Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

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Anomandaris
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Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Anomandaris » Sun Jun 04, 2023 11:31 pm

This may be a kick of the proverbial hornets nest but seemed to be worth a discussion.

The issue I see is a very selective IC response to use of either evil or “dubious” Magics to the point or absurdity. To start with a disclaimer, I have played an epic necromancer, I understand that necromancy is not inherently evil, and that there are “evil spell tags.” And I think it’s fantastic that it appears these days, the use of a given spell/ability is not being metagamed to determine alignment. That said, there’s some patently absurd stuff happening especially around the hemo.

Take a pvp tourny in a surface settlement for example. Say the victor of said tournament dumpsters the opposition with a mostly hemomancy and necromancy toolkit. And this is not a open minded mage using the odd necro spell, it’s obviously an extremely invested necromancer/bloodmage unleashing everything they have.

PCs are throwing really nasty magic around in its most potent and practiced forms (including vampiric feast), all in front of paladins and other good aligned PCs. Yet no one even bats an eyelash or says a thing. Now I get it, we all want to use the useful spells that actually work in PVP and not really worry about tedious IC implications, but it’s pretty out of control and immersion breaking.

That doesn’t mean we should all shout “evil necromancer, kill them” or meta them, but if someone is throwing around epic necromancy spells and is a public figure in a settlement occupied and run in part by good aligned PCs, that should create some issues/cause for concern. They are an EPIC NECROMANCER at even a casual glance, but no one even treats it as such. That means we don’t actually have to think about using these things IC, and it waters down the setting.

Seriously, try to imagine you’re in the bleachers as some paladin watching a tourney. A well known noble and member of the state government rolls up and proceeds to use the most horrific magic you’ve seen used on another member of society in law abiding territory, bleeding themselves dry to unleash high circle death magic and other gruesome spells. That would be SCANDALOUS unless it happened in Thay or another region like it. 10/10 times there’s gonna be a meeting after between some very concerned paladins discussing necromancers infiltrating the government, let alone suspicion cast on the entire family. Too much of your neighborhood friendly hemomancer trope going on.

Can we try to navigate back to a server culture where we don’t just ignore blatantly ridiculous alignment implicated things because it’s inconvenient, we’re OOC friends with someone or we want to use powerful new cookies? I acknowledge this may be a bit of a rehash of the old “enforce paladin alignment” discussion but a different flavor.

Do others see this as a persistent and impactful issue?


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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Morgy » Sun Jun 04, 2023 11:53 pm

I don't disagree. I noticed a much softer/disinterested trend towards dark magics when the ruling was made by King Ed of Cordor that Warlocks are now allowed to openly reside inside the city - yes, I know you can RP disdain and dislike for them still, but ultimately a paladin isn't going to just sit on his hands forever about it when players cannot change the law, and the justice system of Cordor is now expected to extend laws to protect the pacted.

That whole shift made things quite confusing for those involved in writing/enforcing Cordorian law, in how far perscution of particular magic-styles or pacts we can go IC, before an OOC ruling is enforced.


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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Hadals » Mon Jun 05, 2023 12:50 am

I don't see it as much an issue, but suppose the most obvious answer is "talk to the people in charge of the laws and/or handle it IC." Though you're always going to cherry-pick which individual spells you deem negative, unless you also look the same way upon anyone who casts a Greater Restoration or a Chill Touch.

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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Bazelgeuse » Mon Jun 05, 2023 1:23 am

Anomandaris wrote:
Sun Jun 04, 2023 11:31 pm

A well known noble and member of the state government rolls up and proceeds to use the most horrific magic you’ve seen

Sorry, I'll stop turning myself into a chicken


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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Choofed » Mon Jun 05, 2023 1:28 am

I'd totally agree with you.

But we've had the Admins/King explicitly unban warlocks and the likes when Cordor did do that. So now the bar is just 'Don't animate or use magic sourced from a super nasty extraplanar entity that isn't divine'.

