The Paladin Antagonist... what would he do? [Archive] - Wizards Community

The Paladin Antagonist... what would he do? [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Werrwaaa
11-23-06, 12:28 AM So the PCs just finished there first little adventure and made it to level two! They met the first villain i expect and would like to be recurring. He is a Paladin of the Silver Flame (Eberron game mind you). He is Lawful Good, but has his flaws that make him a "bad guy". He is a bit racist, and egotistical, controlling, and generally just not a nice man. The PCs just saved a town from a mysterious plauge that this Paladin was there to quarantine and cure, but couldn't. When he reports back to the church, he will take as much credit as he can get away with, and maybe even get the PCs jobs through the church, but always nefarious and dangerous ones. What can a LG Paladin do to antagonize a party of good and neutral character?
Sabular
11-23-06, 04:57 AM He could be extremely judgemental to anyone who isn't exactly his kind of good.

thus in the traditional "should we kill the babies of this evil race" dilemma he would choose one option (probably the harsher kill option) and declare anyone who doesn't make the same choice as, if not outright evil, at least as dangerously neglicent etc.

Combine this with a personal grudge against the pc's (for stealing his thunder in the quarantain/curing of the disease) that makes the paladin constantly whatch the pc's to slip up (he won't make false incriminations or frame the pc's, just pay them very special attention). And once the pc's make a mistake he will publicly announce their failure and dubious moral fabric, waging a pr war.

This way a deep-rooted vendetta between the paladin and the pc's can form.
Stormbrand
11-23-06, 05:00 PM So the PCs just finished there first little adventure and made it to level two! They met the first villain i expect and would like to be recurring. He is a Paladin of the Silver Flame (Eberron game mind you). He is Lawful Good, but has his flaws that make him a "bad guy". He is a bit racist, and egotistical, controlling, and generally just not a nice man. The PCs just saved a town from a mysterious plauge that this Paladin was there to quarantine and cure, but couldn't. When he reports back to the church, he will take as much credit as he can get away with, and maybe even get the PCs jobs through the church, but always nefarious and dangerous ones. What can a LG Paladin do to antagonize a party of good and neutral character?

Leeching credit? Isn't that dishonesty?
Punishing others out of jealousy or personal reasons full stop, chaotic or evil act.
Racism = persecuting others unfairly, an affront to both law and good.

These all have to be fairly mild to be a paladin.

What he could do is have the PCs infiltrate a cult, and then encounter the PCs and deal with them as he would true cultists. Suddenly the PCs are opposing paladins who aren't holding back.

If the PCs don't hold back, then they have dead paladins on their hands, which then leads to all sorts of legal problems.
JulesCARV
11-23-06, 06:19 PM One approach would be to have a CG lycanthrope spellcaster type (say, a wererat gnome cleric of Sovereign Host or... whatever) who spends most of her time in Lammania, but occassionally planeshifts to Eberron to keep an eye on things and advise people who need it. The wererat notices the PC's mission, shifts to Eberron to help them out secretly, but the paladin notices. The paladin (especially if Aundairan) is not going to be pleased with this idea, and basically says that if the lycanthrope ever comes back from Lammania again, he'll kill her on sight, and the PCs will be held responsible for sheltering such a monster.

The problem is, this requires a level 9+ lycanthrope cleric, which is something like ECL 12, which is legendary by Eberron standards and would hardly view most paladins of the Silver Flame as a threat. Maybe if there were a planeshift-casting item or something, or some secret way the cleric knew to traverse the planes without using level 5 spells.
Allthegoodnamesweretaken
11-23-06, 08:47 PM I think that a paladin antagonist has to be approached from a completely different standpoint than any other sort of antagonist. The Paladin will still be a paladin, you can't go around being hateful/spiteful and so forth and still remain a paladin.

So what do you do? Make the paladin a rival type of antagonist! Have the paladin constantly trying to outdo the PCs and beat them to solving the quest. Having the paladin manage to beat the PCs to the punch on a quest or two and humiliate them a bit would be a good way to make the PCs dislike the paladin a bit and build up a good rivalry.
TheAnthroDM
11-24-06, 03:04 PM Where in the nine hells does it say that you can't hate and be good? :confused:

If the group includes any lycanthropes, shifters or otherwise "evil" races, it would be extremely easy to do.

Otherwise you are best to stick with the Rivaling standpoint. After all, if evil can rival other evil, good can rival other good.
Werrwaaa
11-24-06, 04:39 PM Thanks for the suggestions guys! Keep 'em coming. :)
Stormbrand
11-26-06, 12:05 PM Where in the nine hells does it say that you can't hate and be good? :confused:

If the group includes any lycanthropes, shifters or otherwise "evil" races, it would be extremely easy to do.

