| Post/Author/DateTime | Post |
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| EvilVegan07-05-07, 11:15 AM | If someone is trying to kill you and you charm them, they now treat you as a trusted friend and ally. Ok, so they stop trying to kill you. But what if they're a lawful evil soldier and their commanding officer orders them to kill you? They would normally kill their trusted friend or ally if ordered to do so, so does this spell override their natural predisposition towards killing their friends? Or more importantly, this came up when my party was trying to get past some guards who were forbidden from letting anyone entering without proper identification (which they didn't have). They charmed the guard and asked to be let in, and in a very friendly manner the guard told the "no". Charm Person Enchantment (Charm) [Mind-Affecting] Level: Brd 1, Sor/Wiz 1 Components: V, S Casting Time: 1 standard action Range: Close (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels) Target: One humanoid creature Duration: 1 hour/level Saving Throw: Will negates Spell Resistance: Yes This charm makes a humanoid creature regard you as its trusted friend and ally (treat the target’s attitude as friendly). If the creature is currently being threatened or attacked by you or your allies, however, it receives a +5 bonus on its saving throw. The spell does not enable you to control the charmed person as if it were an automaton, but it perceives your words and actions in the most favorable way. You can try to give the subject orders, but you must win an opposed Charisma check to convince it to do anything it wouldn’t ordinarily do. (Retries are not allowed.) An affected creature never obeys suicidal or obviously harmful orders, but it might be convinced that something very dangerous is worth doing. Any act by you or your apparent allies that threatens the charmed person breaks the spell. You must speak the person’s language to communicate your commands, or else be good at pantomiming. |
| jaelis07-05-07, 11:23 AM | I'd say you could stop a soldier ordered to kill you, unless the soldier were fanatically loyal to his commander, which the soldier you describe sounds like he is. In that case, I'd probably call for an opposed Cha check. And I probably would have let the party get past your guards with an opposed Cha check. That sounds like getting them to do something they wouldn't ordinarily do, but it's not suicidal or obviously harmful. |
| Vegepygmy07-05-07, 01:35 PM | But what if they're a lawful evil soldier and their commanding officer orders them to kill you? They would normally kill their trusted friend or ally if ordered to do so...If they would normally do so, then yeah, they'd still do so under the influence of charm person. But not all Lawful Evil soldiers would do so. In fact, most would not, IMO. Or more importantly, this came up when my party was trying to get past some guards who were forbidden from letting anyone entering without proper identification (which they didn't have). They charmed the guard and asked to be let in, and in a very friendly manner the guard told the "no".I agree with Jaelis. Your instincts were right (the PCs don't automatically get in), but a decent Bluff should be enough to persuade the guard. |
| Seeker9507-05-07, 02:51 PM | But what if they're a lawful evil soldier and their commanding officer orders them to kill you?1. If your opponent is a career soldier, you're dead*. 2. If your opponent is weak-willed, you're dead*. I would suggest your opponent must make a will check against the charisma of the ordering officer in order to overcome the command. *Dead = attacked and, if successful, dead. |
| lukelightning07-05-07, 02:59 PM | I guess charm spells are now useless, because lawful evilcreatures will kill you if they've been ordered, and Chaotic Evil creatures will kill you because they don't care about friendship. :confused: |
| Seeker9507-05-07, 03:38 PM | I guess charm spells are now uselessYou're right, if... the only folks you ever encounter are lawful or chaotic evil, and *all* of the lawful evil characters are in the military, and *all of the LE military opponents have a commanding officer present, and *all* of the LE military opponents' commanders order them to kill you, and *all* of your chaotic evil opponents are also sociopaths. In my game, the PCs tend to meet lots of non-evil NPCs, some of them that would even count as opponents. Furthermore, some of the spellcasting PCs with access to charm person use this spell outside of combat. Not at all useless in my game. |
| DarkPawn07-05-07, 03:41 PM | I'm a bit confused here. What does alignment at all have to do with how you feel about a friend? I don't care if you're evil or good, a friend is a friend. A good example of this would be Caramon and Raistlin from Dragonlance. Raistlin was without a doubt evil, but he would not allow his brother to die out of love. If you charm someone and they are evil, they now consider you a friend. So why on earth would they want to kill you, no matter what they've been ordered? |
| Seeker9507-05-07, 04:27 PM | If you charm someone and they are evil, they now consider you a friend. So why on earth would they want to kill you, no matter what they've been ordered?It is not that a LE charmed opponent would *want* to kill you. It is that a LE charmed opponent might still be duty-bound to kill you despite their wants. It is not because they are evil as much as it is that they are lawful. Your "average" lawful evil charmed opponent could not be ordered to kill you. But add to it the command structure of the military, the importance of following orders, and the lack of a moral reason for opposing orders (versus a personal reason, that is). |
| DarkPawn07-05-07, 04:41 PM | It is not that a LE charmed opponent would *want* to kill you. It is that a LE charmed opponent might still be duty-bound to kill you despite their wants. It is not because they are evil as much as it is that they are lawful. Your "average" lawful evil charmed opponent could not be ordered to kill you. But add to it the command structure of the military, the importance of following orders, and the lack of a moral reason for opposing orders (versus a personal reason, that is). Frankly I still don't see a big debate here. If anything they would not act, because that type of decision is not an easy one. I'm a pretty lawful person but if I caught my mother stealing, and the punishment was death, I wouldn't be jumping to a decision on what to do anytime soon. I really don't see the person doing anything with that type of conflict. They won't kill you, they won't turn on their boss. They will basically do nothing because they have conflicting emotions. Sounds like real life to me. I don't see the point of reading anymore into it then necessary when you deal with this spell. It makes someone that would normally want to smash your face in like you. So they don't smash your face in. Unless you have them do something so unlike themself... for example: -ask the paladin to stomp that puppy -ask the druid to burn down that forest -ask a wizard to burn his spellbooks |
| DocBeard07-05-07, 05:09 PM | Would you risk your job and future employment prospects because your best friend wanted to see the inside of the highly-secure area you're guarding? Especially if he's in the company of unsavory people who *aren't* your friends. (Some people might, others might not, but I hardly think it's unreasonable to suggest that you might think twice.) Putting limits on what Charm Person can accomplish hardly makes it useless. It just makes it, well, not a Dominate Person spell. |
| DarkPawn07-05-07, 05:15 PM | Would you risk your job and future employment prospects because your best friend wanted to see the inside of the highly-secure area you're guarding? No I wouldn't, but the OP was asking if it would stop someone from killing you. Which I honestly believe it would, as long as you aren't doing anything else to provoke them. If they were ordered to guard the highly-secure area, not let anyone in, and kill anyone who finds out about...and you cast charm person on them (them being LE), what would happen? I think he would say, "Okay, Bob, get the hell out of here and I'll pretend you didn't just stumble onto this place cause you're my friend." This doesn't mean he won't report the incident to his boss and except his punishment, since that would be the lawful thing to do afterall...but you can't expect someone to just kill people because they are lawful. Now if you tried to get past the aforementioned person I think the charm spell is a moot point now. |
