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I've always found the best way to get PCs to do 'evil' is to studiously not judge anything they do out of character, let them do whatever they want, and give them reasons to seek power. I see it mostly in Ars Magica - while, sure, your average PC will violently resist advice from a demon, they'll be happy to gently caress some guy over just because he's annoying.
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Nov 7, 2016 19:18
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Yeah, exactly. It's often easier to draw PCs into doing dangerous/harmful stuff if you don't flag it as "THIS IS EVIL." Or if they feel like they're the ones in control, rather than being tricked or deceived.
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Nov 7, 2016 20:01
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The best way to make an evil campaign is to gleefully steal from Nippon Ichi. Sure, the evil PCs will try to backstab each other, but they're too moronic to be succesful. echopapa posted:I yearn for the day that this principle is extended to other classes and we get Anti-Barbarians who spend their days arranging flowers and drinking tea. The Anti-Barbarian enters a zen state that gives him Sherlock-tier intelligence. The Anti-Fighter is a Solar Exalted. The Anti-Druid is an aggresively hegemonizing ursine swarm that can voltron into a bearded human. Doresh fucked around with this message at 20:35 on Nov 7, 2016 |
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Nov 7, 2016 20:32
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Kavak posted:What's an Anti-Cleric, Dick Dorkins? Better yet, what's an Anti-Bard?
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Nov 7, 2016 20:45
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Kavak posted:What's an Anti-Cleric, Dick Dorkins? Someone who disbelieves in the gods so hard that they nullify all divine magic around them?
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Nov 7, 2016 21:24
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The Sin of Onan posted:Someone who disbelieves in the gods so hard that they nullify all divine magic around them? The Athar were cool.
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Nov 7, 2016 21:24
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13th Age has a Black Guard faction leader who turns demon pits into super jails and destroys churchs because they don't worship the evil gods so that's cool. edit: the anti-monk is just your average goon Ominous Jazz fucked around with this message at 21:31 on Nov 7, 2016 |
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Nov 7, 2016 21:26
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The anti-wizard is someone who is fun to be around.
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Nov 7, 2016 21:34
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The Sin of Onan posted:Someone who disbelieves in the gods so hard that they nullify all divine magic around them? I always did want to play an Ur-Priest. The fact that militant atheism is mechanically broken enough to show up in at least 1 in 4 min/max builds doesn't hurt, of course. Thanks, Monte Cook!
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Nov 7, 2016 21:53
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senrath posted:I'll admit I haven't read or played through it, but the bits I've heard from others who have played through it indicated a good portion of Way of the Wicked is "Do EEEEEEVIL things because you're EEEEEEVIL and that's what EEEEEEVIL people do for no other reason than to do EEEEEEVIL." What's your opinion on that? I converted Way of the Wicked to 13th Age and ran it about halfway over on roll20; unfortunately, my group got hit by a bunch of dropouts and I wasn't able to finish. I do think it's a quite good AP, especially when you slice away the inevitable padding. I never had any problems with my players going Chaotic Stupid Evil. WOTW is pretty clear-eyed about the problems that all too often sink evil campaigns, and it's good at putting the PCs in situations where they have clear goals to focus on, instead of just letting them roam the countryside burning and looting.
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Nov 7, 2016 21:57
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Mors Rattus posted:The Athar were cool. I'm sufficiently unfamiliar with Planescape to have to look up what "Athar" means, and a) lol at calling those factions "based in philosophy," and b) whose bright idea was it to put the Randroid faction in charge of Sigil's tax collection? Alien Rope Burn posted:I always did want to play an Ur-Priest. The fact that militant atheism is mechanically broken enough to show up in at least 1 in 4 min/max builds doesn't hurt, of course. Thanks, Monte Cook! Those guys I do remember. Mostly I remember being annoyed by the "always evil" thing, because half the D&D gods are huge loving arseholes (especially the Forgotten Realms ones; the Wall of the Faithless always made my hackles rise) and siphoning their power always seemed like a pretty sensible idea to me (and also a good character concept).
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Nov 7, 2016 22:11
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The Sin of Onan posted:Those guys I do remember. Mostly I remember being annoyed by the "always evil" thing, because half the D&D gods are huge loving arseholes (especially the Forgotten Realms ones; the Wall of the Faithless always made my hackles rise) and siphoning their power always seemed like a pretty sensible idea to me (and also a good character concept). You'd love Mask of the Betrayer then, unfortunately there's not an option to tear the whole thing down because AO is both A) All Powerful and B) A loving idiot.
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Nov 7, 2016 22:30
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From what I remember, not being able to destroy the wall was one of the few times lore guys stepped in from Wizards to say 'no, you can't do that' as Obsidian originally planned for a 'destroy the wall' ending. (Then Wizards ditched it for 4E and I hope it stays gone in 5th. Did it?)
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Nov 7, 2016 22:32
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Kurieg posted:You'd love Mask of the Betrayer then, unfortunately there's not an option to tear the whole thing down because AO is both A) All Powerful and B) A loving idiot. And according to the ending of the Avatars novels, AO has an even bigger divine boss. So he's some kind of horrible middle management omnipotence, spread too thinly over who knows how many worlds, with subordinate gods playing Clerks and Office Space because they know he's distracted.
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Nov 7, 2016 22:39
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unseenlibrarian posted:From what I remember, not being able to destroy the wall was one of the few times lore guys stepped in from Wizards to say 'no, you can't do that' as Obsidian originally planned for a 'destroy the wall' ending. I've always heard it was either that was what happened, or Obsidian wrote the endings assuming Wizards would never have been okay with it and it turns out they'd have been down. Either/or.
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Nov 7, 2016 22:38
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Bieeardo posted:And according to the ending of the Avatars novels, AO has an even bigger divine boss. So he's some kind of horrible middle management omnipotence, spread too thinly over who knows how many worlds, with subordinate gods playing Clerks and Office Space because they know he's distracted. I just hate how the solution to "Gods need followers to live" wasn't "Force gods to actually do their followers solids to keep their worship up" and instead "Force people to follow gods and/or willingly drat themselves to avoid an even worse fate."
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Nov 7, 2016 22:49
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Kurieg posted:You'd love Mask of the Betrayer then, unfortunately there's not an option to tear the whole thing down because AO is both A) All Powerful and B) A loving idiot. Daeren posted:I've always heard it was either that was what happened, or Obsidian wrote the endings assuming Wizards would never have been okay with it and it turns out they'd have been down. Either/or. An injustice I plan to let my players correct some day.
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Nov 7, 2016 22:51
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The wall loving pisses me off, and it ruined what would've been a good concept: having an actual good God of Death having to clean up after the evil chucklefucks that had the position before him, but nope: Gotta have that wall, and Kelemovr ends up becoming Neutral.
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Nov 7, 2016 23:00
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Kurieg posted:I just hate how the solution to "Gods need followers to live" wasn't "Force gods to actually do their followers solids to keep their worship up" and instead "Force people to follow gods and/or willingly drat themselves to avoid an even worse fate." The Wall was the most grotesque, thoughtless, rear end in a top hat-DM answer to atheism in gaming. I've seen some serious grot ooze out of Realms material, and it remains one of the worst examples for me.
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Nov 7, 2016 23:04
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What really pisses me off is that the Wall wasn't like some fundamental part of the universe. It was made by Myrkul, an absurdly evil and relatively young god of death. In fact the original evil lord of the dead, Nergal, didn't even do something like that. But then Ao decided "oh that is an excellent idea, ultimate evil dude". Though it would be an interesting campaign idea to play as followers of Nergal and Kelemor trying to overthrow the divine order. Find one of those god killing elder evils and use it to kill Ao and the other gods who condone the Wall.
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Nov 7, 2016 23:08
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The Sin of Onan posted:I'm sufficiently unfamiliar with Planescape to have to look up what "Athar" means, and a) lol at calling those factions "based in philosophy," and b) whose bright idea was it to put the Randroid faction in charge of Sigil's tax collection?
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Nov 7, 2016 23:14
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Myrkul was just a tremendous dick -- he put the wall up in the old days, before gods needed worshipers. When Kelemvor tried to go easy on the faithless, literally all the other gods dragged him to god court over it.
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Nov 7, 2016 23:19
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This is a plot point in Mask, even, when you go talk to Myrkul's corpse and he's laughing it up in the Astral that the biggest dick move he ever pulled is defended by angels and gods in Mount Celestia (the plane of Law and Good) because it benefits them for it to be status quo, and thus Lawful.
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Nov 7, 2016 23:25
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Just as KOTOR 2 was a very cynical look at the Star Wars universe, MOTB was taking the Realm's worst setting feature and asking "Seriously what the gently caress?!"
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Nov 7, 2016 23:39
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Daeren posted:I've always heard it was either that was what happened, or Obsidian wrote the endings assuming Wizards would never have been okay with it and it turns out they'd have been down. Either/or. The writers for Mask of the Betrayer didn't bother asking if it was okay since they assumed it wasn't.
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Nov 7, 2016 23:39
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And then you can either eat him or unbind his spirit, thus denying him his ultimate revenge.
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Nov 7, 2016 23:40
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Daeren posted:This is a plot point in Mask, even, when you go talk to Myrkul's corpse and he's laughing it up in the Astral that the biggest dick move he ever pulled is defended by angels and gods in Mount Celestia (the plane of Law and Good) because it benefits them for it to be status quo, and thus Lawful. It's like the story in the Fiendish Codex or whatever it was called, the book on Devils, where all the Good Gods were willing to sign on on the horrible torture damnation stuff Asmodeous was pushing in order to 'keep law', but demanded he take it somewhere they couldn't see it and ended up giving him free reign to create Hell. Good going, you hypocritical jackass parasites.
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Nov 7, 2016 23:46
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It really illuminates the problem with D&D alignment-based outsiders. At least a human in the game with a Good alignment is that way because of his actions and if he acts badly enough it can shift to reflect that. Outsiders like gods or angels or whatever are just objectively Good because That's What They Are and it often seems to have very little to do with how they actually act.
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Nov 7, 2016 23:49
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Night10194 posted:It's like the story in the Fiendish Codex or whatever it was called, the book on Devils, where all the Good Gods were willing to sign on on the horrible torture damnation stuff Asmodeous was pushing in order to 'keep law', but demanded he take it somewhere they couldn't see it and ended up giving him free reign to create Hell.
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Nov 7, 2016 23:50
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ZeroCount posted:It really illuminates the problem with D&D alignment-based outsiders. At least a human in the game with a Good alignment is that way because of his actions and if he acts badly enough it can shift to reflect that. Outsiders like gods or angels or whatever are just objectively Good because That's What They Are and it often seems to have very little to do with how they actually act. I tell you it's been a lot of fun to throw D&D Angels at a Christian, Jewish, and Muslim party and see them react to them like demons, though. Or try to convert or argue theology with them.
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Nov 7, 2016 23:52
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True story, my paladin once used diplomacy to convince an angel that their actions were wrong and creating more harm than good even with the strictest adherence to the law. When the DM asked me to eludicate precisely how I worded this argument my response was "Backhand them with my gauntlet and point at the nearest corpse while glowering."
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Nov 7, 2016 23:56
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Kurieg posted:And then you can either eat him or unbind his spirit, thus denying him his ultimate revenge. That little [devour soul] dialogue option is about the only thing I liked about MotB.
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Nov 7, 2016 23:57
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Kurieg posted:True story, my paladin once used diplomacy to convince an angel that their actions were wrong and creating more harm than good even with the strictest adherence to the law. "Yo dog you're murdering a whole lotta people and this is basically the worst crime there is." is something D&D characters are surprisingly resistant to.
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Nov 8, 2016 00:00
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Night10194 posted:"Yo dog you're murdering a whole lotta people and this is basically the worst crime there is." is something D&D characters are surprisingly resistant to. in D&D murdering people is often a moral good
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Nov 8, 2016 00:03
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ZeroCount posted:in D&D murdering people is often a moral good I know, this is why I referred to a Paladin as a heavily armed psychopath with a religiously tuned targeting system from their God (hi Detect Evil). From one point of view they literally have a voice in their heads telling them who it's okay to kill. E: This is a deliberately uncharitable view, I'm just used to using it because, well, D&D IS the villain in the one game I run that has D&D stuff.
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Nov 8, 2016 00:04
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Night10194 posted:It's like the story in the Fiendish Codex or whatever it was called, the book on Devils, where all the Good Gods were willing to sign on on the horrible torture damnation stuff Asmodeous was pushing in order to 'keep law', but demanded he take it somewhere they couldn't see it and ended up giving him free reign to create Hell. That's a bit of a disingenuous take on that story. The gods saw that mortals kept finding ways to let demons into the Prime and Asmodeus offered a solution which the gods agreed to without really thinking about it or inquiring as to what the solution meant. When they figured out about Hell they then tried to get the whole thing stopped and Asmodeus was just like "someone didn't read the EULA before clicking accept, not my problem".
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Nov 8, 2016 00:14
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ZeroCount posted:It really illuminates the problem with D&D alignment-based outsiders. At least a human in the game with a Good alignment is that way because of his actions and if he acts badly enough it can shift to reflect that. Outsiders like gods or angels or whatever are just objectively Good because That's What They Are and it often seems to have very little to do with how they actually act. At least in 3.5 outsiders can shift alignments based on their actions, it's just that it pretty much doesn't come up and most people forgot it was a thing.
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Nov 8, 2016 00:14
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Kurieg posted:I just hate how the solution to "Gods need followers to live" wasn't "Force gods to actually do their followers solids to keep their worship up" and instead "Force people to follow gods and/or willingly drat themselves to avoid an even worse fate." IIRC, divine strength wasn't directly proportional to the number of worshippers until Myrkul and Bane pissed off Ao and started the Time of Troubles. Essentially Ao just did it because everyone had pissed him off.
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Nov 8, 2016 00:15
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Nessus posted:For A. I get the feeling the 'philosophical knife fights' were basically alignment warring but I never "got" Planescape anyway, I guess. As for B., middle class white American game designers, I reckon; I also imagine this is why the gods keep being so loving brutal. A situation where God is good and organized religion is a force for positivity does not gel well with the zeitgeist The thing about Planescape is that the factions don't map directly to alignments. For instance, the Harmonium is just generally Lawful, it covers everything from Lawful Good progressives wanting a functioning police system, through Lawful Neutral obsessives with legal minutiae and through Lawful Evil fascists who want to purge all the elves because they're scum. Anarchists can be Anarchists for any reason. Because they love seeing corpses, because they want to benefit from the chaos, because they want to upset the current order because they feel it's stifling, or maybe because they feel the existing Factions are doing more harm than good. Generally any given faction will map to either Lawful or Chaotic, that's it. Some don't even map to that, you've got the Bleak Cabal, which is everything from depressive mopers so far removed from giving a poo poo about anything that they might as well not have an alignment, through nihilistic ubermensch who've embraced the lack of universal meaning to carve out their own purpose. The Dustmen? How do you map "the universe is false, a pointless illusion, until you embrace true death, you'll never break free from it." Its total relinquishing of the physical universe and its passions and purposes, just doesn't map to Good or Evil, Law or Chaos. In fact, having an alignment would probably bar you from True Death since having an alignment would mean you CARE about something. ZeroCount posted:It really illuminates the problem with D&D alignment-based outsiders. At least a human in the game with a Good alignment is that way because of his actions and if he acts badly enough it can shift to reflect that. Outsiders like gods or angels or whatever are just objectively Good because That's What They Are and it often seems to have very little to do with how they actually act. Outsiders CAN change alignment. Angels can fall, demons can rise. And alignment has more to do with self-perception than any actions being objectively good or evil, at least in Planescape.
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Nov 8, 2016 00:17
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I'd be pissed too if I was the over God of the poo poo show that is the Realms. Gouge out my own omniscience so I didn't have watch Elminster loving a bear.
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Nov 8, 2016 00:18
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