Adept vs monk: the final nail in the coffin

[Bozwevial]

A warlock can make a pact with a demon for power and start tossing around hellfire itself without any alignment repercussions, but if an adept casts Deathwatch one too many times, he goes off the deep end.

This is what happens when you think of alignments as a straitjacket rather than a guideline or a suggestion, but that's just a personal distaste for the way the system handles it.

[Sir Giacomo]

Situation 3 is easily done, create a wight, make it kill a chicken, make all the farmer joes bring in their animals for being turned into wights, then use an army of wights to kill the orcs.

Situation 2, send in some of your minions under you command. Make them research how to find the leader while you are staying safe outside the city, once your minions have found the leader. You can arrange for a meeting, you just need one meeting, and the rest can be done through the sending spell. Alternatively, you could go about this invisible.

Situation 3, well both adepts already handles this better than both monk builds.

Situation 2: I do not think that this will work. What kind of minions are these? The commoner minions that were talked about in this thread probably do not have the abilities to succeed. More importantly, though, it takes a mere sense motive DC 15 for the slaves and their resistance leader to notice that it is a dominated minion. This does not exactly gain their trust.

Situation 3: I do not think that this will work, either. How will the adept create the wight in the first place? And then, wights can only spawn humanoids - no chicken army here, I'm afraid. Finally, the army of orcs can be expected to have clerics with them. They could rebuke or turn the fairly low-level wights.

But keep the ideas coming!

- Giacomo

[Bozwevial]

Situation 3: I do not think that this will work, either. How will the adept create the wight in the first place? And then, wights can only spawn humanoids - no chicken army here, I'm afraid. Finally, the army of orcs can be expected to have clerics with them. They could rebuke or turn the fairly low-level wights.

Creatures killed by negative levels may possibly turn into the creature that killed them, assuming that creature has that ability. If not, they turn into a wight. So instead you'd have to ambush a small group of orcs, taking one or two out with a negative level. The next night, come back with Command Undead, take control of the wight, and lead it to ambush more orcs.

[Bauglir]

I think the best part about this thread is that we only have one more page before the lock.

[Shiki]

I think the best part about this thread is that we only have one more page before the lock.

Cheers!

[BeholderSlayer]

I think the best part about this thread is that we only have one more page before the lock.

There is no way a person could agree more with something than I am agreeing with this right now.

[Lycanthromancer]

I think the best part about this thread is that we only have one more page before the lock.

There is no way a person could agree more with something than I am agreeing with this right now.

The fun part is when Giacomo or some other thrice-bedamned fool starts up a new one.

[Halinn]

And the explicit statement that it inevitably happens. We don't know how long it takes, which is a bit of a stumbling block, but it seems pretty safe to say that a character who regularly makes use of Animate Dead qualifies. The only exception is if you're deliberately defining things to reach the conclusion you want, in which case I'm pretty sure dying means you are restored to full hit points and gain a +20 bonus on all d20 rolls.

"But mr. Strawman, won't it seem silly when I am only arguing points that I made up?"
"Of course it won't, because that means you are winning the argument, and people who win arguments never seem silly."
"But what if I'm not winning arguments that the other posters are engaging me in?"
"There's a simple solution to that problem. Just claim that you have won and ignore all posts that say you haven't."

[ninjarabbit]

I think the best part about this thread is that we only have one more page before the lock.

And I'm proud of that

[awaken DM golem]

hmm ... so [evil] starts an approximation toward an alignment change to Evil.

But there isn't a table or other hard fast rules.
A weeks worth of game time, isn't a really good time measure; like at all.

Fireball isn't evil.
Fireball + a corrupt tag = evil
Shriveling is evil.
etc

1 evil spell per combat, isn't going to be evil for one week of game time, for quite a while.

 

[weenog]

I think the best part about this thread is that we only have one more page before the lock.

To be honest, I'm kind of impressed with the troll.  The troll is obvious, no one could be this persistently ignorant, and yet he manages to be just interesting enough to keep folks engaged for 50 pages.  He's good at this.

[Sobolev]

I think the best part about this thread is that we only have one more page before the lock.

To be honest, I'm kind of impressed with the troll.  The troll is obvious, no one could be this persistently ignorant, and yet he manages to be just interesting enough to keep folks engaged for 50 pages.  He's good at this.

I actually keep at this so that other, non-Trolls, can read the thread and possibly find some good information.  It's not really even for him now, he's just a hypothetical person who has no clue what he's talking about.

[Mixster]

I think the best part about this thread is that we only have one more page before the lock.

To be honest, I'm kind of impressed with the troll.  The troll is obvious, no one could be this persistently ignorant, and yet he manages to be just interesting enough to keep folks engaged for 50 pages.  He's good at this.

Remarkably good. I'm falling for it over and over.

Situation 2: Huh? Well I'm just sending my minions in there for the rebel leaders, I don't need them to trust my low level minions, I need them to trust me. And honestly, why wouldn't they? I would be ready to meet them anywhere, with my minions long away from me if they wanted to, and then I could tell them that I am here to help them against the Tyrant, and I bring with me an army of undead that I will depart with when they are done fighting. Then I also tell him that I will attempt to aid them through use of a sending spell. If they want me to grab a few of the tyrants guys hostage to prove that I'm loyal to the resistance, I could easily do that, and send them down there dominated.

Situation 3: From the SRD:
Level Loss:

A character with negative levels at least equal to her current level, or drained below 1st level, is instantly slain. Depending on the creature that killed her, she may rise the next night as a monster of that kind. If not, she rises as a wight.

Under Wight:

Create Spawn (Su)

Any humanoid slain by a wight becomes a wight in 1d4 rounds. Spawn are under the command of the wight that created them and remain enslaved until its death. They do not possess any of the abilities they had in life.

So a Wight that slays humanoids with regular damage or level loss makes that humanoid into a wight in 1d4 rounds. But:

A wight that slays a non-humanoid through only level loss (such as instructing it to hit the chicken with Subdual damage would do), will raise it the next day as the wight as per the ruling from level loss.

So yeah, we just need one negative level to fire this off, and we will have loads of wights in a weeks time, so many wights that the orcrish army wont be able to rebuke the lot of them.

EDIT: If you need a way to get a wight, Ebberron adepts can add hunger domain (from libris mortis) and get enervation.

[Bauglir]

And the explicit statement that it inevitably happens. We don't know how long it takes, which is a bit of a stumbling block, but it seems pretty safe to say that a character who regularly makes use of Animate Dead qualifies. The only exception is if you're deliberately defining things to reach the conclusion you want, in which case I'm pretty sure dying means you are restored to full hit points and gain a +20 bonus on all d20 rolls.

"But mr. Strawman, won't it seem silly when I am only arguing points that I made up?"
"Of course it won't, because that means you are winning the argument, and people who win arguments never seem silly."
"But what if I'm not winning arguments that the other posters are engaging me in?"
"There's a simple solution to that problem. Just claim that you have won and ignore all posts that say you haven't."

What does this have to do with the quoted post? I've not claimed victory at all, and the point there was to illustrate that the rules failing to be specific doesn't mean they can safely be ignored.

I'm on the Adept's side here, you have to understand, but I'm even more on the side of intellectual honesty. We don't need to bend the rules or interpret them creatively here, guys. It's a spellcaster versus the monk. If our argument really hinges on "Well, the rules don't say when I become evil", we are fucking failing. And if it doesn't, just concede it and move on, and crush the monk with better, sounder arguments.

[PhaedrusXY]

I'm on the Adept's side here, you have to understand, but I'm even more on the side of intellectual honesty. We don't need to bend the rules or interpret them creatively here, guys. It's a spellcaster versus the monk. If our argument really hinges on "Well, the rules don't say when I become evil", we are fucking failing. And if it doesn't, just concede it and move on, and crush the monk with better, sounder arguments.

Who said the adept can't be evil, anyway?... How did we get on this tangent? 

[X-Codes]

And the explicit statement that it inevitably happens. We don't know how long it takes, which is a bit of a stumbling block, but it seems pretty safe to say that a character who regularly makes use of Animate Dead qualifies. The only exception is if you're deliberately defining things to reach the conclusion you want, in which case I'm pretty sure dying means you are restored to full hit points and gain a +20 bonus on all d20 rolls.

My character will eventually become evil just like he will eventually finish that Ghost Savage Progression.  Promise.

[Bauglir]

The rules don't say you have to finish the savage progression we're talking about, IIRC. And if they do, then you can't stop taking levels in it. I don't see the relevance. You're right, there's a gray area; it's impossible to say at what point, precisely, a character crosses the line. It is easily said, though, that a character that regularly performs evil acts has crossed that line when they start performing Evil acts on a regular basis. I don't see what other definition you could reasonably use, especially since the text for alignment make pretty clear that small amounts of Evil trump any amount of Good in determining a character's overall alignment (you can feed and clothe all the orphans you like, but if you sacrifice just one elderly couple to a demon for Real Ultimate Power everyone throws a fit).

Hell, I'd say a character that tries to game the alignment system to gain maximum power (committing Evil acts in the process) becomes evil, because morality actually has a lot of catch-22s like that.

And we know that an Adept that regularly casts [Evil] spells is regularly performing evil acts, because the rules say that.

EDIT: Changed wording slightly to be less of an ass.

[X-Codes]

Where does it say that one evil act outweighs X good acts?  The "rules" for alignment are spread out over at least a half-dozen different books (probably more if we include Campaign books).  What's more, how evil is evil?  If one Adept creates a giant zombie that then accompanies him for a year, while another Adept replaces a number of lesser zombies over the course of the same year, is the latter more evil than the former?  Also, what if a character simultaneously undertakes both good and evil actions?  Hell, it's not impossible to cast a spell with both descriptors.

The problem with the idea that Good characters can't cast Evil spells is that there's no quantifiable goodness or evilness in given actions.  AFAIK there's not even a line described in any of the books as to whether a given character changes to become good or evil dependent on their actions.  Sure, a character that regularly commits evil acts is probably evil but it's not because there's some rule mandating that his alignment has to be evil.

[JaronK]

Hell, I'd say a character that tries to game the alignment system to gain maximum power (committing Evil acts in the process) becomes evil, because morality actually has a lot of catch-22s like that.

And we know that an Adept that regularly casts [Evil] spells is regularly performing evil acts, because the rules say that.

And an adept that regularly tries to gain maximum power for the purpose of defeating the ultimate evil and thus saving the world, even if that involves evil acts... is he evil?  He just defeated the ultimate evil and saved the world, caring more about that than his personal afterlife.  Is he not far more good than the do gooder who maintains good status by avoiding all evil, even to the point of allowing the world to be damned because he wasn't willing to take the necessary sacrifices to save it?

After all, the purpose in gaining power in D&D for PCs is regularly to save the world.  In this case, I'd say the ends do indeed justify the means.

JaronK

[Saxony]

Nope. He's less evil than the ultimate evil, but that doesn't make him good.

That particular justification doesn't work. Is it needed? Eh, probably not.