| Wrong07-05-07, 05:28 PM | Ok, so they stop trying to kill you. But what if they're a lawful evil soldier and their commanding officer orders them to kill you? They would normally kill their trusted friend or ally if ordered to do so, so does this spell override their natural predisposition towards killing their friends?I'd say it depends if the commanding officer is present or not. The soldier is lawful and considers you as a "trusted friend and ally". If the officer is not present, the soldier will search for a solution with you to not killing you (order you to beat him until he's unconscious and flee or something else). If the officer is present, perhaps he will try to kill the officer instead, it really depends on the relation between the officer and the soldier. Maybe its here that a Charisma check can solve the situation. Or more importantly, this came up when my party was trying to get past some guards who were forbidden from letting anyone entering without proper identification (which they didn't have). They charmed the guard and asked to be let in, and in a very friendly manner the guard told the "no".Personally, I do not consider that someone who doesn't respect my sense of duty or honor can be called a trusted friend or ally. I think it's the case where you have to convince the target that "something dangerous is worth doing". In this case, it's "dangerous" for the target's self-esteem ;) |
| DocBeard07-05-07, 07:57 PM | No I wouldn't, but the OP was asking if it would stop someone from killing you. Which I honestly believe it would, as long as you aren't doing anything else to provoke them. Yeah, there I would tend to agree, though there are probably circumstances where it would be different. (Mind you, if every Charm Person target ends up being the sort of psychotic who would gleefully murder his best friends, then the players will rightly call foul.) |
| ArcTan07-05-07, 08:26 PM | If someone is trying to kill you and you charm them, they now treat you as a trusted friend and ally. Ok, so they stop trying to kill you. But what if they're a lawful evil soldier and their commanding officer orders them to kill you? They would normally kill their trusted friend or ally if ordered to do so, so does this spell override their natural predisposition towards killing their friends? No, but you can make an opposed Cha check. Or more importantly, this came up when my party was trying to get past some guards who were forbidden from letting anyone entering without proper identification (which they didn't have). They charmed the guard and asked to be let in, and in a very friendly manner the guard told the "no". Again, opposed Cha check. That's what it's there for. |
| Seeker9507-06-07, 08:30 AM | No I wouldn't, but the OP was asking if it would stop someone from killing you.Not exactly. The OP asked:Ok, so they stop trying to kill you. But what if they're a lawful evil soldier and their commanding officer orders them to kill you? They would normally kill their trusted friend or ally if ordered to do so, so does this spell override their natural predisposition towards killing their friends?The extra information: lawful evil, soldier, commanding officer, orders to kill adds sufficient context to answer the specific question. We don't have to "read more into it". The OP gave us exactly what we need. |
| EvilVegan07-06-07, 08:41 AM | I'm a bit confused here. What does alignment at all have to do with how you feel about a friend? I don't care if you're evil or good, a friend is a friend. A good example of this would be Caramon and Raistlin from Dragonlance. Raistlin was without a doubt evil, but he would not allow his brother to die out of love. If you charm someone and they are evil, they now consider you a friend. So why on earth would they want to kill you, no matter what they've been ordered?Have you read any dragon lance? :D Raistlin killed Caramon in his rise to become a wizard. It was an illusory double of Caramon, but he killed him without knowing that. Not only would he let Caramon die, he would kill him himself if he was in his way. Frankly I still don't see a big debate here. If anything they would not act, because that type of decision is not an easy one. I'm a pretty lawful person but if I caught my mother stealing, and the punishment was death, I wouldn't be jumping to a decision on what to do anytime soon.Are you EVIL? Are you a member of a highly regimented and evil society where that is the real penalty? (death isn't currently a penalty of theft in any society I know of) I really don't see the person doing anything with that type of conflict. They won't kill you, they won't turn on their boss. They will basically do nothing because they have conflicting emotions. Sounds like real life to me.But this isn't real life? :) -ask the paladin to stomp that puppy -ask the druid to burn down that forest -ask a wizard to burn his spellbooksIs the puppy evil? The paladin is LAWFUL GOOD and furthermore has a code of conduct that needs to be observed, even if his friends and allies are asking him to ignore it. Is the forest harming nature? The druid has his own oaths that he isn't going to ignore just because his friends are asking him too. There is no reason a wizard would burn his spellbook if asked by his friend or ally, unless they could convince him that it was necessary for their survival (charisma check) and then it would still come down to the alignment of the wizard in question. You are ignoring the fact that trained military typically don't question orders and that furthermore a lawful evil soldier would question their orders even less. If they were ordered to guard the highly-secure area, not let anyone in, and kill anyone who finds out about...and you cast charm person on them (them being LE), what would happen? I think he would say, "Okay, Bob, get the hell out of here and I'll pretend you didn't just stumble onto this place cause you're my friend." This doesn't mean he won't report the incident to his boss and except his punishment, since that would be the lawful thing to do afterall...but you can't expect someone to just kill people because they are lawful. Now if you tried to get past the aforementioned person I think the charm spell is a moot point now.Do you know what EVIL is? Every person in the situations you've described has been either good or neutral in alignment (and somewhat chaotic). But yes, a civilian, even if evil and under orders, would probably refrain from killing their friends. A soldier however in the above situation would kill his friend or at the very least have him detained. In a lawful evil military there is a good chance that failing to follow orders would result in the death of the soldier, ie "something dangerous". |
| DarkPawn07-06-07, 11:58 AM | Do you know what EVIL is? Every person in the situations you've described has been either good or neutral in alignment (and somewhat chaotic). Do you know what evil is? Do you honestly think an evil person can't love, can't have friends, has to "ALWAYS" act evil, and never show any kindness or compassion? From your experience do people playing good "ALWAYS" do things good, never act evil or neutral? What is your point by this? My point is simply that whether you're evil or good, a friend is a friend. For an evil person they may even be more defensive of their friends because it is hard for them to trust someone that much in the first place. Alignment in the game is a generalized rule of how someone should act. It is not an end all rule of how you have to act. I think you and I have two very different ideas of how an alignment should be played. Lawful Evil means you generally obey laws and will generally do whatever it takes to get ahead. Sounds like most CEO's of companies and yes, I pretty much am Lawful Evil. I follow laws, and enforce them...but really don't care about anyone but myself and my family. I would do just about everything legally, no matter what the ethics, to get ahead. What would you consider that? However, I'm extremely loyal to my friends and wouldn't shoot someone in the head if someone higher ranking told me to. Evil isn't the monster in the closet, it isn't Freddy, or psychopath killers, it can be the guy next door. You are the one that doesn't seem to understand what evil is. I deal with people like this everyday. Perhaps you and I have very different views of what evil is, or perhaps you're just extremely naive. I don't know. |
