Good aligned PvE

[aaron22]

A good concept, but I suspect it would become irresistible PvP bait.

Imagine, a group of "Good" PC's trying to RP in that area, or heck even just passing through it.......when suddenly a gang of "Evil" decides it's time to grind out a level or two there.

Sure, it COULD generate some great RP opportunities........... but we all know what is more likely to happen. Imagine the PM's flowing in complaining about "those Goodies are camping the area, just waiting for us bad guys to show up !"

Sorry, I just don't think it will happen. *shrug*

cuz that is happening so often in the reverse? That concept holds little water. the orcs could "camp" the xvarts and just murder all the grinders that peek in. But we don't. Mainly because that is not very much fun and there is just no IC reason behind it than be OOC a-holes.

If you are saying that the goodies are less mature than the evils and would use it to monger... well. Im not saying it. You are.

[Steve]

Would it really hurt to install at least one such Area as proposed, so see what the outcome was?

[aaron22]

2 areas could fill all these voids.

area1: CR10 and CR15
area2: CR20 and CR25

[Deathgrowl]

This was debated once before, but there are some problems with it due to the faction system. Why would a good aligned creature ever outright attack, say, a paladin? Because paladins would be able to go there. And what happens when the paladins and good aligned clerics go to "hunt" (READ: Mindlessly grind) the good aligned mobs?

It's much easier to make sense out of evil vs evil than good vs good.

[aaron22]

Good points Deathgrowl and instead of creating a wall of text to rebut, I will try to break this down into smaller portions. Easier to digest the small bites.

Well for the first part I would say rules. Rules are why a good aligned character would not grind the good aligned mobs. The same rules that don't let evil orcs to set up a kissing booth in the wide. Or that let any character walk into the Church of Helm (or whatever) and fire bomb the place to oblivion. Sure. Anyone can do these things, but they don't. Give a little bit of credit to the player base here. Not too much. Just a little bit.

Let me set a stage. Lets use the Dragonspear map as surrogate for this thought experiment. I am not saying Dragonspear should be used. There is lore and circumstance that would deny such. It's just a map that most players have seen and has the layout that works for what I am thinking.

OK so the outer part. Where the boars and stuff are. Make it some aggressive force. This aggressive force of humanoid manlings would be laying siege on a castle that has barricaded itself behind thick walls. Unknown to the siege force, there is a secret way behind the gates. Once behind these gates the goodly warriors will attack the strangers that come through sure that must mean harm. They have no reason to talk. Certainly not in these desperate times.

The courtyard holds many warriors but the strongest and elite warriors lay behind the sturdy door. In there are warriors and and followers of the goodly order that govern this castle and surrounds. At its topmost is the best of the best.

The secret door will have a transition check. This transition check would send an alert to the DM on duty if the transition is triggered by a good aligned character. Of course the transition should be allowed, but an alert to both the player and admin would make sense.

So not having it because players might abuse it is not a reason to not put stuff in. Some players abuse. Most do not. Some accidentally break rules. It happens. Most of the time an accident is a one time offense. There are lots of spoken and unspoken rules. Having a good aligned area being invaded by good aligned grinders seems like a small chance occurrence when there are plenty of other areas that are not good aligned.

to be continued...

[aaron22]

On your point of evil v. evil makes more sense than good v. good, I agree. But I do this using the same broad brush that you are using. In a more detailed examination, it is not so easy to make such proclamations.

Specifically in the case of the orc players that I RP with, It makes no sense that goblins, hobgoblins, bugbears, and even other orcs would not stop attacking me on site. And this is specific to the race I play as these races see orcs as being something they would follow. Shared motivations and cultural integration that would put a powerful orc in a different light that an equally powerful human, dwarf or elf could. They are just not seen the same way. I have learned to accept this flaw to the game. It is just a game after all. We work through it and make it work for the RP we hope to generate and goals we wish to accomplish.

Good v. Good is not as uncommon as you may think. Or others that look at the biggest picture and not the pieces that make the whole.

