I have some questions raised in game about torture and torturous death.

What alignment could someone be to bury a Banite alive for the reason that the Banite is a perpetrator of innocent suffering?

What alignment would a person be who would torture a captive?

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I hated hipsters before hating them was cool.

Safe to say (IMHO) that Torture is the realm of the Neutral or Evil alignments, NOT Good.

Unless we rock out the Vigilante prestige class, I'd say that was pretty durn evil. Even for a vigilante.

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We are all here on earth to help others; what on earth the others are here for I don't know.

Oh no, not moar aligmentz stuff!

Firstly, as always, depends on the DM watching. But I personally don't see why some Good characters couldn't do it, with good reason.

The easy answer with these things is always to go "Hoarite", but that's kinda a cop-out of explaining the situation. Now, admittedly, maybe most PC's of good alignment would see that as cruel, but what if the circumstances called for it? Maybe the villain is too hard to kill outright. Maybe he can't be killed outright. If the opportunity presented itself to take this villain, and put him underground, starving him to death and ultimately destroying him, maybe that is the feasible and wise decision.

Now what if it's some random joe blow and he just buries the Banite alive because he just thinks he's a jerk. Not because he was doing something evil, not because there's no other way to kill him, not because he deserves such a punishment, but just because he selfishly feels like making someone else suffer. Now that is evil. But it's the same action. Only a different circumstance.

Some actions are just downright evil, no matter the circumstance. But others seem like that would be not only the good thing to do, but otherwise foolish and negligent not to. Just asking "Would doing this be seen as evil", with a generally frowned upon action, will usually get you a "yes". Which is the dangerous thing about asking those questions. They hardly ever show up IG or even IRL as clear cut and simple.

That's a bit oversimplified. Consider the person who does bury the Banite because the Banite was and will do something evil if let out, if the Banite cannot be killed any other way, if the Banite does indeed deserve the punishment, and yet the person with the shovel still experiences the joy of another's suffering, perhaps even against his/her better judgment.

It really depends on one's deity/reasoning. Alignment-wise, not so much. Main Example: The Inquisition. Pretty sure those guys saw themselves as good.

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Retired

Alignment in FR is objective, not subjective. Certain acts are good and certain acts are evil.

A LOT of evil PC's see themselves as good.

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Araxus Balmor
Gurth Balmor (retired)

torture can easily be justified as good, its a valid method of extracting information in faerun, and unusually slow death like being burried alive?..as long as the one that does the burrying dosnt enjoy it..sure it can be a good thing, punishments are often cruel and unusual in forgotten realms.

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-Ja'acira Arrows'R'Us
-Balorin Wolfhammer- A dwarf so old he remember when the Beer stein was invented
Saisha Jai'diem Knight of bahamut, and abit of a looker

Well, wouldn't it also depends on what they're enjoying about the thing?

Are they saying in their head "Hells yeah, take that you evil bastard. You deserve to rot." Or "Hells yeah, I've done right in the eyes of my god. A pity that guy has to suffer, but I did the good thing, so I'm happy".

If they HAD to do it, then the good thing to do would be to leave a lamp and a decent book or two.

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Alignment action definition has always been a tough call for D&D. Primarily as players and DMs try to rational out what a alignment means in action.
Fortunately, the game has started to lay out general guidelines of what is good and what is evil.

Based on the D&D wiki page for 3.5, the general definition for good and evil can be found http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Alignment

As such;


The qualifiers of Neutrality, Chaos, or Lawfulness tint and set the boundaries of the above, but it does not bestow exceptions to them.

Good, despite chaos, law, and neutrality, still maintains a respect for life, not good life, not evil life, just life. And one could see that as sentient life as life and dignity go hand in hand. On the other hand, torture and murder fall pretty far away from the respect of life and the concern for the dignity of sentient beings. So, as one engages in actions such as torture of another, they move away from the respect for life and concern of the dignity of sentient beings, and thus move towards evil.

So, back to the top question, does burying a person alive show respect for their life and concern for the dignity of their being? And the question of if they're good or evil doesn't matter. It's that they're sentient.
I can see the exception for this may exist if one's Deity code allows for the killing of evil in any manner, way, or shape possible, or if said deity offers absolution to evil acts (which usually requires a general inner desire for redemption of the act and a genuine sense of regret for committing the act). But said code would have to stipulate any way possible instead of just kill/destroy evil.

And I think it's important to keep in the mind that balance, that distance, between good and evil. Because the boarder is a gray fog that good usually get lost in, and slip into evil. Alignment change isn't just a choice, but also a penalty. This is why paladins fall, for example. And alignment is important, not just evil and good and neutrality, but also chaos and law. Sometimes they're choices, but they're also ingrained viewpoints of the world. What is right and what is wrong, what is allowable and what is taboo, not just in the actions of others, but in the action of the self.

And that is about 30 years worth of thoughts on alignment, good, and evil from playing/DMing D&D. And I'll say that's about 4cents.

Whether or not there are more stipulations, details on a character or not-- the second question is definitely a bit more pliable toward the Good side than the first. It depends on how invasive said torture is, really. I'm not one to debate about Gods/individuals/etc. (I mean, I am, just not in this instance because that part is obvious.) But the question fails to elaborate on whether it's mental/physical torture, whether it was begged to be stopped, how purposefully planned it is, etc.

I think this is an interesting point and I hope Janna makes it ICly, too. I've raised this question countless times and never really found an honest debate about it.

Depends entirely on the person/diety/situation in my opinion.

Dogma > alignment.

Only thing that I have to say is that I hope whoevers being buried alive has consented to having their character trapped and possibly dead for an extended period of time.

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I keels u with my axe!

"Do ye know where the Holy-Flamin' Frost-brand Gronk-slayin' Vorpal Hammer o' woundin' an' returnin' an' Shootin'-Lightnin'-out-yer-bum is?"

Or you can just have a friend 'take care of it' for you.

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This.

Alignment is objective, but not completely reduced to objective and external standards. Intention is the most important thing, I believe. Two actions can look similar, but they're never the same action. Therefore there's no reason to assume their alignment value is identical, either. Whatever example you evaluate, you can be sure that there are circumstances and factors you're not aware of and therefore can't be absolutely sure. It's impossible to make general rules, but it's also pointless to talk much about individual cases. It can only lead to metagaming, because OOC knowledge of alignment shouldn't influence your RP in any way. Leave it to the DMs; they'll distribute alignment points if they feel compelled.

Even if there was a formula to calculate this stuff, it shouldn't be known to players. In practice, every DM and player has their own ideas about good and evil, and that can only enrich the game. There has never been, and hopefully never will be, a normative Handbook of Amian Alignment.

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There's an interesting point concerning enjoyment that Yossarin brought up. I think it's pretty commonly accepted that you can only be morally responsible insofar as you have free will. Things done under compulsion or unknowingly (as long as you didn't neglect information you should've known) aren't something you can be praised or condemned for. But you probably can't control your feelings. They are part of the deterministic physical world. From a Kantianist perspective, whether you enjoy cruelty or abhor virtue has little to do with your moral character. It is the choice of the categorical imperative regardless of your base instincts that determines your character.

I'm more neo-Aristotelian and don't quite agree with the above. However, the realization that you're not fully responsible for your emotions is worth remembering.

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For torture, anything but Lawful Good and Neutral Good, Loviatar herself is lawful. :3

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Would Lawful Good, loyal steward disobey the lawful order of his rightful king to torture a prisoner personally for information that might save the realm he is sworn to protect?

There's no right answer, of course. But the fact that both answers may be viable under certain conditions shows the folly of generalization.

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You all put some thought into your answers, and I appreciate that. I wanted a general consensus. This server has, by it's culture, a higher standard of RP than I have seen previously on other servers, and I want very much to keep to that.



It does, however, or else we wouldn't be the ones deciding, at character creation, what kind of person they are going to be. It's a framework for behavior.

I see some possible pathways in my character's development that might arise due to some rp, and inflicting torture/torturous death (not necessarily living burial) might occur.

I think I get the point that, although alignment, to us, is a framework, we shouldn't let it be a chain for our RP.

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I hated hipsters before hating them was cool.

The relevant theoretical framework here is cause and effect. I think you have the causality backwards, or at least you suppose a reciprocal effect between alignment and behaviour. But I think the only way to interpret alignment sensibly is as a pure effect. It is not any kind of a cause at all.

In simple terms: does the label "Good" cause you externally to do good things, or are you labelled "Good" because you do good things? Does your alignment cause you behave in a certain way, or does your behaviour determine your alignment? I daresay the latter answer is obvious. Your character behaves how she does because of her personality and context, nature and nurture. You choose an alignment to describe your character, not to guide her behavior. (Alignment is not to be confused with the sum of her personality, which admittedly includes more than actions. Alignment is an attempt to describe that personality.)

I get your point about a framework: it may be easier to remember what kind of a person your character is by looking at her alignment. But it should be nothing but a quick reminder. When you wonder what your character would do, it goes deeper than alignment. You try to understand her motives, beliefs, impulses and circumstances. Always ask what your character as a person would do, never what a generic alignment would do. It might turn out that a character you previously labelled Lawful Good will choose to do something objectively vile. But that's no problem: you just adjust the alignment description as necessary and move on.

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You dirty spammer Iron.

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I keels u with my axe!

"Do ye know where the Holy-Flamin' Frost-brand Gronk-slayin' Vorpal Hammer o' woundin' an' returnin' an' Shootin'-Lightnin'-out-yer-bum is?"

Torturing is innately evil. It purposefully causes suffering. Were I in the DM hat, there would be no 'neutrality' to it from my point of view. A 'symbolic' 1 point shift closer to evil would get the point across to the Player. There are no equivocations; torture is not a good thing. This does not mean it cannot lead to a favorable outcome for good folks or to help. It is a dangerous path to walk down and part of being good is taking the harder more difficult road; especially when things are at their worst, because that is the right thing to do.

How far of a shift towards evil for it?... that is where it gets complicated. It depends a lot on the character's feelings about what they are doing, such as guilt, or glee and the reasons they are doing it. However, that kind of judgment requires a level of knowledge about certain PC's innermost mind or character which must come from getting inside their brain. Such is a complicated method, if not impossible method to utilize; specifically when they are not your creations.

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Dwagin [Duh-wa-GIN] N. - 1a. Small and cute thingum, particularly fond of four legged scaled creatures of the metalic and chromatic varieties.

-Extraordinarily ordinary in the mostest of ways.

I agree with this post, for the most part, though I disagree that anything is "innately" evil, for inevitable logical reasons; I'd say that all documented instances of torture feature an element of evil, so we can reasonably expect that in the future. Either way, it's worth keeping in mind that though the torturing action itself might be evil, there needn't be any alignment shift towards evil if the whole of the event (the intentions, the outcome, the context) was largely good. On the most basic level it's simple arithmetic, calculating the sum of Good, Evil, Lawful and Chaotic points. Let's take the classic example of casting an evil spell (say, Animate Dead) to save the town. You might get 5 Evil points from the spell but 8 Good points from saving the town, so the sum of the event would be +3 Good points.

It really depends on how closely we look at actions. It's completely arbitrary. Our perspective can range from the person's whole life (or even that of his offspring, like Aristotle points out) to a single second, so you need to evaluate critically what's a relevant perspective to take.

You're right about the complexity of the issue. That's why as a DM, I'd either refrain from touching alignment in the first place or treat it lightly and without consequence, but if I really had to change it dynamically with meaningful implications I'd evaluate things one day or adventure at a time. It's really pointless to start calculating individual actions on the fly. As a PW DM, I didn't consider PC alignment any of my business unless it was inevitable in the case of special requests and such, exaclty because I wouldn't know enough (and I wanted to respect individual players' own interpretations). That's not to say I wouldn't bring up difficult moral questions to consider, I'd simply refrain from passing final judgement. That rarely does any good.

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Naturally, I am witness to the actions of your PCs, both public and private. What you may not realize (some of you do, actually) is that I analyze your roleplay, your writing, your acting, the text that appears above your character's head and the actions and directions you move that character in (literally and figuratively) in the context of the alignment you have on your character sheet.

9.8 times out of 10, what all of you do matches your alignment. Not always perfectly, but even without your input I can often find some kind of justification for your action based upon what you said, how you said, what I've seen you say before, what I've seen you do before, what I anticipate you may be doing, or whether it fits the litmus test of any of the manifold interpretations of the alignment you chose.

Therefore, is is extremely rare that I ever have cause to fiddle with alignment. I've done only maybe once or twice this entire year, unprovoked.

Intent matters a lot to me where your alignment is concerned, however. And 762 is right that details of alignment are, as a matter of course, objective rather than subjective. Otherwise a sociopath would never be evil because when he does evil (rape, murder, cannibalization, predation, terrorization) he is not reveling in any evil, just in an activity that is devoid of moral consequence.