| DarkPawn07-06-07, 12:06 PM | Have you read any dragon lance? :D Raistlin killed Caramon in his rise to become a wizard. It was an illusory double of Caramon, but he killed him without knowing that. Not only would he let Caramon die, he would kill him himself if he was in his way. You're ignoring the grand finale of the the battle against a god? Okay whatever, for those that haven't read the books I'm not going into it. You're obviously the one that didn't read enough Dragonlance to make this comment. You are ignoring the fact that trained military typically don't question orders and that furthermore a lawful evil soldier would question their orders even less. Oh my god dude, have you ever served in any military or para-military organization? They typically don't question orders? All we do is ***** about orders. Don't believe what you read and watch on television. That is make believe. |
| Elana07-06-07, 12:13 PM | Ah, but the DL grand finale wasn't so much brotherly love (no matter what caramon might say) Raistlin just didn't want to be the god of a destroyed dead world, and saw a better way. (Even if it took him a long time to get out of the Abyss again) But on the matter on hand. If the character in question has a INT of over 6 and isn't a total delusional psycopath, he wouldn't kill a friend. (Friends are hard to come by and extremely usefull. In an extreme situation he might use non lethal forms of combat. For example if the character is currently busy hitting another friend of the charmed person. (Assuming he still doesn't make his save)) |
| Seeker9507-06-07, 12:32 PM | Oh my god dude, have you ever served in any military or para-military organization? They typically don't question orders? All we do is ***** about orders.But how many of you in the military are lawful evil? How many are even lawful? Humans are typically neutral. They do the right thing when someone is looking. And when nobody is looking, they do the right thing if it doesn't cause them to have to go out of their way. Think about a mafia hit man ordered by his boss to kill his friend. In front of the boss. Do you think the mafia hit man is going to say no? |
| DarkPawn07-06-07, 12:47 PM | But how many of you in the military are lawful evil? How many are even lawful? Humans are typically neutral. They do the right thing when someone is looking. And when nobody is looking, they do the right thing if it doesn't cause them to have to go out of their way. Think about a mafia hit man ordered by his boss to kill his friend. In front of the boss. Do you think the mafia hit man is going to say no? Well considering you or I have no real justification to answer that I won't even bother. People are not black and white. They aren't classified by alignments because alignments are just silly concepts. Which brings me back to the main point. An alignment is a general rule for how someone will generally act. Your example of the mafia hit man (again too much television) is a perfect one. Sure he may kill someone (even a friend), but he goes home and loves his family. He will take a bullet for his child or wife. This all reinforces the fact that an evil person can and will care about other people, and often do. If you want to argue rules and say chaotic evil must always break laws, and kill people, that is fine. I disagree but I have the right to do so. The main issue was how charm person should affect an evil character as opposed to a good or neutral character. For the sake of simplicity and just plain common sense, it shouldn't be any different. You charm someone, they won't kill you unless you absolutely force them to. End of story. |
| Seeker9507-06-07, 02:51 PM | Your example of the mafia hit man (again too much television) is a perfect one. Sure he may kill someone (even a friend), but he goes home and loves his family.But the OP did not ask if charm person will make an opponent go home and kill his family. He asked if charm person will prevent a lawful evil soldier from following a direct order to kill you. You are ignoring the OP, ignoring the context of our answers, and ignoring the content of our answers. If you do much more ignoring, I suspect it will not be *our* answers that get ignored. |
| DarkPawn07-06-07, 03:51 PM | But the OP did not ask if charm person will make an opponent go home and kill his family. He asked if charm person will prevent a lawful evil soldier from following a direct order to kill you. You are ignoring the OP, ignoring the context of our answers, and ignoring the content of our answers. If you do much more ignoring, I suspect it will not be *our* answers that get ignored. What is your malfunction? I just explained that it doesn't matter what alignment you are, you're not going to kill your friend. It doesn't matter if you're Lawful Good, Lawful Neutral, Lawful Evil, Evil Evil, etc..etc... You aren't going to kill your friend because everyone has their view of what laws take priority over others. There is the law of man, there is the law of your god, there is the law of your personal emotions, there are many laws... Often laws do not mesh together...for example your god's law, or the law of your boss. So what happens here? Exactly what I've been talking about over and over. You don't do anything or at the worse, you make a check to see if you would ignore your order or kill your friend. Someone clearly pointed this out as a valid RAW option. When your personal moral code and direct orders conflict, this is when you make a roll. What is so hard to figure out about this? And why do you keep saying I'm ignoring the OP. Are you just trying to irritate me or are you this daft? |
| ssvegeta55507-06-07, 04:02 PM | Why not just flip a coin? This is obviously a grey area in how to solve the situation. |
| DarkPawn07-06-07, 04:09 PM | Why not just flip a coin? This is obviously a grey area in how to solve the situation. I honestly don't think so at all. Reading the spell it says the target will view the person who cast it as a friend. Take out all alignment factors (since there are many combinations), what will happen if they were ordered to kill their friend? As I stated, at the very minimum they will have a moral crisis. They will then make another save by RAW, if they are ordered to do something against their nature. I think this goes both ways, whether ordered by the person who charmed them, or by someone who is telling them to kill the person who charmed them. Now add your personal view of how someone of <insert alignment> should act, that is where the difference in opinion comes about. I honestly don't understand how people think evil characters are always evil, kill babies, betray friends, murder relatives, etc..etc.. This is not a written rule on playing evil. Actually look at someone like Lord Soth, the guy was more honorable then many good characters. He would keep his word, and honor agreements. Now look at Robin Hood, who would you rather make a verbal contract with? I think the key issue is how people view alignments. They basically feel that the way they view an alignment acting, is how everyone should view that alignment. This is wrong, very very wrong. You can play chaotic evil as a sociopath murdering, walking around killing everyone. That would be legit, but I can play a guy who is openly kind, behaves in such, then in secret murders you and your family. Heck the fact that you're acting lawful one moment, then the next chaotic, then perhaps neutral, would definately fit into a chaotic personality. |
| EvilVegan07-06-07, 04:18 PM | What is your malfunction? I just explained that it doesn't matter what alignment you are, you're not going to kill your friend. It doesn't matter if you're Lawful Good, Lawful Neutral, Lawful Evil, Evil Evil, etc..etc... You aren't going to kill your friend because everyone has their view of what laws take priority over others. There is the law of man, there is the law of your god, there is the law of your personal emotions, there are many laws... Often laws do not mesh together...for example your god's law, or the law of your boss. So what happens here? Exactly what I've been talking about over and over. You don't do anything or at the worse, you make a check to see if you would ignore your order or kill your friend. Someone clearly pointed this out as a valid RAW option. When your personal moral code and direct orders conflict, this is when you make a roll. What is so hard to figure out about this? And why do you keep saying I'm ignoring the OP. Are you just trying to irritate me or are you this daft?You are Lawful Evil and if you don't kill your friend you will be killed for disobeying a direct order. Make a decision. You can complain to your friends later "man I wish I hadn't shot my buddy, but orders are orders" but that doesn't mean you wouldn't follow through with it. Our (US) military is full of people with varying alignments, but I would say over all "it" tends towards lawful neutral (at best), with deviation from the grunts in the front-line and those behind the scenes. But D&D is set in a fantasy land where not everyone is "Neutral Chaotic-Lawful Good-Evil, depending on situation" like they are in real life. We aren't playing a relativist game where everyone thinks they're a certain way, acts a different way, and is judged a third way by other people. This is a world where I cast a spell and can know 100% what their alignment is (barring other effects to block detection) and further can bring other effects down upon them depending on that alignment. |