There are good elves that live in the High Forest that have segregated themselves from the world since the crown wars. These elves live a secluded life that has no desire for invasion either friendly or unfriendly. The woods they live in are fiercely protected and anyone (anyone) that is not of their clan would not be allowed entrance. If the nicest of super good clerics of goodliness came to these woods. The cleric would be forced to immediately withdrawal or be killed. This concept is loosely seen in the elf guild of EDE. I am not gonna speak for them, but from what I know of them, They are good in the biggest picture. But good for them may not be good for you if you tried to do something that works against their progress or compromises the things they hold sacred, you would meet stiff resistance.

There are also paladins. Now you may think that paladins are the best of the good and are beacons of light of good. You are correct, but that does not mean you would enjoy a sit down breakfast with one. A "typical" adventurer would be wise to stay well away from any paladin they see. If a "typical" adventurer had a campfire chat with a paladin they would be reprimanded for wasting the paladin's time with idiotic ramblings and then persecuted for unsavory actions that the adventurer would have done. Depending on the paladin's order, the paladin could judge, jury, executioner that filth from the land. This now dead adventurer could be good, just has much looser morals to achieving this good.

edit: I'm not as familiar with Dwarf lore, but I could see such good v. good with them as well. I have nothing to provide you as instances with details. But from my ignorant view I have to assume that with such attitudes and personalities that are common, it wold be hard to believe that there are not such instances or that this is implausible.

[Ravial]

There are good elves that live in the High Forest that have segregated themselves from the world since the crown wars. These elves live a secluded life that has no desire for invasion either friendly or unfriendly. The woods they live in are fiercely protected and anyone (anyone) that is not of their clan would not be allowed entrance. If the nicest of super good clerics of goodliness came to these woods. The cleric would be forced to immediately withdrawal or be killed. This concept is loosely seen in the elf guild of EDE. I am not gonna speak for them, but from what I know of them, They are good in the biggest picture. But good for them may not be good for you if you tried to do something that works against their progress or compromises the things they hold sacred, you would meet stiff resistance.

I have no idea where you got all that regarding High Forest, but that's just flat out wrong. High Forest does have elves living in it, but they have not been segregated from outside world since the Crown Wars at all. In fact, they've been pretty damn open- to the point that they had at one moment THREE elven kingdoms there: Eaerlann, Siluvanede and Sharrven. Three elven Kingdoms, out of which Earlann was so good going, it lasted from -4700DR to over 800+DR. It lived to see Fall of Myth Drannor and existed a whole century afterwards, too. We're literally ~500 years since the disbanding of Eaerlann, which mostly retreated to Evermeet and Evereska. Five centuries is almost nothing for elves in terms of remembering their history- heck, some elves that lived in Eaerlann still live to this day on our server. On top of that, High Forest was home to several settlements of humans, including a druidic city in woods that was helped to exist -by elves themselves-. Ascalhorn (Now known as Hellgate Keep) was also given by elves to netherese refugees. An elven city given to -humans- inside the forest.

They're not segregated at all. They're not killing people that tresspass either. In majority, unless someone is actually a monster, they either capture and mind-wipe people in order to release them somewhere safe or scare tresspassers away.

On top of that, in recent years the elves living in the High Forest have gotten so well and numerous, they've began thinking about re-establishing Eaerlann back again (though that's a theme that is going on since 2nd/3rd edition).

[mrm3ntalist]

It is high unlikely to implement areas that only a portion of the playerbase can go, especially when there is a limit in the resources we have. There is currently, no area that evil or good aligned characters cant go. I dont see this changing.

[Deathgrowl]

There are also paladins. Now you may think that paladins are the best of the good and are beacons of light of good. You are correct, but that does not mean you would enjoy a sit down breakfast with one. A "typical" adventurer would be wise to stay well away from any paladin they see. If a "typical" adventurer had a campfire chat with a paladin they would be reprimanded for wasting the paladin's time with idiotic ramblings and then persecuted for unsavory actions that the adventurer would have done. Depending on the paladin's order, the paladin could judge, jury, executioner that filth from the land. This now dead adventurer could be good, just has much looser morals to achieving this good.