Otherwise you are best to stick with the Rivaling standpoint. After all, if evil can rival other evil, good can rival other good.

It doesn't say it in the Nine Hells, it says it in the Celestial Realms. ;)

But serioiusly now, hatred is possible, harmful selfishness is not.

Mostly the paladin would speak out against the party's less respectable choices, making it harder for the group to gain respect. He would not do this out of spite, but he is offended by all the good press the PCs get when he knows the dark side about them, and he feels people are entitled to make a balanced judgement.

He would usually just pressure the church to withold support for the party, on the belief that the behaviour of the party would put good men at risk.

Think, not spite, suspiscion. Then you have an antagonist paladin.

A good motive for paladins is suspiscion. He could give the PCs dangerous jobs on the logic that it is "better than risking the lives of good men."
SageBahamut
11-26-06, 03:22 PM The idea of making him extremely paranoid also works. It's not evil if it's a derangement (and can't be helped). The best example I've ever seen of doing horrible things in a good name is the Children of the Light from "The Wheel of Time". They honestly believe they're doing the world a favor by killing people who can use magic. Of course, they honestly believe they're doing people a favor by stabbing women and children. But in their own minds they're LG (which, if I'm not mistaken, is how Eberron reckons alignment - by your belief in yourself and your internal moral character).

He could be of the type that believes anyone who isn't perfect isn't Good enough. "Yes, you're a fellow paladin, but... you /did/ accept a share of the treasure, while I have Vow of Poverty, so you're not LG /enough/... SMITE!" etc. etc. Works even better if he PrC's into Shadowbane Inquisitor later.

And yes, it's valid for him to be suspicious of the PC's, especially if they are actually of questionable morality. Salem witch trials, anyone? Political oneupsmanship combined with religious fervor... never a good thing.
Gorillastyle
11-26-06, 09:52 PM Here is another option.
In order for the Paladin to be an effective antagonist he simply needs to believe that the party is truly evil or that they are lawbreakers – or both.

Since I will assume the party isn’t breaking any laws intentionally, you could easily have them enter a province, village, city, etc… where they break some law unknowingly, and then proceed to resist arrest/flee justice (possibly without them knowing it is the hand of justice they face/resist/run from).

Or they could be framed.
Eventually they might straighten it out, but it will be very complicated.

I have a currently low-level adventure which has multiple story arcs running thru it.

A larger over-arc is an aggressive city-state (think Germany just prior to WW2) who has been building a large army of warforged (it is a homebrew) and looking into occult and technological sources of military power. The party will run into a small group of them at a encampment /weapons facility that is also the site of an ancient tomb that holds several powerful relics from long ago – these are powerful magic items which will grow in power with the PC’s (and thus won’t be just discarded when a “better” item comes along).

What they won’t know is that these items will be tainted with evil, and so is the party from having spent several weeks in a heavily tainted area. They can eventually remove the taint from most of the items, but they have to first identify the issue.

At any rate, the primary antagonist I will introduce to the players is a paladin who will believe thoroughly in the evil-ness of the party. Not only will they have probably killed several of his country-men. But when he does the obligatory ‘detect evil’ on them… viola!
He is certain of their wickedness and won’t be easily swayed to give them the benefit of the doubt or bother to check again. I don't plan on telling the PCs this outright, but I will make it obvious that he has used detect evil on them and they've been marked for elimination.
Crinos
11-27-06, 01:29 PM Maybe down the road he could become a blackguard or a Paladin of Tyranny?

Also, would it be inappropriate to suggest Dominic Deegans Siegfried or the order of the sticks Miko as example of "noble" knights who are also complete a-holes.
Reversefigure4
11-27-06, 05:56 PM Or you could make a GOOD Paladin. Good, Good, Good, with the alignment Annoying Good. He doesn't take credit for their deeds, because that would be wrong. Instead, it's "I would like to thank the League of Heros for stopping those goblins... I was very surprised they managed it despite not being Paladins." He's pious to the point of total obnoxiousness, forever attempting to encourage the group to be more morally pure like him.
CheeseMan
11-28-06, 05:17 PM yeah, the 'taking as much credit as possible' thing isnt 'good' but he could be pulling a Zap Branigan and actually think that he really IS responsible for resolving the situation, or he could just admit to being upstaged and be repremanded for it (which would make him dislike the PCs even more). as for making him evil down the line, it sounds like it really could work. after a few more adventures where the PCs make him look bad/defeat him/outright foil whatever he was planning, he could just become so obsessed with getting back at them that it drives him to evil. until then, here's a suggestion: some NPC (a rogue perhaps) gets caught doing something thats a serious offense (very serious), and is sentanced to death, but is of some good alignment, or is more useful alive for some reason, and in helping him escape, the PCs earn the ire of this particular paladin.
Timespike
12-02-06, 06:45 PM It sounds like this particular jerk would be better off as a corrupt avenger, not a paladin. Paladinhood requires a level of compassion and selflessness that this spineless scumbag obviously does not posses. Watch for him to become a Blackguard, Corrupt Avenger, or, at best, maybe a Holy Liberator.

