species, or putting chili on a hot dog (you monster).

It is unfortunate for those who can't come up with something they deem "sufficiently evil," though.

Pretty sure that's how you become a death knight, not a lich.

[NichG]

I guess another way to spin it would be to ask, what kind of continuing evil would be so bad that it would be forgivable for even a paladin to sacrifice the populace of an entire kingdom against their will in order to prevent it?

For example, what if the lichification ritual involves binding a particular deed, behavior, or virtue that should normally be Good such that it instead automatically consigns anyone who exhibits it to go to the Lower Planes when they die. So every year the lich continues to exist, something like 0.5% of the Good population of the multiverse are consigned to be tortured eternally in the hells. Furthermore, the triggering virtue is becoming known as deities warn their followers about it, meaning that a particular component of Goodness itself is being eroded - charity, mercy, kindness, patience... one of them is now a cardinal sin.

Would that reach the 'forget about the details of our ethics and principles, we have to end this now!' threshold?

[Nightcanon]

Speaking for myself, I'm saying that copping out of describing bad things can be the correct choice. However, as a matter of philosophical truth, to claim that "unwise to speak of" is the same as "cannot be spoken of" is untrue.

In D&D there exist mere words whose utterance is so evil that most normal people die on hearing them. It's not so much of a stretch to suggest that some acts might be even more dangerous to describe. In English law, at any rate, the concept of obscenity is based on the notion that the witnessing of obscene acts is harmful to the person witnessing them. I don't have much truck with censorship, but there are extremes at which I think that this can be true.
On another tack, I've been to places and seen sights that have inspired world-famous poets to write world-famous poems extolling their beauty, and concluded that the poetry is insufficient to describe them. I therefore do think that for practical purposes I have seen things that are indescribably beautiful. In a D&D world in which supernatural abilities and wish spells exist, someone could doubtless make a better job of describing such things than the greatest real-world poets (epic bard with 40 charisma + wish > greatest RL romantic poet), but as a concept 'indescribable beauty' I think is valid. Likewise 'unspeakable evil': we might be able to name the act (raping babies to death), but we aren't really communicating the evil that it involves, and indeed the sort of gross-out escalation that would occur in trying to name the 'most evil act imaginable' can only occur by creating that disconnect. It's hardly surprising, and by no means a cop out, that TSR/ WotC didn't sit their staff down for a brainstorming session to come up an act that was sufficiently evil (industrialised genocide of 6 million people- no sixty million, with added rape!). It's not like they could have published result, if details got out it would be a PR disaster worse than the 1980s devil-worship moral panic, and it would be impossible to do without a mental disconnect about what the acts named actually entailed, which in itself is a harmful thing to do.

[Segev]

Part of the lich ritual involves starting an alignment discussion on the internet.

[Koo Rehtorb]

I guess another way to spin it would be to ask, what kind of continuing evil would be so bad that it would be forgivable for even a paladin to sacrifice the populace of an entire kingdom against their will in order to prevent it?

I think this is the wrong way to think about paladins. I would suggest that if a paladin had a choice between killing a child and letting the universe be destroyed, killing the child would be the option that made the paladin fall. Which isn't to say that it would be the wrong choice to make, just that paladins do not function on consequentialist ethics.

Righteously smiting an evil lich is always permissible for a paladin, regardless of the fallout that may arise. How much priority any individual paladin may place on avoiding said fallout is a choice for the individual paladin.

[Satinavian]

I always assumed that the act of unspeakable evil was informed evil. The same way as "Protection from good" is an Evil deed, only far more evil.
Not because anyone actually got harmed, but because the Cosmic Powers of Good and Evil say so.

And it is so incredible powerful evil because you mess with your own soul and it is a single act that will forever bar you from certain afterlifes. While things like mass murder can be forgiven and redemption is possible and you might still end up in some kind of heaven, separating your soul is evil and isolating it from the cosmos kinda prevents cleaning it from that particular evil.