The character you're describing would be a fallen paladin. I play a paladin, myself, and this is nothing like what paladins are like. They accept that not everyone are paragons of righteousness. They don't object to farmers who have neutral alignment. They object to evil. They can get into conflict with chaotic good, but extremely rarely would it be violent, and more importantly, it would never ever start as violence. To a paladin, violence is a solution they reach with reluctance unless they are facing true evil, such as undeads and fiends.

EDIT: Actually, where in the world are you getting that paladins are actually persecuting people?

[aaron22]

@Ravial
I am away from my main computer that has the reference to this type of zenophobic elvish tribes that would only allow known allied elves entrance. I am almost 100% sure it is in elves of evermeet though.

You are mixing in your rebuttal with copper and green elves a bit. green elves are the ones that (may) mind wipe. I would say this would be the friendliest of these green elves though or possibly a median with some tribes being more defensive and some less.

@MrM
There are lots of places that are not allowed by a portion of the player base.

@DG
Im not gonna tell you how you should RP what you do, but I would RP..

Be the champion of the weak and the defenseless.
Be stern, unyielding and unswerving in your battles with evil.
Obey your masters with alert judgment and anticipation.
Serve the common good and the rule law established by honorable rulers.
Seek prowess and skill in all endeavors.
Stand ever alert against corruption.
Every failure of duty diminishes Torm and every success adds to his luster.
Be ever mindful of the code , and use them in your actions to swiftly enact justice.

...as a no nonsense, unyielding seeker of justice and vanquisher of evil in all forms. large and small. A neutral farmer being no less exempt from his lawbreaking than an evil thief.

[Ravial]

I'm not mixing anything at all. If you're going to use 2nd edition for your arguments, then you have to treat wood and wild elves as the same elven subrace, since that's what they are in that edition. in 3.0 they split green elves into Wood and Wild elves, from which the latter most often conduct the mind wipes and/or scare tresspassers away (with exception to one region away from the Sword Coast where Wild elves are super hostile, though I forget how that region was named), and the former believe that humanity and other races have to be guided towards betterment, since they'll never go away and are part of nature just elves are. Furthermore my entire rebuttal, as you've named it, was done only in regards to High Forest (Which has a considerable amount of moon elves as well, not only wood and wild elves) and not elves at large, since there are always exceptions to general rules somewhere on Faerun- places where elves are more hostile or more welcoming.

[Deathgrowl]

...as a no nonsense, unyielding seeker of justice and vanquisher of evil in all forms. large and small. A neutral farmer being no less exempt from his lawbreaking than an evil thief.

That character won't remain a paladin long. That is Lawful Neutral, not Lawful Good.

[aaron22]

That character won't remain a paladin long. That is Lawful Neutral, not Lawful Good.

how do you figure that? Seems to me, your version of Paladin is more LN than mine. Defeating Evil in all forms while maintaining strict Law? Or is being good about making cupcakes for children and playing a happy clown at birthday parties? That will win this planar war of good v. evil. Doing what is easy and placating the masses is not being a paladin.

Just an opinion. Play how you want, but that is not what that means to me at all.

[SyntheticRose]

I mean, I think a monastery full of Lawful Neutral monks who beat up trespassers would suffice as a 'mostly goodly-ish' place for Evil PCs to level, I guess? Neutral people do prefer the company of Good people over Evil people simply because no~one likes an (hero). And that way, you don't have the Paladin code of conduct to consider, and said monks can reasonably be hostile to PCs of all alignments -- after all, there's a sign at the entrance that says KEEP OUT!! TRESPASSERS WILL BE PUNCHED!, so it's reasonable for them to assume that anyone who's there and isn't wearing apprentice robes shouldn't be there.

And they just don't accept PC students, of course.

[aaron22]

compromise is commendable and your monk example is solid. My request is about having good aligned foes to do evil upon that are not DM placed or player controlled. perhaps there can be something between all of our combined thoughts that can fill this void while not upsetting the Good aligned player base's game environment.