Paladins, on the whole, should either be paladins all the way or not at all. What you're looking for is a knight/cleric, not a paladin. A paladin, a true paladin, doesn't even see his life as his own property; it belongs to the weak, oppressed, terrorized, innocent, and fearful. By taking on the mantle of paladinhood, you take up the standard of goodness and honor, and should carry them with humility and dilligence for the rest of your life. A paladin's outlook has no room for racism, cruelty apathy, or self-centeredness. They will do what is right, even if it kills them. It is a hard road. It should be. Virtue, for a paladin, must be its own reward. Oh, and by the way, read the blue text in my sig.
Stormbrand
12-03-06, 12:10 PM It sounds like this particular jerk would be better off as a corrupt avenger, not a paladin. Paladinhood requires a level of compassion and selflessness that this spineless scumbag obviously does not posses. Watch for him to become a Blackguard, Corrupt Avenger, or, at best, maybe a Holy Liberator.

Paladins, on the whole, should either be paladins all the way or not at all. What you're looking for is a knight/cleric, not a paladin. A paladin, a true paladin, doesn't even see his life as his own property; it belongs to the weak, oppressed, terrorized, innocent, and fearful. By taking on the mantle of paladinhood, you take up the standard of goodness and honor, and should carry them with humility and dilligence for the rest of your life. A paladin's outlook has no room for racism, cruelty apathy, or self-centeredness. They will do what is right, even if it kills them. It is a hard road. It should be. Virtue, for a paladin, must be its own reward. Oh, and by the way, read the blue text in my sig.

Once more Timespike I salute you, you are now officially the authority on paladins. :bow:

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Werrwaaa 11-23-06, 12:28 AM	So the PCs just finished there first little adventure and made it to level two! They met the first villain i expect and would like to be recurring. He is a Paladin of the Silver Flame (Eberron game mind you). He is Lawful Good, but has his flaws that make him a "bad guy". He is a bit racist, and egotistical, controlling, and generally just not a nice man. The PCs just saved a town from a mysterious plauge that this Paladin was there to quarantine and cure, but couldn't. When he reports back to the church, he will take as much credit as he can get away with, and maybe even get the PCs jobs through the church, but always nefarious and dangerous ones. What can a LG Paladin do to antagonize a party of good and neutral character?
Sabular 11-23-06, 04:57 AM	He could be extremely judgemental to anyone who isn't exactly his kind of good. thus in the traditional "should we kill the babies of this evil race" dilemma he would choose one option (probably the harsher kill option) and declare anyone who doesn't make the same choice as, if not outright evil, at least as dangerously neglicent etc. Combine this with a personal grudge against the pc's (for stealing his thunder in the quarantain/curing of the disease) that makes the paladin constantly whatch the pc's to slip up (he won't make false incriminations or frame the pc's, just pay them very special attention). And once the pc's make a mistake he will publicly announce their failure and dubious moral fabric, waging a pr war. This way a deep-rooted vendetta between the paladin and the pc's can form.
Stormbrand 11-23-06, 05:00 PM	So the PCs just finished there first little adventure and made it to level two! They met the first villain i expect and would like to be recurring. He is a Paladin of the Silver Flame (Eberron game mind you). He is Lawful Good, but has his flaws that make him a "bad guy". He is a bit racist, and egotistical, controlling, and generally just not a nice man. The PCs just saved a town from a mysterious plauge that this Paladin was there to quarantine and cure, but couldn't. When he reports back to the church, he will take as much credit as he can get away with, and maybe even get the PCs jobs through the church, but always nefarious and dangerous ones. What can a LG Paladin do to antagonize a party of good and neutral character? Leeching credit? Isn't that dishonesty? Punishing others out of jealousy or personal reasons full stop, chaotic or evil act. Racism = persecuting others unfairly, an affront to both law and good. These all have to be fairly mild to be a paladin. What he could do is have the PCs infiltrate a cult, and then encounter the PCs and deal with them as he would true cultists. Suddenly the PCs are opposing paladins who aren't holding back. If the PCs don't hold back, then they have dead paladins on their hands, which then leads to all sorts of legal problems.
JulesCARV 11-23-06, 06:19 PM	One approach would be to have a CG lycanthrope spellcaster type (say, a wererat gnome cleric of Sovereign Host or... whatever) who spends most of her time in Lammania, but occassionally planeshifts to Eberron to keep an eye on things and advise people who need it. The wererat notices the PC's mission, shifts to Eberron to help them out secretly, but the paladin notices. The paladin (especially if Aundairan) is not going to be pleased with this idea, and basically says that if the lycanthrope ever comes back from Lammania again, he'll kill her on sight, and the PCs will be held responsible for sheltering such a monster. The problem is, this requires a level 9+ lycanthrope cleric, which is something like ECL 12, which is legendary by Eberron standards and would hardly view most paladins of the Silver Flame as a threat. Maybe if there were a planeshift-casting item or something, or some secret way the cleric knew to traverse the planes without using level 5 spells.
Allthegoodnamesweretaken 11-23-06, 08:47 PM	I think that a paladin antagonist has to be approached from a completely different standpoint than any other sort of antagonist. The Paladin will still be a paladin, you can't go around being hateful/spiteful and so forth and still remain a paladin. So what do you do? Make the paladin a rival type of antagonist! Have the paladin constantly trying to outdo the PCs and beat them to solving the quest. Having the paladin manage to beat the PCs to the punch on a quest or two and humiliate them a bit would be a good way to make the PCs dislike the paladin a bit and build up a good rivalry.
TheAnthroDM 11-24-06, 03:04 PM	Where in the nine hells does it say that you can't hate and be good? :confused: If the group includes any lycanthropes, shifters or otherwise "evil" races, it would be extremely easy to do. Otherwise you are best to stick with the Rivaling standpoint. After all, if evil can rival other evil, good can rival other good.
Werrwaaa 11-24-06, 04:39 PM	Thanks for the suggestions guys! Keep 'em coming. :)
Stormbrand 11-26-06, 12:05 PM	Where in the nine hells does it say that you can't hate and be good? :confused: If the group includes any lycanthropes, shifters or otherwise "evil" races, it would be extremely easy to do. Otherwise you are best to stick with the Rivaling standpoint. After all, if evil can rival other evil, good can rival other good. It doesn't say it in the Nine Hells, it says it in the Celestial Realms. ;) But serioiusly now, hatred is possible, harmful selfishness is not. Mostly the paladin would speak out against the party's less respectable choices, making it harder for the group to gain respect. He would not do this out of spite, but he is offended by all the good press the PCs get when he knows the dark side about them, and he feels people are entitled to make a balanced judgement. He would usually just pressure the church to withold support for the party, on the belief that the behaviour of the party would put good men at risk. Think, not spite, suspiscion. Then you have an antagonist paladin. A good motive for paladins is suspiscion. He could give the PCs dangerous jobs on the logic that it is "better than risking the lives of good men."