In certain religions suicide was considered an unforgivable sin. Not because it was worse than anything else but because you are dead afterwards and can't atone for it anymore until you die. Becoming a Lich is probably similar and the reason why it is considered so evil.

[ShaneMRoth]

Part of the lich ritual involves starting an alignment discussion on the internet.

This post is just one reason why I put down any beverage before reading threads.

#SpitTakeAverted

[NichG]

I think this is the wrong way to think about paladins. I would suggest that if a paladin had a choice between killing a child and letting the universe be destroyed, killing the child would be the option that made the paladin fall. Which isn't to say that it would be the wrong choice to make, just that paladins do not function on consequentialist ethics.

Righteously smiting an evil lich is always permissible for a paladin, regardless of the fallout that may arise. How much priority any individual paladin may place on avoiding said fallout is a choice for the individual paladin.

That's kind of ironic because its a very consequentialist take on paladin behavior - that is to say, it's proposing that 'anything that doesn't cause a loss of powers is fair game' is a reasonable code for a paladin to follow. I think its possible to construct an absolutely monstrously evil (in the colloquial sense if not the cosmic sense) paladin by taking that to the limit - having a paladin who places themselves in, say, a country which is undergoing major social problems such as famine or revolution, and makes as many opportunities for themselves to have the choice to Smite or Not Smite on a daily basis as possible - and then specifically only chooses to Smite those whose deaths would have horrible downstream consequences, while specifically sparing those whose survival would similarly have horrible downstream consequences.

It kind of goes to Segev's point about Atonement - there's both a letter and a spirit that must be satisfied. Someone who seeks atonement specifically to exploit the system ends up not receiving it. Similarly, if a paladin is beholden to both law and good, a paladin who exploits the letter of their code while being willfully negligent of the spirit might not be mandated to fall by the letter of the code, but presumably they'd be failing at the spirit of it.

It's so frequently an issue because of the disconnect of the metagame. The player is empowered to write something down on the character sheet - to proclaim that the character is Good at heart, to choose a class of Paladin, to write the backstory that said 'such and such a god said I'm a good guy and gave me a chunk of power because of it'. But that also empowers the player to intentionally stress the consistency of those structures if they so choose - they can choose to play a Paladin of Pelor who actually is more or less fine with the undead, or other weird combinations. There's a metagame factor which prevents Pelor from just removing their support (it would be bad if the GM were constantly judging the player and pulled their powers whenever they got annoyed), but presumably if Pelor is an entity who is empowered to know the true heart and soul of his paladins, if he found something not to his liking he just wouldn't invest that person as a paladin in the first place. However, we are forced to consider the situation in which Pelor (or Cosmic Good, or whatever) is bound to be blind to the real intents of their mortal proxies and has to navigate ethics with and only with a specified code.

[Koo Rehtorb]

That's kind of ironic because its a very consequentialist take on paladin behavior - that is to say, it's proposing that 'anything that doesn't cause a loss of powers is fair game' is a reasonable code for a paladin to follow.

No, I didn't say that. I specifically said that taking the option that didn't cause the paladin to fall would be the wrong choice, in this case. What I am proposing is that sometimes a paladin who also wants to be a good person might have to choose a path that would make him fall. I also think that in such cases it would be relatively easy for the paladin to get redeemed. I guess I am saying that D&D's alignment system is inherently broken and will occasionally promote actions that are clearly the wrong choice as being the right choice. And therefore, by extension, a paladin's code is not necessarily the same thing as always doing the right thing. D&D Good is not necessarily the same thing as actually doing right, in my opinion.

I think its possible to construct an absolutely monstrously evil (in the colloquial sense if not the cosmic sense) paladin by taking that to the limit - having a paladin who places themselves in, say, a country which is undergoing major social problems such as famine or revolution, and makes as many opportunities for themselves to have the choice to Smite or Not Smite on a daily basis as possible - and then specifically only chooses to Smite those whose deaths would have horrible downstream consequences, while specifically sparing those whose survival would similarly have horrible downstream consequences.

I think you could do it without violating certain paladin codes. I don't think you could do it without changing alignment, though. Someone who has a specific intent to cause harm is probably crossing an alignment line. I don't think specifically intending to throw a nation into chaos is the same as someone who either doesn't recognize the potential for that to happen, or someone who shrugs and says that the nation collapsing is not his responsibility and that lawful goodness will prevail there in the end.

I will say as someone who thinks D&D's alignment is broken, you have a few options to deal with it.

1) You can scrap alignment entirely. Probably the best choice. It causes way more trouble than it's worth.

2) You can embrace it. It can be fun to roleplay with a morality system that's different from what we're accustomed to. I've had a lot of fun playing Good aligned characters that were terrible people, and Evil characters that wanted all the best for everyone.

Chaotic Good serial killer. She was always completely diligent about doing all the legwork, making sure that this villainous person was truly irredeemable and their death would make the world a better place for all concerned. Would donate a sizable percentage of the loot she got from these killings to hungry orphans or whatever. Would even kill them quickly and painlessly. Was still doing it because she got a sick thrill out of killing that she never admitted to herself.

Lawful Evil nation builder. Strongly believed that the best (and only) way to turn his war torn nation into a peaceful and prosperous nation was to ruthlessly crush dissent beneath his iron boot. He might have been right. Believed that one day it might even be possible to dial it back and make the kingdom happy as well as peaceful and prosperous. Didn't enjoy the ruthless tactics at all.

3) Or you can try to shoehorn modern morality into a system that is, in my humble opinion, not at all built for it. I think things break when you try to do this.

[NichG]

No, I didn't say that. I specifically said that taking the option that didn't cause the paladin to fall would be the wrong choice, in this case. What I am proposing is that sometimes a paladin who also wants to be a good person might have to choose a path that would make him fall. I also think that in such cases it would be relatively easy for the paladin to get redeemed.

Ah, okay. Yeah, I agree with this.

I guess I am saying that D&D's alignment system is inherently broken and will occasionally promote actions that are clearly the wrong choice as being the right choice. And therefore, by extension, a paladin's code is not necessarily the same thing as always doing the right thing. D&D Good is not necessarily the same thing as actually doing right, in my opinion.

This is also true, but I guess the thing I was getting at with previous posts is that there is a reason for D&D Good to try to be the same thing as actually doing right, inasmuch as possible (in this case, both from the in-universe point of view of cosmic forces arrayed behind the banner, and from the out-of-universe point of view of the GM and players trying to maintain verisimilitude). The reason being that if they're generally pretty correlated, people in a D&D universe have reason to allow themselves to be guided by cosmic alignment considerations when their own judgement might be lacking or their information incomplete. But if you move too many ticks in the direction of blue/orange morality, you're going to start to get people judging the cosmos and finding it wanting (both in-universe, and players at the table saying 'yeah, alignment is pretty random isn't it, lets just ignore that').

Not to say it can always be achieved (much like, sometimes the paladin should choose to fall). But failing too severely at it has consequences (for the game, for the story, for in-character entities). Generally speaking, the consequence is to make alignment less relevant.

1) You can scrap alignment entirely. Probably the best choice. It causes way more trouble than it's worth.

I tend towards this, if its not obvious

2) You can embrace it. It can be fun to roleplay with a morality system that's different from what we're accustomed to. I've had a lot of fun playing Good aligned characters that were terrible people, and Evil characters that wanted all the best for everyone.

Chaotic Good serial killer. She was always completely diligent about doing all the legwork, making sure that this villainous person was truly irredeemable and their death would make the world a better place for all concerned. Would donate a sizable percentage of the loot she got from these killings to hungry orphans or whatever. Would even kill them quickly and painlessly. Was still doing it because she got a sick thrill out of killing that she never admitted to herself.

Lawful Evil nation builder. Strongly believed that the best (and only) way to turn his war torn nation into a peaceful and prosperous nation was to ruthlessly crush dissent beneath his iron boot. He might have been right. Believed that one day it might even be possible to dial it back and make the kingdom happy as well as peaceful and prosperous. Didn't enjoy the ruthless tactics at all.

3) Or you can try to shoehorn modern morality into a system that is, in my humble opinion, not at all built for it. I think things break when you try to do this.

Well I think the issue is, interactions between sentient entities aren't arbitrary. Consequences remain the same even if you change the underlying philosophy. So even if you try to embrace it, the fact of the matter is the guy who is nominally a paragon of blue!good may well be a jerk that ruins everything your blue!good character holds dear but does so according to the playbook of the alternate moral system. You're supposed to be on the same side, but the consequence of that pattern of behavior is still real and so either you tend to bias the playable archetypes more towards madmen and extremists of various stripes, excluding the middle ground of people with generally reasonable and stable behavior. Even if the paladin is blue!good and the peasants of the lich king is blue!good and the lich king is orange!evil (but is doing a good job), those peasants really should band together and stop the paladin regardless of whether you're using modern morality or blue/orange alternate morality - anything else is pretty self-destructive of them.

[Unoriginal]

Part of the problem of this thread is that it's handling different settings and games with very different conceptions of alignment.

[Elderand]

As far as I'm aware, the lichification rituals was given at least once in great details, Van richten's guide to the lich for ravenloft adnd 2nd edition details the whole process of becoming a lich.

None of it is actually evil aside from getting the fresh heart of a sentient creature for a potion. But even then, that can be arranged without going into evil.
Then once a century or so, a lich need to do a ritual were again, the heart of a sentient creature is used to help preserve the body of the lich. But that's not even necessary, the book mention liches can just let his or her body crumble to dust, have the spirit go into the phylactery and possess a random corpse nearby.

[Unoriginal]

The process to become a Lich changed several time.

The 2e Van Richten's version is very different from the 5e version, for exemple. And I'm pretty sure it doesn't fit the 3.X or 4e versions either.

[Elderand]

The process to become a Lich changed several time.

The 2e Van Richten's version is very different from the 5e version, for exemple. And I'm pretty sure it doesn't fit the 3.X or 4e versions either.

You can't really say the process as changed when every other version makes it a point to not say what the process is.

[Koo Rehtorb]

This is also true, but I guess the thing I was getting at with previous posts is that there is a reason for D&D Good to try to be the same thing as actually doing right, inasmuch as possible (in this case, both from the in-universe point of view of cosmic forces arrayed behind the banner, and from the out-of-universe point of view of the GM and players trying to maintain verisimilitude). The reason being that if they're generally pretty correlated, people in a D&D universe have reason to allow themselves to be guided by cosmic alignment considerations when their own judgement might be lacking or their information incomplete. But if you move too many ticks in the direction of blue/orange morality, you're going to start to get people judging the cosmos and finding it wanting (both in-universe, and players at the table saying 'yeah, alignment is pretty random isn't it, lets just ignore that').

I don't think it's as bad as all that. I think most of the time "Good" aligns with "morally right", it just isn't a perfect match. And I kind of think that's a feature, not a bug. I sort of like that there exists legitimate reasons for people to pick different alignments. If you can make arguments why being evil is a good thing then that adds a little something over the villains just being cackling moustache twirlers.

Well I think the issue is, interactions between sentient entities aren't arbitrary. Consequences remain the same even if you change the underlying philosophy. So even if you try to embrace it, the fact of the matter is the guy who is nominally a paragon of blue!good may well be a jerk that ruins everything your blue!good character holds dear but does so according to the playbook of the alternate moral system. You're supposed to be on the same side, but the consequence of that pattern of behavior is still real and so either you tend to bias the playable archetypes more towards madmen and extremists of various stripes, excluding the middle ground of people with generally reasonable and stable behavior. Even if the paladin is blue!good and the peasants of the lich king is blue!good and the lich king is orange!evil (but is doing a good job), those peasants really should band together and stop the paladin regardless of whether you're using modern morality or blue/orange alternate morality - anything else is pretty self-destructive of them.

I sort of think the peasants in this example should be grey/neutral. And I sort of like that dynamic where good is potentially fighting for high minded long term moral concerns that the average peasant couldn't give two ****s about. I like the conflict between good and practicality.

I do think it's a bug in the intended system when two people of the same alignment have to fight, as the intended system is just to present people with different jerseys for ease of killing each other. But I don't necessarily think it's a bad thing either if you want to use that simplistic system to get some more interesting nuance.

Something weird has just occured to me. Contrary to what most people seem to say the point of alignment is, getting new roleplayers to roleplay. I think alignment is a tool that should only be used as entertainment for experienced roleplayers to fool around with if they feel like it. Alignment is a terrible system for roleplay. It encourages making shallow characters and then stuffing them in a straightjacket. But I do think it potentially has some value as a system where the point is exploring the weirdness that follows from a setting where alignment is a real actual flawed thing.

[Reboot]

Some Possiblities.

1.

Soldier The demon hordes are coming to despoil our land, and do awful things to our children, and kick our puppies, and talk at the theater. The army has been defeated in the field, we few survivors are not enough to defend the city, or even slow the horde long enough for the people to flee.

Wizard: What can be done, what can I do to save our people?

Scholar: Only someone of impossible arcane might can face the demon general and win, What's worse, all living things near him die immediately, and so that which kills him cannot be alive. There is a ritual, but it is...

Wizard: It is what?

Scholar: It is drastic, some would say wrong.

Wizard: It cannot be more wrong than allowing our children to fall into the clutches of the demon horde. Tell me, what must I do.

Scholar: We shall need... gods forgive us, we shall need a volunteer. She must be a virgin...

I would tend to think that an "unspeakably evil" process would prohibit the use of willing victims.

Situation 2

Evil Necromancer Lich: HA HA HA I SHALL KILL YOU AND REANIMATE YOU INTO A POWERFUL LICH LIKE MYSELF! THEN YOU SHALL BE EEEVIL LIKE ME AND WILLINGLY DESTROY ALL THAT WHICH YOU DEFEND! MUAH HA HA HA HA! I AM SO DELICIOUSLY EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEVIL!

Hero: NOOOOO!

One Dark Ritual Later

Lichified Hero: So I'm a powerfull lich now?

Evil Necromancer Lich: Yes, now use your newfound dark powers to lay waste to that which you formerly loved!

Lichified Hero: As a counterproposal, Chop, punch, stab, maim, ignite, thump, kaboom, impale, zzzap, biff, pow, I'm still intelligent you know, I still have free will. Idiot. Hey, newfound dark powers are great for killing things. Many evil things need killing. I should continue killing evil things, only now be better at it.

"The process of becoming a lich is unspeakably evil and can be undertaken only by a willing character." (emphasis mine)

[Tetsubo 57]

I've had a neutral lich ruling an island kingdom before. He started by just buying up unwanted land. Over a few centuries he ended up with a majority of the island. They place had been an unaffiliated land. Eventually he just took over as the best option to rule fairly and justly. Turned half the island back into wild lands (for his own purposes), most of the rest into a plantation and a single city of the living. He became the breadbasket of a few neighboring kingdoms. Also, very wealthy.

[Max_Killjoy]

I'd ditch alignment entirely. "Good" and "evil" are about intent and action and effect, not about what jersey someone is wearing.

Really wouldn't allow a paladin to serve generic "good", it would have to be a specific deity, and that deity's code. When the deity's code or demands conflicted with what the paladin viewed as good, then the paladin would have a choice. No being is "good by definition", not even a deity, and "good" isn't defined by fiat.

[JNAProductions]

I'd allow a Paladin to serve their own personal moral code, rather than any deity's, regardless of if I'm using alignment.

[Keltest]

I'd allow a Paladin to serve their own personal moral code, rather than any deity's, regardless of if I'm using alignment.

Indeed. While I think a paladin works well as a holy agent, it diminishes them if theyre only serving the cause of good because their god is good, and not because they really are just that righteous.