| DarkPawn07-06-07, 04:24 PM | You are Lawful Evil and if you don't kill your friend you will be killed for disobeying a direct order. Make a decision. You can complain to your friends later "man I wish I hadn't shot my buddy, but orders are orders" but that doesn't mean you wouldn't follow through with it. But you're assuming that you will die if you disregard the order. Like it is 100% going to happen. Who has that certainty about the future? I don't care what alignment you are, the majority of people are going to kill someone else, to save their life. It is called survival instinct. It is called duress, it is a legitimate and legal defense against murder. But the fact of the matter is you don't know for sure you're going to die in this situation. Nobody has that clarity. If your boss attacks you, you could fight back and kill him. The point is you can go back and forth on ethics, morals, mores, etc... You can read far too much information into it, you can add your own views on the subject...but why do any of this? Simply play it by the rules. You view the person as your friend and don't want to kill them. If your boss shows up and says kill him now fool, or you'll die, you make a save and see if you stick to your nature or instead follow the artificial loyalty to your friend. End of story, no debate, no personal feelings. This is how I would handle it, I wouldn't dwell on ethical issues, because you can't prove how someone would act in that situation either way. But you're all free to do whatever you want. I'm just trying to explain to the OP why I feel the way I do about my answer to his question. |
| EvilVegan07-06-07, 04:27 PM | I honestly don't understand how people think evil characters are always evil, kill babies, betray friends, murder relatives, etc..etc.. And you wonder why we're accusing you of taking us out of context! We aren't saying "when you charm a person who is lawful evil they automatically attack you because they consider you a friend and they always betray and kill their friends." We are saying "if a person is charmed who would normally kill their friends under certain limited conditions (such as being lawful evil and ordered by a superior officer)" what would happen? This is not a written rule on playing evil. Actually look at someone like Lord Soth, the guy was more honorable then many good characters. He would keep his word, and honor agreements. Now look at Robin Hood, who would you rather make a verbal contract with? Depends on the verbal contract. If I'm an evil, peasant beating bureaucrat I'd probably want to deal with Soth. If I'm a peasant suffering under said bureaucrat I'd probably want to talk to Sire Loxley. I think the key issue is how people view alignments. They basically feel that the way they view an alignment acting, is how everyone should view that alignment. This is wrong, very very wrong. You can play chaotic evil as a sociopath murdering, walking around killing everyone. That would be legit, but I can play a guy who is openly kind, behaves in such, then in secret murders you and your family. Heck the fact that you're acting lawful one moment, then the next chaotic, then perhaps neutral, would definately fit into a chaotic personality.Yes, I do think that following the rules of the PHB is how everyone should follow the rules of the PHB. If you don't want to play the way the PHB is written that's fine, but its a house rule. I personally typically don't even use alignments in my campaigns, or adjust them greatly. |
| ssvegeta55507-06-07, 04:29 PM | I honestly don't understand how people think evil characters are always evil, kill babies, betray friends, murder relatives, etc..etc.. This is not a written rule on playing evil. Actually look at someone like Lord Soth, the guy was more honorable then many good characters. He would keep his word, and honor agreements. Now look at Robin Hood, who would you rather make a verbal contract with? I think the key issue is how people view alignments. They basically feel that the way they view an alignment acting, is how everyone should view that alignment. This is wrong, very very wrong. You can play chaotic evil as a sociopath murdering, walking around killing everyone. That would be legit, but I can play a guy who is openly kind, behaves in such, then in secret murders you and your family. Heck the fact that you're acting lawful one moment, then the next evil, would definately fit into a chaotic personality. Like I said, a grey area. You said it yourself, alignment is not absolute black and white. It's blurred. I do agree with you on the whole alignment aspect. I prefer my games not to be so pretictable and governed by something as abstract as alignment. But this situation can go both ways, it really depends on many factors, like the ones you listed. But I'm more inclined to go the route where the soldier does not kill the PCs. If I remember correctly, you know when you were charmed after the effects are gone. And if that happens, that soldier will be pretty mad, and might be a recurring villian (henchman?). And it could even make it harder to charm that particular soldier in the future. |
| EvilVegan07-06-07, 04:29 PM | But you're assuming that you will die if you disregard the order. Like it is 100% going to happen. Who has that certainty about the future? I don't care what alignment you are, the majority of people are going to kill someone else, to save their life. It is called survival instinct. It is called duress, it is a legitimate and legal defense against murder.YOU don't care, D&D ruleset does. But the fact of the matter is you don't know for sure you're going to die in this situation. Nobody has that clarity. If your boss attacks you, you could fight back and kill him. But you wouldn't do so if you were LAWFUL evil. The point is you can go back and forth on ethics, morals, mores, etc... You can read far too much information into it, you can add your own views on the subject...but why do any of this? Simply play it by the rules. You view the person as your friend and don't want to kill them. If your boss shows up and says kill him now fool, or you'll die, you make a save and see if you stick to your nature or instead follow the artificial loyalty to your friend. End of story, no debate, no personal feelings. This is how I would handle it, I wouldn't dwell on ethical issues, because you can't prove how someone would act in that situation either way. But you're all free to do whatever you want. I'm just trying to explain to the OP why I feel the way I do about my answer to his question.Fair enough. Its actually a charisma check, not another save (but close enough). |
| Seeker9507-06-07, 04:35 PM | EvilVegan, If the soldier is a hobgoblin, and his commanding officer is there, your charm person will not help stop him from attacking you. Orders are orders, and hobgoblins know that there is no such thing as a disobeyable order. Better to cast it on the commanding officer. |
| DarkPawn07-06-07, 05:07 PM | We are saying "if a person is charmed who would normally kill their friends under certain limited conditions (such as being lawful evil and ordered by a superior officer)" what would happen? Two things and I'm done with this. One, do you impose these rigid alignment rules on your players or just your NPCs? I'm curious because I have never seen a group of players that constantly without error, play their alignment exactly as the rules say they should. You've never seen lawful good characters argue over a magical item for example? Number two, from PHB and I quote, "A creature's general moral and personal attitudes are represented by its alignment:..." +and continued...."Alignment is a tool for developing your character's identity. It is not a straitjacket for restricting your character. Each alignment represents a broad range of personality types or personal philosophies, so two lawful good characters can still be quite different from each other. In addition, few people are completely consistent. A lawful good character may have a greedy streak that occasionally tempts him to take something or hoard something he has, even if that's not lawful or good behavior. People are also not consistent from day to day. A good character can lose his temper, a neutral character can be inspired to perform a noble act, as so on." +and straight under lawful evil, "Some evil villains have particular taboos, such as not killing in cold blood or not letting children come to harm."...or perhaps, not killing their friends? So who is not reading RAW? Where do you see a lawful evil character will kill their friends typically all the time? You show me where it says lawful evil characters will generally kill their friends if ordered to and I will shut up. You're putting your personal feelings of how this alignment should act and thrusting it upon me. Please refrain from doing so. |