SageBahamut 11-26-06, 03:22 PM	The idea of making him extremely paranoid also works. It's not evil if it's a derangement (and can't be helped). The best example I've ever seen of doing horrible things in a good name is the Children of the Light from "The Wheel of Time". They honestly believe they're doing the world a favor by killing people who can use magic. Of course, they honestly believe they're doing people a favor by stabbing women and children. But in their own minds they're LG (which, if I'm not mistaken, is how Eberron reckons alignment - by your belief in yourself and your internal moral character). He could be of the type that believes anyone who isn't perfect isn't Good enough. "Yes, you're a fellow paladin, but... you /did/ accept a share of the treasure, while I have Vow of Poverty, so you're not LG /enough/... SMITE!" etc. etc. Works even better if he PrC's into Shadowbane Inquisitor later. And yes, it's valid for him to be suspicious of the PC's, especially if they are actually of questionable morality. Salem witch trials, anyone? Political oneupsmanship combined with religious fervor... never a good thing.
Gorillastyle 11-26-06, 09:52 PM	Here is another option. In order for the Paladin to be an effective antagonist he simply needs to believe that the party is truly evil or that they are lawbreakers – or both. Since I will assume the party isn’t breaking any laws intentionally, you could easily have them enter a province, village, city, etc… where they break some law unknowingly, and then proceed to resist arrest/flee justice (possibly without them knowing it is the hand of justice they face/resist/run from). Or they could be framed. Eventually they might straighten it out, but it will be very complicated. I have a currently low-level adventure which has multiple story arcs running thru it. A larger over-arc is an aggressive city-state (think Germany just prior to WW2) who has been building a large army of warforged (it is a homebrew) and looking into occult and technological sources of military power. The party will run into a small group of them at a encampment /weapons facility that is also the site of an ancient tomb that holds several powerful relics from long ago – these are powerful magic items which will grow in power with the PC’s (and thus won’t be just discarded when a “better” item comes along). What they won’t know is that these items will be tainted with evil, and so is the party from having spent several weeks in a heavily tainted area. They can eventually remove the taint from most of the items, but they have to first identify the issue. At any rate, the primary antagonist I will introduce to the players is a paladin who will believe thoroughly in the evil-ness of the party. Not only will they have probably killed several of his country-men. But when he does the obligatory ‘detect evil’ on them… viola! He is certain of their wickedness and won’t be easily swayed to give them the benefit of the doubt or bother to check again. I don't plan on telling the PCs this outright, but I will make it obvious that he has used detect evil on them and they've been marked for elimination.
Crinos 11-27-06, 01:29 PM	Maybe down the road he could become a blackguard or a Paladin of Tyranny? Also, would it be inappropriate to suggest Dominic Deegans Siegfried or the order of the sticks Miko as example of "noble" knights who are also complete a-holes.
Reversefigure4 11-27-06, 05:56 PM	Or you could make a GOOD Paladin. Good, Good, Good, with the alignment Annoying Good. He doesn't take credit for their deeds, because that would be wrong. Instead, it's "I would like to thank the League of Heros for stopping those goblins... I was very surprised they managed it despite not being Paladins." He's pious to the point of total obnoxiousness, forever attempting to encourage the group to be more morally pure like him.
CheeseMan 11-28-06, 05:17 PM	yeah, the 'taking as much credit as possible' thing isnt 'good' but he could be pulling a Zap Branigan and actually think that he really IS responsible for resolving the situation, or he could just admit to being upstaged and be repremanded for it (which would make him dislike the PCs even more). as for making him evil down the line, it sounds like it really could work. after a few more adventures where the PCs make him look bad/defeat him/outright foil whatever he was planning, he could just become so obsessed with getting back at them that it drives him to evil. until then, here's a suggestion: some NPC (a rogue perhaps) gets caught doing something thats a serious offense (very serious), and is sentanced to death, but is of some good alignment, or is more useful alive for some reason, and in helping him escape, the PCs earn the ire of this particular paladin.
Timespike 12-02-06, 06:45 PM	It sounds like this particular jerk would be better off as a corrupt avenger, not a paladin. Paladinhood requires a level of compassion and selflessness that this spineless scumbag obviously does not posses. Watch for him to become a Blackguard, Corrupt Avenger, or, at best, maybe a Holy Liberator. Paladins, on the whole, should either be paladins all the way or not at all. What you're looking for is a knight/cleric, not a paladin. A paladin, a true paladin, doesn't even see his life as his own property; it belongs to the weak, oppressed, terrorized, innocent, and fearful. By taking on the mantle of paladinhood, you take up the standard of goodness and honor, and should carry them with humility and dilligence for the rest of your life. A paladin's outlook has no room for racism, cruelty apathy, or self-centeredness. They will do what is right, even if it kills them. It is a hard road. It should be. Virtue, for a paladin, must be its own reward. Oh, and by the way, read the blue text in my sig.
Stormbrand 12-03-06, 12:10 PM	It sounds like this particular jerk would be better off as a corrupt avenger, not a paladin. Paladinhood requires a level of compassion and selflessness that this spineless scumbag obviously does not posses. Watch for him to become a Blackguard, Corrupt Avenger, or, at best, maybe a Holy Liberator. Paladins, on the whole, should either be paladins all the way or not at all. What you're looking for is a knight/cleric, not a paladin. A paladin, a true paladin, doesn't even see his life as his own property; it belongs to the weak, oppressed, terrorized, innocent, and fearful. By taking on the mantle of paladinhood, you take up the standard of goodness and honor, and should carry them with humility and dilligence for the rest of your life. A paladin's outlook has no room for racism, cruelty apathy, or self-centeredness. They will do what is right, even if it kills them. It is a hard road. It should be. Virtue, for a paladin, must be its own reward. Oh, and by the way, read the blue text in my sig. Once more Timespike I salute you, you are now officially the authority on paladins. :bow: