Lawful Evil

powerpuffpony · July 2014

The Warlock is coming soon. We need evil gods and entities for them to worship; specifically devils, elder evils, and demons. After all, a warlock is an arcanist who gains power through pacts with powerful entities, most commonly devils, elder evils of the Far Realm, fey, or demons.

With the deity choices we have now we will end up with Good Warlocks creating dark pacts with Chauntea and spreading hope and life via portals to Hell. LOL.

tyrtallow · July 2014

Not all warlocks are evil but warlocks do have a propensity towards being evil. I agree, it would be odd if there was a sudden massive influx of good/neutral deity-worshipping warlocks in mod4.
Given our limited selection the only god a I think warlock might actually worship is Oghma. Maaaybe Tymora.

ordensmarschall · July 2014

Game mechanic wise your choice of god is immaterial, so whether or not they add any of the evil gods as choices is neither here nor there. Now Role Playing wise it does matter, but this been said since open beta. The thing you have to think about though if you are to bring role playing into it is, evil characters cannot truly be evil. Everybody is the hero whether they want to be or not.

mhalas · July 2014

The choice of your diety should, imho, have some impact on DC's if no other class.

zebular · July 2014

. . . Warlocks do not have to be evil or follow evil gods or make pacts with evil beings just like Paladins do not have to be good or follow good gods. Heck, a cleric, once ordained, doesn't even need to pray to a god anymore for their divine power. Alignment is now an optional rule in 4th edition, replaced with Personalities.

. . . The gods no longer directly grant or block access to divine power. All they can do now is "turn on" the ability for mortals to access divine power. Once they have access, they have access until the day they die, despite how faithful they are.

. . . Of course, if a mortal ticks off a god, even though they cannot stop them from accessing divine power anymore, doesn't mean they won't seek retribution for such heretic behavior.

. . . Never-the-less, we need to have ALL the Faerunian Pantheon (alive and "dead") added to our Deity Selection list. The few we have now are too narrow of choices. As well, it would be nice to see the deity choice mechanic play an active part in a character, more than just an RP-factor.

charononus · July 2014

zebular wrote: »

. . . Warlocks do not have to be evil or follow evil gods or make pacts with evil beings just like Paladins do not have to be good or follow good gods. Heck, a cleric, once ordained, doesn't even need to pray to a god anymore for their divine power. Alignment is now an optional rule in 4th edition, replaced with Personalities.

. . . The gods no longer directly grant or block access to divine power. All they can do now is "turn on" the ability for mortals to access divine power. Once they have access, they have access until the day they die, despite how faithful they are.

. . . Of course, if a mortal ticks off a god, even though they cannot stop them from accessing divine power anymore, doesn't mean they won't seek retribution for such heretic behavior.

. . . Never-the-less, we need to have ALL the Faerunian Pantheon (alive and "dead") added to our Deity Selection list. The few we have now are too narrow of choices. As well, it would be nice to see the deity choice mechanic play an active part in a character, more than just an RP-factor.

Huh, sounds like Divine casting went to more of an Eberron version in 4e.

aulduron · July 2014

Paladins do not have to be good or follow good gods

When did they change this?

zebular · July 2014

charononus wrote: »

Huh, sounds like Divine casting went to more of an Eberron version in 4e.

Yeah, I personally don't like it and as such my FR Campaign of 20+ years is remaining 2nd edition and I am never bringing about any of the Sunderings. I allowed my PC's to travel back to the Arcane Age and attempt thwart Karsus, of which they were successful and as such, Mystryl still remains supreme never having perished or reshaping the laws of magic. In my campaign, she even destroyed Ao who was replaced by a "Cosmic" like deity that I decided was Ao's "master" he referred to before, and named the being "Eshliarestrasee" for short, whom I made a feminine aspect of a being like Marvel's Eternity and Infinity. I am done with WotC killing off my beloved Mystryl/Mystra! Never again (in my campaign)!

zebular · July 2014

aulduron wrote: »

When did they change this?

It's always been this way, just prior to 4th edition they were labeled "Anti-Paladins." Here's a quote from the 4th edition player's handbook deluxe:

Paladins and Deities
As fervent crusaders in their chosen cause, paladins must choose a deity. Paladins choose a specific faith to serve, as well as an alignment. You must choose an alignment identical to the alignment of your patron deity; a paladin of a good deity must be good, a paladin of a lawful good deity must be lawful good, and a paladin of an unaligned deity must be unaligned. Evil and chaotic evil paladins do exist in the world, but they are almost always villains, not player characters.

So, the exception to the optional alignment rule in 4th edition are Paladins. They must choose the same alignment as their chosen deity. Whether they remain that alignment or not, is up to the player's actions and of course the DM's influences. The only way for a paladin to not choose an alignment is if they chose one of the unaligned deities.

Furthermore, for proof that Warlocks can follow good gods, here is another excerpt:

Religion: Warlocks favor deities of cleverness, arcane power, or secrets. These include Corellon, Ioun, and Sehanine. Evil warlocks often revere Asmodeus or Vecna.

So there are good Warlocks that follow Corellon Larethian, the Chaotic Good God of All Elves.

ianthewizard2012 · July 2014

It's hard to believe that a good or an unaligned god will want to listen to prayers who pact with the infernal and use evil powers all the time. And if you allow them to worship evil gods, it doesn't make sense that they can party with players who worship good gods without consequences.

tyrtallow · July 2014

Agreed with the above. We were talking about in-game warlocks (we always had been).

From OP:

With the deity choices we have now we will end up with Good Warlocks creating dark pacts with Chauntea and spreading hope and life via portals to Hell. LOL.

zebular · July 2014

ianthewizard2012 wrote: »

It's hard to believe that a good or an unaligned god will want to listen to prayers who pact with the infernal and use evil powers all the time. And if you allow them to worship evil gods, it doesn't make sense that they can party with players who worship good gods without consequences.

Their powers are neither good nor evil. What makes them such is how they are used and the alignment of who uses them. Also, tell that to Raistlin Majere who was in a party with many good characters and himself was Chaotic Evil. As always, it boils down to how you role-play your character.

Evil mages tapping Mystra's weave doesn't make all of magic evil, does it?

tyrtallow wrote: »

We were talking about in-game warlocks (we always had been).

So am I. While things may say one thing, this is an action role-playing game at heart, so just like in D&D, it is all a guideline - not strict "do or die" rules. Never-the-less, I am quite disappointed to find that the SW in Preview is basically forcing us to have signed infernal pacts, which makes no sense in Neverwinter since we're all supposed to be heroes. There needs to be more freedom of choice. Where are our Fey (light) and Star (unaligned) pact powers? The only powers we have are infernal and then we have only the Hellfire Paragon Path.

Don't get me wrong, the class looks and feels awesome, if I want to play an evil infernal warlock.

charononus · July 2014

ianthewizard2012 wrote: »

It's hard to believe that a good or an unaligned god will want to listen to prayers who pact with the infernal and use evil powers all the time. And if you allow them to worship evil gods, it doesn't make sense that they can party with players who worship good gods without consequences.

It depends on your viewpoint. If there is a good end, you could say that the ends justify the means and still be good in some morality systems. But we're getting into real life philosophy and ethical theory here.

beelzebubbanw · July 2014

zebular wrote: »

Yeah, I personally don't like it and as such my FR Campaign of 20+ years is remaining 2nd edition and I am never bringing about any of the Sunderings. I allowed my PC's to travel back to the Arcane Age and attempt thwart Karsus, of which they were successful and as such, Mystryl still remains supreme never having perished or reshaping the laws of magic. In my campaign, she even destroyed Ao who was replaced by a "Cosmic" like deity that I decided was Ao's "master" he referred to before, and named the being "Eshliarestrasee" for short, whom I made a feminine aspect of a being like Marvel's Eternity and Infinity. I am done with WotC killing off my beloved Mystryl/Mystra! Never again (in my campaign)!

I concur with everything you wrote. The whole Gnomes being gone thing is absolutely moronic. I DMed FR in 2nd ed. rules and never bought any later rules afterwards

I had it tweaked where I wanted it.

Lawful Evil

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