| Vegepygmy07-06-07, 05:11 PM | I don't care what alignment you are, the majority of people are going to kill someone else, to save their life. It is called survival instinct. It is called duress, it is a legitimate and legal defense against murder.You might want to check your hornbook there, counselor. Duress is not a defense to murder (at least, not in the United States or any other place that follows the English common law). Blackstone wrote that a man under duress "ought rather to die himself than escape by the murder of an innocent." And Lord Hailsham, noting that the essence of the duress defense is that it is better to commit the lesser of two evils, wrote (of the defense applied to murder): "Other considerations necessarily arise where the choice is between the threat of death...and deliberately taking an innocent life. In such a case a reasonable man might reflect that one innocent human life is at least as valuable as his own or that of his loved one. In such a case a man cannot claim that he is choosing the lesser of two evils. Instead he is embracing the cognate but morally disreputable principle that the end justifies the means." Here ended the lecture. :teach: |
| DarkPawn07-06-07, 05:14 PM | You might want to check your hornbook there, counselor. Duress is not a defense to murder (at least, not in the United States or any other place that follows the English common law). Blackstone wrote that a man under duress "ought rather to die himself than escape by the murder of an innocent." And Lord Hailsham, noting that the essence of the duress defense is that it is better to commit the lesser of two evils, wrote (of the defense applied to murder): "Other considerations necessarily arise where the choice is between the threat of death...and deliberately taking an innocent life. In such a case a reasonable man might reflect that one innocent human life is at least as valuable as his own or that of his loved one. In such a case a man cannot claim that he is choosing the lesser of two evils. Instead he is embracing the cognate but morally disreputable principle that the end justifies the means." Here ended the lecture. :teach: Okay first of all, I meant to put coercion, since that is this situation but duress works too. Kill that person or I kill you. That being said, you honestly think duress is not a defense you could use against performing a crime? I'm not saying it gets you off, but it is definately a defense. Duress or coercion (as a term of jurisprudence) is a possible legal defense, usually as an excuse rather than a justification, by which defendants argue that they should not be held liable because the actions that broke the law were only performed out of an immediate fear of injury. Black's Law Dictionary (6th ed.) defines duress as "any unlawful threat or coercion used... to induce another to act [or not act] in a manner [they] otherwise would not [or would]." The notion of duress must be distinguished both from undue influence in the civil law and from necessity which might be described as a form of duress by force of circumstances Are you a lawyer? By implying you're lecturing and teaching me I hope you have some legitimate right to do so. As a law enforcement officer that has seen this defense in the court room, I guess I'm hoping you have more experience then I do then. |
| Vegepygmy07-06-07, 05:22 PM | You think duress and coercion are not defenses you can use against performing a crime?No, I think duress is not a defense you can use against a charge of murder. It is a valid defense to other, lesser crimes. I'm not saying it gets you off, but it is definately a defense. If someone has a gun to your head and says pull the trigger and you do, you think that isn't a defense? Or they have a knife to your daughter's throat and order you to do the same?That is correct. If someone has a gun to your head and they order you to kill some other, innocent person or die yourself, you cannot kill that innocent person and claim the legal defense of duress as justification for your crime of murder. If someone puts a knife to your daughter's throat and orders you to kill someone else's innocent daughter or else they will slit your daughter's throat, you do not get to trade that other daughter's life for your daughter's life. That's exactly what Lord Hailsham was saying, yes. Are you a lawyer? By implying you're lecturing and teaching me I hope you have some legitimate right to do so.I am a lawyer, and in fact I practice criminal law. I assume you are not and do not. So yeah, I suppose I have the "right" to lecture you. ;) |
| DarkPawn07-06-07, 05:26 PM | No, I think duress is not a defense you can use against a charge of murder. It is a valid defense to other, lesser crimes. So as a lawyer, you're honestly going to tell me that if a defense attorney proves duress, a jury might not consider that when they deliberate on a charge? Honestly? Come on man. I guess I could go look up similar cases and see if duress ever got someone out of a murder charge but why? I can think of women claiming they were afraid their husbands would beat them, or kill them, so they killed their husband. It is not unheard of for a woman to walk from a charge because of that defense. How is this not duress? I am a lawyer, and in fact I practice criminal law. I assume you are not and do not. So yeah, I suppose I have the "right" to lecture you. ;) I don't have a juris doctorate, I am working toward my MBA...so I will humbly except your statement. I don't necessary agree though and you should know that every state has slight differences in law. For example some states have a duty to retreat, which in Wisconsin, I can assure you we don't. |
| DarkPawn07-06-07, 05:36 PM | Btw, I have to say I really enjoy these threads. I get to argue morals, rules, economic theories and now law. What fun! :D :D |
| Vegepygmy07-06-07, 05:37 PM | So as a lawyer, you're honestly going to tell me that if a defense attorney proves duress, a jury might not consider that when they deliberate on a charge?No. I'm going to tell you that it is not a legitimate and legal defense against murder, as you claimed. Juries do all kinds of things they are not supposed to do. It's called jury nullification, and it is not legitimate (though it is certainly effective). I don't have a juris doctorate, I am working toward my MBA...so I will humbly except your statement. I don't necessary agree though and you should know that every state has slight differences in law. For example some states have a duty to retreat, which in Wisconsin, I can assure you we don't."Duty to retreat" has nothing to do with duress. That is a self-defense issue. Duress and self-defense are entirely different defenses to crimes. You can legally kill someone who is threatening to kill you. That is a legitimate and legal defense against murder, because the person you are killing is not an innocent person. |
| DarkPawn07-06-07, 05:43 PM | No. I'm going to tell you that it is not a legitimate and legal defense against murder, as you claimed. Wow you are a lawyer. Okay, let me rephrase my statement, "Duress or coercion are defenses against murder, which could get you off the hook legally if a jury decides so." :P "Duty to retreat" has nothing to do with duress. That is a self-defense issue. Duress and self-defense are entirely different defenses to crimes. I never claimed they were the same. I meant that some states have different laws and case laws. You're also not mentioning anything about case law, which one could point to as showing where duress, was used and agreed upon as defense against murder. Hey your honor, the supreme court ruled in this case, that the woman was in fear of further abuse and or death, and under that duress she killed her husband. This woman was not charged with any crimes. So hey, this is the same situation. <nudge, nudge> EDIT: I think what we have here is someone like me not using the exact law definition of legal or legitimate. I'm not a lawyer. What I meant is that it is a defense, that can get you out of being charged with murder. If you aren't charged with murder, what you did was therefore in common terms, legal. Since it wasn't illegal (because you weren't charged). By legal standards, perhaps my terminology was flawed...but the spirit of the the statement remains unchanged. If you kill someone under coercion or duress, it can and has in the past, been justification for doing so, which resulted in someone not being charged with murder. |
| Vegepygmy07-06-07, 06:02 PM | I never claimed they were the same. I meant that some states have different laws and case laws.That's why I quoted Blackstone and said "or any other place that follows the English common law." I'm not aware of any state in the U.S. that doesn't follow the English common law regarding duress as a defense to murder, but it's a possibility, sure. You're also not mentioning anything about case law, which one could point to as showing where duress, was used and agreed upon as defense against murder.I didn't want to cite any case law because (1) this is totally off-topic anyway and (2) case law varies from state to state, as you recognize. Suffice it to say that I'm not aware of any case law in any state that legitimizes duress as a defense to murder. And there's very, very good reason why that is so. Blackstone and Hailsham were absolutely right: my life is every bit as precious as yours, so why should I be allowed to save myself at your expense? Where is the justice in that? Hey your honor, the supreme court ruled in this case, that the woman was in fear of further abuse and or death, and under that duress she killed her husband.That's not duress. That's self-defense. This is duress: "Hey your honor, the woman's husband told her that if she didn't kill her daughter, he would kill the woman, and under that duress, she killed her daughter." EDIT: I think what we have here is someone like me not using the exact law definition of legal or legitimate. I'm not a lawyer. What I meant is that it is a defense, that can get you out of being charged with murder.So is: "I ate too many Twinkies." All I'm saying is that duress is not a legally recognized defense to murder. But I understand now what you meant, and I'm happy I could help you clarify your position. :) |
| gotbrain07-06-07, 06:04 PM | I don't know if anyone has posted this already but just fyi, the SRD says: "Charming another creature gives the charming character the ability to befriend and suggest courses of actions to his minion, but the servitude is not absolute or mindless. Charms of this type include the various charm spells. Essentially, a charmed character retains free will but makes choices according to a skewed view of the world. A charmed creature doesn’t gain any magical ability to understand his new friend’s language. A charmed character retains his original alignment and allegiances, generally with the exception that he now regards the charming creature as a dear friend and will give great weight to his suggestions and directions. A charmed character fights his former allies only if they threaten his new friend, and even then he uses the least lethal means at his disposal as long as these tactics show any possibility of success (just as he would in a fight between two actual friends). A charmed character is entitled to an opposed Charisma check against his master in order to resist instructions or commands that would make him do something he wouldn’t normally do even for a close friend. If he succeeds, he decides not to go along with that order but remains charmed. A charmed character never obeys a command that is obviously suicidal or grievously harmful to her. If the charming creature commands his minion to do something that the influenced character would be violently opposed to, the subject may attempt a new saving throw to break free of the influence altogether. A charmed character who is openly attacked by the creature who charmed him or by that creature’s apparent allies is automatically freed of the spell or effect." |
| DarkPawn07-06-07, 06:07 PM | So is: "I ate too many Twinkies." All I'm saying is that duress is not a legally recognized defense to murder. But I understand now what you meant, and I'm happy I could help you clarify your position. :) Wow, you're so lucky you didn't say "donuts" counselor. :) P.S. Now that I know there is a lawyer around, I'll watch my legal statements and make sure they are kosher. ;) Oh, out of curiosity, are you a defense attorney or prosecution? |
| Vegepygmy07-06-07, 06:30 PM | Wow, you're so lucky you didn't say "donuts" counselor. :)Oh, that wasn't a slam on cops. I was referring to this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twinkie_defense Oh, out of curiosity, are you a defense attorney or prosecution?I'm a persecutor. ;) |
| DarkPawn07-06-07, 06:32 PM | Oh, that wasn't a slam on cops. I was referring to the infamous "Twinkie Defense" -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twinkie_defense Aye I actually knew what you were talking about. Just joking with you. I love the "Twinkie Defense". I'm a persecutor. ;) Well you have my legitimate and legal respect. ;) |
| EvilVegan07-07-07, 08:09 AM | Two things and I'm done with this. One, do you impose these rigid alignment rules on your players or just your NPCs? What part of "if the NPC would normally do this" are you not understanding? I'm not saying "all NPCs are going to always do this". You are taking everything I'm saying and rewording it, then arguing against it So who is not reading RAW? Where do you see a lawful evil character will kill their friends typically all the time? What in the name is all that is holy and unholy is wrong with you? How many times do I have to say "Not ALL evil people will always do this"? :D |
| DarkPawn07-07-07, 10:45 AM | What in the name is all that is holy and unholy is wrong with you? How many times do I have to say "Not ALL evil people will always do this"? :D ...like for example, when under the influence of a charm person spell? :lightbulb |
| Seeker9507-07-07, 11:29 AM | DarkPawn, it appears you do not believe an evil person/creature would kill a friend. It appears from your replies that you believe an evil person will *never* kill a friend. I infer this because you are arguing so consistently against even the possibility that a lawful (respect for authority and order) evil (willing to harm innocents) soldier (trained to obey orders) will NOT obey a direct order to kill a friend. Is this an accurate assessment of your position? |
| DarkPawn07-07-07, 11:45 AM | DarkPawn, it appears you do not believe an evil person/creature would kill a friend. It appears from your replies that you believe an evil person will *never* kill a friend. I infer this because you are arguing so consistently against even the possibility that a lawful (respect for authority and order) evil (willing to harm innocents) soldier (trained to obey orders) will NOT obey a direct order to kill a friend. Is this an accurate assessment of your position? I believe we can't tell what any specific evil person, or any person (at all) in game would do if ordered to kill their friend. So when in doubt, roll an opposed charisma check. Make sense? Otherwise as the DM, just say, well he is evil so he attacks you and tries to kill you because I said so. Because having a lawful evil soldier attack you when ordered, even when under the influence of a charm person spell, is just that. A DM deciding that the lawful evil character would kill his friend if ordered to do so. In my opinion this is lame, and again....and I can't stress this enough, the DM putting his personal feelings of how the aforementioned character would act. If you want to go by RAW, and be as fair as possible, you could simply make an opposed charisma check. As a player I would have serious issues if my DM played word games with spells to find loop holes to screw me over. Charm Person spell since D&D was created had one purpose in mind. From Bargle the Black in the solo quest you could play in the red D&D book, to now. The person regards you as a friend and doesn't kill you. You want to change that now by reading more into it, go for it. |