So the DM's have clearly said "Morally ambigous magic is fine in Cordor. Please don't stomp on the hard working devs stuff."

PCs are throwing really nasty magic around in its most potent and practiced forms (including vampiric feast), all in front of paladins and other good aligned PCs. Yet no one even bats an eyelash or says a thing. Now I get it, we all want to use the useful spells that actually work in PVP and not really worry about tedious IC implications, but it’s pretty out of control and immersion breaking.

Sadly most of the meta sits in the evil park at the moment because most of the development work has been happening in evil/morally ambigous, and thus the power creep is happening there too. Consequentially people's reactions to the necessary evils to remain remotely relevant are necessary.

If you want this fixed, advocate for good magics and some good subclasses/classes to be released, reworked, or creeped up in power.


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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Babylon System is the Vampire » Mon Jun 05, 2023 2:01 am

Anomandaris wrote:
Sun Jun 04, 2023 11:31 pm

Do others see this as a persistent and impactful issue?

In short, yes, but it's not a new thing. It's at least as old as since I started playing here six years ago, and likely much older. "Setting Integrity" just doesn't seem to be a priority to anyone save the few folks brave enough to point out when it gets really wonky, and while this is not the only place where the illusion of said integrity starts to crumble, ooc connections seem to trump logical IC choices time after time. It's not everyone, and for those it is it's at least somewhat understandable. Folks are here to have fun, and they want to play with the folks they have fun with. But it does take likely the most important bit of roleplay out of what is supposed to be a roleplay server, the fact that you are playing a character and not an avatar of yourself.

And just as a disclaimer, lest someone thinks (again) I am attacking them personally; I wasn't at the tournament, I don't know who the hemomancer in question is or even who the chancellor in Cordor is currently, and the situation could have 100% legit ic logic behind it that I know nothing about.

This is just something about the server that I would 100% love to see start shifting in the other direction, even if I have kind of given up on hope that it ever will.


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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by MintoCloudpaw » Mon Jun 05, 2023 3:37 am

As someone who ICly fights against people using -slaadi- summons (as well as animations, fiends, unseelie), because it is morally wrong, I can understand where you're coming from. However, as others have said, King Ed A-Okayed much of the worst people and we can't OOCly or ICly go against King Ed, it's hard for anyone to charge them with a crime for it.

That said, is it really worse to use necromancy to stop someones heart over setting them on fire for 5 minutes? There are a lot of spells that you could easily classify as evil, or just morally wrong, that aren't just some of the new evil ones. My character will never use any of the evil spells and blood magic like curse storm or redbolt, but even if he did he'd -definitely- never use soul scour which is about as evil (in his opinion) as they come.

Curiously we had an IC meeting discussing these recently in a mage guild. You could always try to push for change IC!

It's not really that people just ignore it, it's that some characters don't understand it well enough to know that they -should- take issues. Spending 10 minutes talking about the chaos phage is often enough to get a lot of people to stop using slaadi, but they're the neutral summon and neutral people with PC don't even get a choice. So sometimes convenience probably does win out for people, doesn't mean that you can't try to teach people ethics IC.


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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Eyeliner » Mon Jun 05, 2023 7:33 am

I'm not sure why all surface towns have to be filled with righteous do gooders who destroy anything questionable on sight. I mean if you look at cities in the Forgotten Realms settings (or fantasy in general) they're usually a healthy mix of lawful, evil, good and chaotic factions who may not like each other but generally manage to co-exist... because that's an interesting environment for storytelling. It's too bad we'll probably never really have that here but it would probably take constant DM interference to make that happen.

Anyway, I think going overboard with intolerance over magic is kind of ridiculous. Our characters aren't children (most technically probably have higher intelligence than us as players) and should be able to figure out what's truly evil and dangerous and what is, for example, a dark power turned into a useful tool because it's used in a controlled fashion by someone who's on their side.


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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Scylon » Mon Jun 05, 2023 9:13 am

Morgy wrote:
Sun Jun 04, 2023 11:53 pm

I noticed a much softer/disinterested trend towards dark magics when the ruling was made by King Ed of Cordor that Warlocks are now allowed to openly reside inside the city - yes,

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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by WanderingPoet » Mon Jun 05, 2023 5:39 pm

Eyeliner wrote:
Mon Jun 05, 2023 7:33 am

I mean if you look at cities in the Forgotten Realms settings (or fantasy in general) they're usually a healthy mix of lawful, evil, good and chaotic factions who may not like each other but generally manage to co-exist... because that's an interesting environment for storytelling. It's too bad we'll probably never really have that here but it would probably take constant DM interference to make that happen.

Yes, but also no.

In FR evil is -allowed-, but followers of Cyric don't go around holding murder cult meetings in the open just because evil is allowed. Warlocks can't openly preach about their pact. Some evil is open, like Bane and the Zhentarim, but generally speaking there are enough do gooders in towns that if you break actual laws then you're going down.

Many of the laws in FR are even harsher than on Arelith, in Waterdeep brandishing a weapon without due cause is a tenday imprisonment or 10gp fine (which is a lot for non adventurers). Littering is a 2gp fine, and if caught again you can go to jail or face hard labour. Theft is a flogging followed by a week in jail or a year of hard labour or a fine equal to the stolen goods. Murdering a citizen even -with- justification is a five year exile, or 3 years of hard labour or a thousand gold to their kin. Even slavery is illegal with it carrying a sentence of 10 years of hard labour after a flogging.

How about magic laws?
Using magic to influence a citizen/official without consent is a fine or damages up to 1000 gold, and doing so again can result in imprisonment or hard labour.

Source - the Waterdeep Code Legal.

So technically, being a warlock is legal in Waterdeep, and killing a Warlock for being a Warlock is illegal. However, if a paladin could make the case that the unseelie warlock was magically influencing people then they could legally push to have them edicted and imprisoned.

Interesting as written, you can't blaspheme against evil gods in Waterdeep, even those like Cyric, without getting an edict; though I don't imagine Cyricists are going to put in a public complaint.


I think the problem is less with tolerance (after all, not everyone has high spellcraft to even know what spell was cast, just see the results), and more to do with the fact that unlike Waterdeep, cities are small. You might only have 50-100 players regularly in a city, maybe a bit more. Everyone knows a good portion of the active city, and the NPCs don't commit crimes. So that one warlock spotted, while he can legally be here, is very much more noteworthy than the 200 cyricist cultist NPCs that show up at a DM event.

So while evil/chaos exist alongside good/law in cities in FR, as a matter of scale, they are well hidden amongst thousands of others and many other crimes. Waterdeep might have a high presence of Zhentarim and Xanathar gangs for example, and they might be killing eachother, but the local guard has 100 other problems to deal with then some idiot gang members stabbing eachother.

In Arelith where even busy days are only a few crimes, they can be a much bigger focus, and thus much more pounced on for their rarity. So in a way you're right, if the DMs had the time to constantly make the city feel chaotic/evil and give life to all those NPC evildoers then there'd be a much stronger feel of evil in the city. But it'd probably also be generally less fun for everyone involved; as then actual evil players are just one of many rather than unique.

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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Flower Power » Mon Jun 05, 2023 9:24 pm

If the law fails you, you can always form a secret society devoted to beating up these evil nerds and stealing their lunch money.

Bonus points if you manage to figure out which of the powers that be would rather see the King's edict repealed, and then quietly support/help them reach a point in their careers where they're in a position to just look the other way when a nerd gets the snot beaten out of them.

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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Anomandaris » Mon Jun 05, 2023 9:41 pm

Good discussion so far! Even as someone who enjoys conflict and pvp I personally like somewhat more permissive settlement laws even when they don’t totally fit the setting, as it removes a pretense for what can be lame pvp and can enable more conflict rp interaction opportunities.

That said, I think the distinction between law and public opinion is key. What I see as maybe detrimental is players taking a ruling like King Edward’s and deciding that it means certain behaviors should be culturally accepted IC, as this starts to warp and degrade the meaning of alignment and associated behaviors. This can be exacerbated by players feeling like they no longer have agency to push that rp due to an ooc ruling, which often isn’t true.

In essence the alignment of the settlement occupants (PCs/NPCs) hasn’t substantively changed, just a law on the books.

Whether or not a warlock is “allowed” in the city for trade shouldn’t change a paladin’s perception of the use of certain magics. This means that as a player with necro foci, I should be evaluating my spell use to maintain public appearances if I want to be accepted in a generally good aligned population center.

It strikes me as something that really requires the community to support/reinforce IC through RP, as there’s no appropriate ooc measure that would make sense and not be too overbearing (other than general guidance).


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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Amateur Hour » Tue Jun 06, 2023 3:22 am

Anomandaris wrote:
Mon Jun 05, 2023 9:41 pm

Good discussion so far! Even as someone who enjoys conflict and pvp I personally like somewhat more permissive settlement laws even when they don’t totally fit the setting, as it removes a pretense for what can be lame pvp and can enable more conflict rp interaction opportunities.

That said, I think the distinction between law and public opinion is key. What I see as maybe detrimental is players taking a ruling like King Edward’s and deciding that it means certain behaviors should be culturally accepted IC, as this starts to warp and degrade the meaning of alignment and associated behaviors. This can be exacerbated by players feeling like they no longer have agency to push that rp due to an ooc ruling, which often isn’t true.

In essence the alignment of the settlement occupants (PCs/NPCs) hasn’t substantively changed, just a law on the books.

Whether or not a warlock is “allowed” in the city for trade shouldn’t change a paladin’s perception of the use of certain magics. This means that as a player with necro foci, I should be evaluating my spell use to maintain public appearances if I want to be accepted in a generally good aligned population center.

It strikes me as something that really requires the community to support/reinforce IC through RP, as there’s no appropriate ooc measure that would make sense and not be too overbearing (other than general guidance).

I think this touches on something very important.

As a general rule, without some level of DM intervention, players tend towards the idea that if it's legal, you have to accept it. It's one of the reasons I'm not a fan of how Cordor's acceptance levels are now nearly identical to Guldorand's; having at least someone say warlocks/infernalists/etc. are not okay helped reinforce the setting idea that these things are generally not acceptable.

And this gets to a core point: there's a lot of players Arelith who have absolutely no understanding of Manichean good and evil for the purpose of a fantasy setting because these players do not have a background in tabletop Dungeons and Dragons, and the setting of Arelith isn't teaching it through emergent storytelling. When these players play characters that insist that morality is all shades of gray with all kinds of exceptions, they're not doing so with the understanding that their character is outright wrong and is being mislead, being deliberately obtuse, being manipulative, etc. and that can lead to some serious problems.

My related terrible suggestion that is so terrible that I won't waste developer time by putting it in the Suggestions channel for them to read and reject is that requiring RPR 0 and 10 characters to take a simple setting and rules quiz in the Arelith Entry (questions like "True or False: Good and Evil are clearly-defined cosmic forces in the Forgotten Reams" or "How many quarters is each PLAYER (across all their characters) allowed to own at once?") before getting to play would help correct this, but that would be an extremely ham-fisted approach.

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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Babylon System is the Vampire » Tue Jun 06, 2023 9:36 am

This isn't a "new player with no roleplay experience" problem.

A new player with 0 understanding of what roleplay is will end up taking one of three paths.

1) They will dig what arelith is putting down and do their best to fit in with the way the veterans play. How long it takes from going from someone who has no idea what Amn is to a premium roleplayer who understands the setting fully may vary player to player, but a little patience and understanding (we were all new to nwn rp servers once upon a time) and eventually they will get to a solid point, and in some cases even surpassing the folks that helped them along the way in roleplay skill.

2) They will get bored with what Arelith is and never log in again.

3) Like above, they will also get bored with what Arelith is, and will become disruptive (griefing, ect). This is 90-95% of the time going to be a kid in the age range of 10-14ish, and likely will come down to a ban with the caveat of "come back and see us if you ever want to play the way we play". This happens less and less these days, because let's face it, NwN isn't attracting many pre-teens these days, but it still happens.

None of that is a big deal, and just par for course when dealing with an NwN server's playerbase. Where I think it goes wrong is with 1, because the new players that are willing to try and fit in are going to follow the lead of the veterans.

This only works if veterans aren't using rp as a vehicle to get to the pvp, instead of what pvp is, a tool for rp.

It only works if veterans are adhering to the setting guidelines instead of making up the rules as they go, like using fringe groups to justify the way their playing a race/class way different than the setting defines them as on the norm. Thats not to say you can't play a character on the fringe like that, it should just come with the understanding that that is what you are doing instead of normalizing it.

This only works if veterans playing a lawful good tormite are willing to treat that warlock like a warlock, and not like john the guy you played your last character with very closely.

And finally, as for Cordor's shift toward acceptance, I don't know anything about that. It's not a bad move, I've often said that Cordor would be better off as a more "neutral" location (though I think that involves dismantling pc government there all together), you just hope that it was part of a story somewhere instead of some decision made in the dm forums without any representation of the shift at all in game.


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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by LurkingShadow » Tue Jun 06, 2023 1:33 pm

If Cordor is neutral? Where is it supposed to be the place of "Contempt" and "harder" times for Tieflings and what not? Neutral does not mean "accept monster races with open arms". It is a bit odd that Cordor also has a Banite queen in my opinion. If Cordor becomes Guldorand. What is the reason to have Guldorand and the Free Port around for then? I love Guldorand but if Cordor is as open there is no reason for it.


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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by AstralUniverse » Tue Jun 06, 2023 7:48 pm

Since the setting is quite permissive towards said magic being used in said 'neutral' settlements, I think the criticism here is more on the goodies who eat popcorn in the audience. That said, no one should really expect them to explode in the middle of a tournament and no one should really expect them to not watch tournaments at all. It's just a game and we can flex this little at least. But I simply hope that outside of the arena they take the use of said spells more seriously.

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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by magistrasa » Wed Jun 07, 2023 1:27 am

I feel like this is a downstream consequence of there being no real designated place for evil to exist on the surface. Evil players, and the players who enjoy the roleplay that evil players bring to the table, naturally feel compelled to create a more permissive environment in whatever places it's possible to get a little leeway, even where it makes no logical sense to do so. And it makes sense why there's no "evil settlement" or anything - history has demonstrated its incompatibility with the server as a whole - but I would still love to see something like it tried out at some point in the future. I can still imagine the duergar stronghold getting a massive overhaul where it's not a player owned settlement, but still has most settlement amenities, and is NPC protected akin to the Shadovar Trade Post and Dis. It could be a great venue for alignment mingling, if themed and designed right, which could open up some breathing room for surface villains so they don't have to suck up so much oxygen in Cordor.

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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Marsi » Wed Jun 07, 2023 2:13 am

magistrasa wrote:
Wed Jun 07, 2023 1:27 am

I feel like this is a downstream consequence of there being no real designated place for evil to exist on the surface. Evil players, and the players who enjoy the roleplay that evil players bring to the table, naturally feel compelled to create a more permissive environment in whatever places it's possible to get a little leeway, even where it makes no logical sense to do so. And it makes sense why there's no "evil settlement" or anything - history has demonstrated its incompatibility with the server as a whole - but I would still love to see something like it tried out at some point in the future. I can still imagine the duergar stronghold getting a massive overhaul where it's not a player owned settlement, but still has most settlement amenities, and is NPC protected akin to the Shadovar Trade Post and Dis. It could be a great venue for alignment mingling, if themed and designed right, which could open up some breathing room for surface villains so they don't have to suck up so much oxygen in Cordor.

yes, 100%.

Ten years ago, players weren't more nuanced in how they dealt with necromancer or warlock characters. Probably they were even less. But those necromancers and warlocks went with the implicit protection of stable evil settlements -- Wharftown, Sencliff, etc. You didn't kill warlocks or necromancers or Banites on sight, first of all because they had their own places to be and there wasn't this constant comingling, but also because you wouldn't just be starting a fight with some lone bad guy, but a whole city of them. You'd be hunted down and ganked, just the same as if a warlock had killed a paladin.

I don't know if I agree that history has demonstrated evil settlement can't work. Wharftown was evil or evil-adjacent a long time before it was removed. Guldorand was evil at some point. In fact, for a good chunk of the 2010s, Arelith was evil everywhere, and outside of Cordor (unless it was evil also!) the experience of a paladin was not unlike a warlock. Arelith never figured out (or didn't want to figure out) how to implement a good war system, I don't think it's the fault of the players for doing what players do with regard to conflict. Arelith never had an evil settlement problem, it had (has) a "we don't want to provide good conflict management tools, but refuse to accept that conflict is going to arise with whatever means are available" problem.

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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by magistrasa » Wed Jun 07, 2023 3:01 am

Marsi wrote:
Wed Jun 07, 2023 2:13 am

Wharftown was evil or evil-adjacent a long time before it was removed.

This was all before my time so take what I'm saying with a grain of salt, but my understanding of Wharftown is that it was in a state of perpetual war with nearly every other settlement on the server ever since it became The Evil Settlement. This might have not been as big of a deal during a time where max level characters were far more rare and player counts were far more manageable, but imagine how that same kind of never-ending, unresolvable conflict would play out in the current state of the server. Think of how often the servers would crash any time a sizeable force could be mustered to "cleanse the meddlesome infidels" or "protect cordor's children from the spooky cultist town." I just can't imagine anything like that could be good for Arelith's roleplay environment.

If evil characters are given a place on the surface to unapologetically be their baddest selves, the only way I foresee that could be tolerable within a realistic narrative is if the monkeys are not allowed to run the circus. "Duergar are good trade partners who benefit the isle and have treaties of nonaggression with the rest of the settlements - the hoodlums who loiter in their markets are an unaffiliated band of jackals whom we begrudgingly share space with since the duergar tolerate and protect them while within their territory." The narrative logic there makes it clear that the NPC faction runs the show, while the players are guests who must abide by nonviolent expectations. It's therefore hospitable to evil characters trying to establish a footing on the surface, while also a reasonable venue for even morally upstanding individuals to cross paths and co-mingle outside of a hostile context.

That said, I don't want to pull this thread too far off topic with this line of thought, so that's all I'm going to say about that.

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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by D4wN » Wed Jun 07, 2023 11:07 am

Like Morgy said, there is literally nothing we can do when Admins/DMs/Devs make a decision to remove a law like PNG from Cordor allowing Warlocks and evil Faith worshippers in. We have to just be okay with welcoming Cyricists, Sharrans and even Demon/Devil worshippers and races like Shadovar. So it would be really silly to get upset about an "evil" spell when you literally have very evil people walking around openly.

Some of the laws have been adjusted to slightly compensate for it, but it's not entirely possible. And when we had a list of "These spells aren't allowed cause they're bad.." (that list was very long), we constantly had people arguing every spell on it. So I just removed it and we deal with it on a case by case basis.

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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Babylon System is the Vampire » Wed Jun 07, 2023 1:33 pm

Shadovar make sense to me. As far as Arelith goes, they let folks walk around their outpost free of danger, essentially protecting them. As far as forgotten realms go, in 1372 they had just returned and in short order proceeded to save Evereska from the Phaerim. Many actually viewed them as saviors around the realms at this point, though obviously there were some doubters that would foreshadow what was to come as they moved to spread their influence between 3rd and 4th edition.

As far as cyricists and warlocks go, these are traditionally secretive, and you would hope that would remain the case... I totally get the desire to not see them smushed at level 8 because they were outed, but I really do think losing that aspect takes a lot of fun out of playing those sorts of things. I think it would be better to try and foster maturity when it comes to these classes instead of what appears to be just giving up from my perspective.

As far as Shar and Bane goes, look...We all know the major villains from Forgotten realms lore, but most folks in the forgotten realms do not. And even the ones big enough to be on the lips of every tom dick and jane commoner are known as the individual, not the idividual bannite or sharran. Bane is a popular religion on forgotten realms, and even shar with both loss and despair in her portfolio can often be turned to in times of tragedy, like the death of a mother or a sister, ect.

Zhentil keep is a major force on Faerun in 1372, a former trade post along the northern ride that built up over time and eventually became a small fortress like city. My point here being that just like any other Faerun nation that has representation on Arelith, Zhentil Keep has a place. And while the Zhentarim operate out of the keep, they are a far cry from your average resident of the keep or zhentilar (the name for those who serve in the keeps army) that just worships bane because they think that tyranny is the way to order.

The TLDR point of everything above is that there is a lot of flexibility in the lore without erasing the existence of good and evil. The easiest trick in the book is to create a need for said obviously evil group that supersedes any ability for players to run them out without a better reason than just because bannite or whatever.

Some easy examples:

"Yes, no one likes the bannites and we are all wary of them, but with the growing pirate presence in the archipelago we need men, and the envoy from zhentil keep provides that. Unless you can uncover a plot by all of them to overthrow the king or something equally nefarious, there's not a lot we can do about it."

"When Guldorand first opened, the economy struggled. The thayans promised if we allowed them to open a embassy, they will help fix that, and they delivered."

These examples not only give a built-in excuse for allowing evil to prosper with relative protection as long as they don't do something stupid before they are ready to do something stupid, they also gives players of the good guys a story to try and chip away at. Win win.


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Flower Power
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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Flower Power » Wed Jun 07, 2023 1:37 pm

LurkingShadow wrote:
Tue Jun 06, 2023 1:33 pm

If Cordor is neutral? Where is it supposed to be the place of "Contempt" and "harder" times for Tieflings and what not? Neutral does not mean "accept monster races with open arms". It is a bit odd that Cordor also has a Banite queen in my opinion. If Cordor becomes Guldorand. What is the reason to have Guldorand and the Free Port around for then? I love Guldorand but if Cordor is as open there is no reason for it.

Honestly, considering the fact that Cordor's entire raison d'être is providing the Amnian fleet with a resupply station to extend their reach out in to the Trackless Sea and out towards Maztica (and even at a discount, given Amn's favored nation status, as interactions with DMs and in events over the years have repeatedly reinforced) and thus to facilitate human suffering on a nigh unimaginable scale and the literal enslavement of millions of people... Yeah, I'd say it's pretty fair for Cordor to be pushed by DM-NPCs like King Edward towards a more hard Neutral stance, or even leaning Evil, thanks to his Banite waifu.

It occupies a space within the setting at large as a quasi-colony of Amn existing purely to facilitate the establishment of additional colonies in Maztica, that kind of makes it incredibly difficult to justify existing as part of the Cordorian state in any meaningful capacity while still claiming to be a moral individual - and that's entirely fine, from a narrative perspective. If anything, it should be something that is brought up more often and people are made to meaningfully grapple with considering the number of Paladins and priests of goodly-aligned gods we see congregating in Cordor.

Guldorand, on the other hand, gets pinned as 'the Evil Settlement' just because it also has some weirdly permissive DM-NPC laws because at the time of its launch the DMs had to forcibly cleave out a space for people who weren't hand-wringingly 63-black wearing evil to have some breathing room on the Surface without being auto-yeeted into the Underdark the moment they got Detect Alignment'ed. But when push comes to shove, it's still an actual genuine Noble Republic with very strict laws aimed at promoting individual liberties that just also happens to have a Thayan enclave in it.

Thematically, it would make far more sense for Guldorand and Cordor's status in the narrative to end up swapping, but I doubt we'll ever see that happen.

what would fred rogers do?

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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by LurkingShadow » Wed Jun 07, 2023 1:42 pm

Flower Power wrote:
Wed Jun 07, 2023 1:37 pm
LurkingShadow wrote:
Tue Jun 06, 2023 1:33 pm

If Cordor is neutral? Where is it supposed to be the place of "Contempt" and "harder" times for Tieflings and what not? Neutral does not mean "accept monster races with open arms". It is a bit odd that Cordor also has a Banite queen in my opinion. If Cordor becomes Guldorand. What is the reason to have Guldorand and the Free Port around for then? I love Guldorand but if Cordor is as open there is no reason for it.

Honestly, considering the fact that Cordor's entire raison d'être is providing the Amnian fleet with a resupply station to extend their reach out in to the Trackless Sea and out towards Maztica (and even at a discount, given Amn's favored nation status, as interactions with DMs and in events over the years have repeatedly reinforced) and thus to facilitate human suffering on a nigh unimaginable scale and the literal enslavement of millions of people... Yeah, I'd say it's pretty fair for Cordor to be pushed by DM-NPCs like King Edward towards a more hard Neutral stance, or even leaning Evil, thanks to his Banite waifu.

It occupies a space within the setting at large as a quasi-colony of Amn existing purely to facilitate the establishment of additional colonies in Maztica, that kind of makes it incredibly difficult to justify existing as part of the Cordorian state in any meaningful capacity while still claiming to be a moral individual - and that's entirely fine, from a narrative perspective. If anything, it should be something that is brought up more often and people are made to meaningfully grapple with considering the number of Paladins and priests of goodly-aligned gods we see congregating in Cordor.

Guldorand, on the other hand, gets pinned as 'the Evil Settlement' just because it also has some weirdly permissive DM-NPC laws because at the time of its launch the DMs had to forcibly cleave out a space for people who weren't hand-wringingly 63-black wearing evil to have some breathing room on the Surface without being auto-yeeted into the Underdark the moment they got Detect Alignment'ed. But when push comes to shove, it's still an actual genuine Noble Republic with very strict laws aimed at promoting individual liberties that just also happens to have a Thayan enclave in it.

Thematically, it would make far more sense for Guldorand and Cordor's status in the narrative to end up swapping, but I doubt we'll ever see that happen.

Guldorand is complex and a politicial hell because of the many chefs around the cauldron.

Neutraliy Cordor makes sense, but neutrality does not mean Cyric followers running around on the streets or Banites kill bashing chaotic lvled low lvl. If Cordor turns to that it be weird, might aswell let the Drow and Duergar back in.


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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Babylon System is the Vampire » Wed Jun 07, 2023 2:19 pm

Flower Power wrote:
Wed Jun 07, 2023 1:37 pm

I that just also happens to have a Thayan enclave in it.

The following cities had large Thayan enclaves around 1372 DR:[3]

Athkatla
Baldur's Gate
Calaunt
Calimport
Cimbar
Hillsfar
Hlath
Hlondeth
Innarlith
Iriaebor
Marsember
Messemprar
Mulmaster
Procampur
Proskur: The enclave of Proskur brought significant wealth to the leaders of the Dragon Coast city.[4]
Ravens Bluff
Saerloon
Scardale: Despite their reputation elsewhere, the Red Wizards of the enclave in Scardale Town were rather trusted by the local Dalesfolk.[5]
Scornubel
Soorenar
Telflamm
Veltalar: (founded later)
Waterdeep: Technically placed in Skullport and connected to their mundane offices in the city proper.[citation needed]
Westgate
Yhaunn

Just from a FR wiki search.


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Re: Spell-casting, Alignment & IC Reactions

Post by Flower Power » Wed Jun 07, 2023 2:38 pm

Yeah, they really aren't that uncommon. They're in a ton of the major cities, especially the ones that play a big role in most campaigns. It's not even that big of a black mark against Guldorand (although having them have an active and vocal role in governing the city is a different matter entirely.)

what would fred rogers do?

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