| Derren S.07-07-07, 11:48 AM | Why wouldn't a LE soldier kill a friend when ordered to do so? We are not talking about some guys going to the shooting range at the weekend to call themself paramilitary organization. We are talking about people who would fit perfectly into a SS death squad or worse. Evil means that the person likes to spread fear and misery and I don't see any reason why such a person wouldn't kill a friend if ordered to do so. |
| DarkPawn07-07-07, 11:54 AM | Double Post |
| DarkPawn07-07-07, 11:56 AM | Evil means that the person likes to spread fear and misery and I don't see any reason why such a person wouldn't kill a friend if ordered to do so. ..... |
| gotbrain07-07-07, 12:07 PM | Hmm, I'll post this again since it answers the question and comes from the SRD. "A charmed character is entitled to an opposed Charisma check against his master in order to resist instructions or commands that would make him do something he wouldn’t normally do even for a close friend. If he succeeds, he decides not to go along with that order but remains charmed" |
| DarkPawn07-07-07, 12:12 PM | Hmm, I'll post this again since it answers the question and comes from the SRD. "A charmed character is entitled to an opposed Charisma check against his master in order to resist instructions or commands that would make him do something he wouldn’t normally do even for a close friend. If he succeeds, he decides not to go along with that order but remains charmed" That is not helping because they are purely focusing on what I highlighted. They are basically saying that all evil creatures would normally kill friends, so of course by that reasoning, they would still attack you. Meaning no opposed charisma check...just cause. |
| gotbrain07-07-07, 12:23 PM | Well I think the SRD agrees with both of you. Yes they would try to follow orders and attack you (depending on many circumstances) but they would have to make a charisma check to succeed. I think it only fair that a check is made to follow the role playing aspect of the game instead having all NPC's DM-dominated. |
| DarkPawn07-07-07, 12:34 PM | Well I think the SRD agrees with both of you. Yes they would try to follow orders and attack you (depending on many circumstances) but they would have to make a charisma check to succeed. I think it only fair that a check is made to follow the role playing aspect of the game instead having all NPC's DM-dominated. Yes the opposed charisma check is a solution to the debate, and was mentioned I think within four posts from the OP's. With how rare a situation like this would occur, where a LE soldier's superior officer (boss) was there telling him to kill the charmer, I wouldn't even dwell on it. For the sake of fairness, intention of the spell, spirit of the game, and just plain speed of gameplay, treat the spell the same way for any alignment. |
| Seeker9507-07-07, 03:04 PM | I believe we can't tell what any specific evil person, or any person (at all) in game would do if ordered to kill their friend. So when in doubt, roll an opposed charisma check.Fair enough, but the majority of your answers have indicated this is NOT acceptable to you -- that said LE soldier would simply disobey the order. I believe we can't tell what any specific evil Otherwise as the DM, just say, well he is evil so he attacks you and tries to kill you because I said so. Because having a lawful evil soldier attack you when ordered, even when under the influence of a charm person spell, is just that. A DM deciding that the lawful evil character would kill his friend if ordered to do so.That is the purpose of having a DM. To decide what the NPCs will do in a given situation. In my opinion this is lame, and again....and I can't stress this enough, the DM putting his personal feelings of how the aforementioned character would act.Personal feelings? Okay, I must at this time rescind my "fair enough" comment above. You start out semi-reasonable, and manage to undermine your credibility by overstating your position. If you want to go by RAW, and be as fair as possible, you could simply make an opposed charisma check.True. But you keep saying a lawful evil soldier would NOT kill a friend if given a direct order to do so. As a player I would have serious issues if my DM played word games with spells to find loop holes to screw me over.you find it impossible that an evil character might kill a friend, you find it impossible that a soldier might follow orders to kill a friend, you find it impossible that a lawful soldier might obey orders to kill a friend, you find it impossible that a lawful evil soldier might obey a direct order to kill a friend. Charm Person spell since D&D was created had one purpose in mind. From Bargle the Black in the solo quest you could play in the red D&D book, to now. The person regards you as a friend and doesn't kill you. You want to change that now by reading more into it, go for it.You accuse us of reading something into charm person, yet ignore the specific circumstantial conditions offered by the OP. Fair enough, but your insistence upon ignoring the text does not make your accusation of us reading something into it carry much validity. Personally, I find it rather stupid that someone might try to use this in combat in the first place. This spell is perfect for getting information from a non-hostile guard. It is very useful for getting a better room at the inn. It is useful for getting a shopkeeper to inform the guard that you went a direction other than where you intend to go. It will NOT cause a lawful evil soldier to completely ignore the years (and perhaps lifetime) of training he has received to obey orders or suffer the consequences. With how rare a situation like this would occur, where a LE soldier's superior officer (boss) was there telling him to kill the charmer, I wouldn't even dwell on it.Except that this was explcitily the OPs question. All the other stuff you have been dwelling on have little to do with the OP question. |
| ArcTan07-07-07, 03:08 PM | So who is not reading RAW? Where do you see a lawful evil character will kill their friends typically all the time? You show me where it says lawful evil characters will generally kill their friends if ordered to and I will shut up. You're putting your personal feelings of how this alignment should act and thrusting it upon me. Please refrain from doing so. Being willing to kill your friends when ordered to isn't Lawful *Evil*. It's just Lawful -- and very, very Lawful. Most generally Lawful people, in my view, would at least hesitate for a good long while before actually killing their best friend when ordered to. (It had better be a *pretty* damn strongly worded and important order.) You can argue that creatures designed to be Usually Lawful like Hobgoblins will therefore be a quantum leap ahead of Humans in Lawfulness -- unlike Lawful Humans, have *no* regard for things like personal attachment or friendship or loyalty -- but I don't think the PHB description is clear enough to rule that this is what must happen. FWIW, Lawful Evil has nothing to do with it. A Lawful Neutral character would kill his best friend if ordered to because he must obey orders. A Lawful Good character would do it because he must care for the greater good of all people (and the order would have to occur in a context where it was obvious killing his friend was for the greater good). A Lawful Evil character would do it because he would gain benefit from being part of the system (and it would have to occur in a context where it was obvious he would gain some kind of reward or honor for doing so). |
| ArcTan07-07-07, 03:11 PM | Yes the opposed charisma check is a solution to the debate, and was mentioned I think within four posts from the OP's. With how rare a situation like this would occur, where a LE soldier's superior officer (boss) was there telling him to kill the charmer, I wouldn't even dwell on it. For the sake of fairness, intention of the spell, spirit of the game, and just plain speed of gameplay, treat the spell the same way for any alignment. Again, it has nothing to do with alignment. If an LG Purple Dragon Knight is there and his superior is saying "Kill him! Quickly! The fate of the nation depends on it!" and he's used to situations where the fate of the nation depends on killing someone, he'd totally kill him. Hell, you can argue that if it came down to it a CG or TN character would still kill his friends if he *really had to*. In some situations CG is more likely to turn on his friends for the greater good than LG (because CG's definition of "Good" is entirely situational). There's no rule about *any* of the alignments that says this or that alignment is "more likely to kill his friends". Hell, there's a kind of LE soldier whose response to being ordered to kill his friends would be saying "You have violated the tenets of honor that bind all our people together, and are no longer worthy of your office" and then proceed to frag his superior officer. It's all situational, and claiming that there's any specific definition of, say, Lawful Evil that says "Lawful Evil characters are the ones who betray their friends to their superior officers" is doing exactly what the PHB says not to do -- making a total straitjacket out of alignment and turning each alignment into a very specific personality archetype. |
| ArcTan07-07-07, 03:13 PM | Why wouldn't a LE soldier kill a friend when ordered to do so? We are not talking about some guys going to the shooting range at the weekend to call themself paramilitary organization. We are talking about people who would fit perfectly into a SS death squad or worse. Evil means that the person likes to spread fear and misery and I don't see any reason why such a person wouldn't kill a friend if ordered to do so. Plenty of Evil people are Evil to a lot of other people but not their friends. LE doesn't mean *very* Evil, it just means you fall into the Evil scale. The obnoxious IRS auditor who enjoys prolonging your paperwork process is probably mildly LE -- it doesn't make him a killer. (Please, please, please do not quote the PHB and say that the fact that Evil "involves killing" means that you have to be a murderer to be Evil.) Again, what I protest against is turning alignment into a personality archetype and saying that every LE character looks, talks and acts a certain way. There were members of the SS who were CE, LE, NE, LN, TN, CN and maybe even Good. |
| ArcTan07-07-07, 03:14 PM | YOU don't care, D&D ruleset does. But you wouldn't do so if you were LAWFUL evil. Fair enough. Its actually a charisma check, not another save (but close enough). Again, "Lawful" doesn't mean "Perfectly Lawful". There's a wide gulf between a Lawful Human and a Modron. |
| DarkPawn07-07-07, 03:33 PM | Again, it has nothing to do with alignment. If an LG Purple Dragon Knight is there and his superior is saying "Kill him! Quickly! The fate of the nation depends on it!" and he's used to situations where the fate of the nation depends on killing someone, he'd totally kill him. Hell, you can argue that if it came down to it a CG or TN character would still kill his friends if he *really had to*. In some situations CG is more likely to turn on his friends for the greater good than LG (because CG's definition of "Good" is entirely situational). There's no rule about *any* of the alignments that says this or that alignment is "more likely to kill his friends". Hell, there's a kind of LE soldier whose response to being ordered to kill his friends would be saying "You have violated the tenets of honor that bind all our people together, and are no longer worthy of your office" and then proceed to frag his superior officer. It's all situational, and claiming that there's any specific definition of, say, Lawful Evil that says "Lawful Evil characters are the ones who betray their friends to their superior officers" is doing exactly what the PHB says not to do -- making a total straitjacket out of alignment and turning each alignment into a very specific personality archetype. Um, that is the point I've been trying to make for two days straight now. Thank you ArcTan, I was starting to lose my mind thinking the whole world had gone mad. |
| Kuronue07-07-07, 03:33 PM | The point about alignment is moot. Regardless of alignment, regardless of whatever that means, the OP said that the soldier would kill his best friend if he was commanded to do so, because that's the kind of person he is, and as charm only makes you their best friend, it's unlikely that would save you. |
| DarkPawn07-07-07, 03:41 PM | True. But you keep saying a lawful evil soldier would NOT kill a friend if given a direct order to do so. For the 100th TIME!! I don't feel anyone is any more likely to kill their friend, no matter what their alignment. Get that?? Do you GET that? you find it impossible that an evil character might kill a friend, you find it impossible that a soldier might follow orders to kill a friend, you find it impossible that a lawful soldier might obey orders to kill a friend, you find it impossible that a lawful evil soldier might obey a direct order to kill a friend. I just said that in certain situations, anyone would probably kill their friend. Did you skip that whole post and go right to what you wanted to quote and argue about? If you aren't going to read what I post then stop responding. I said it doesn't matter, under duress or coercion we all might kill our friend. Regardless, I repeat REGARDLESS of our alignment. You accuse us of reading something into charm person, yet ignore the specific circumstantial conditions offered by the OP. Oh really? Was the lawful evil soldier ordered previously, a day ago to kill you? Or was he right there demanding it? Who is reading more into it? It will NOT cause a lawful evil soldier to completely ignore the years (and perhaps lifetime) of training he has received to obey orders or suffer the consequences. ..and I totally disagree with you. I personally think you are wrong, not going by RAW, and reading far more into a "few words" in the spell, and ignoring the obvious. So what are you going to do about it? |
| DarkPawn07-07-07, 03:46 PM | Originally Posted by DarkPawn View Post With how rare a situation like this would occur, where a LE soldier's superior officer (boss) was there telling him to kill the charmer, I wouldn't even dwell on it. Except that this was explcitily the OPs question. All the other stuff you have been dwelling on have little to do with the OP question. The OP did not say the commanding officer was right there in the flesh giving the order. It was implied the orders had been given...and in his example the two guards were left with their orders to guard a door. Where are you getting that the commanding officer is right behind them yelling orders? ..and you accuse me of reading more into it? Pot calling the kettle black eh? Stop quoting me out of context. The point was in a normal situation, charm person should work no different on anyone...no matter what alignment they have. If a commanding officer "was" there, which the OP never claimed they were...then it should be no different what alignment the person has. If they fear death for disobeying a direct order, they should make an opposed charisma check. You stated your opinion that the lawful evil soldier would kill you. Well prove your point or say something to back it up. Stop arguing with me about my opinion. You're not going to change my opinion with anything you've said up to this point. So drop it, or make your point to the OP who still might be on the fence. |
| Seeker9507-07-07, 10:02 PM | The OP did not say the commanding officer was right there in the flesh giving the order. It was implied the orders had been given...and in his example the two guards were left with their orders to guard a door. Where are you getting that the commanding officer is right behind them yelling orders?From the OP:But what if they're a lawful evil soldier and their commanding officer orders them to kill you?orders. Not ordered. Not "ordered" some time in the past. Not "has a standing order". Commanding officer orders...and you accuse me of reading more into it?No. I have suggested that you are actually choosing not to read it. Stop quoting me out of context. The point was in a normal situation, charm person should work no different on anyone...no matter what alignment they have.I am not quoting you out of context. My quoting you has been very much in context. I have quoted your entire post, leaving it explicitly in the context in which you offer it. Your "point" requires that we ignore the explicit context in which the OP asked the question. If a commanding officer "was" there, which the OP never claimed they were...then it should be no different what alignment the person has. If they fear death for disobeying a direct order, they should make an opposed charisma check.If you were to have ended your comment with this, all would have been good. But you choose to keep going, ruining a perfectly good answer with...You stated your opinion that the lawful evil soldier would kill you. Well prove your point or say something to back it up.I Already proved my point. I explained why the combination of alignment, military career, commanding officer's presence, and direct order all combine to make the effects of a charm person spell less than useful.Stop arguing with me about my opinion. You're not going to change my opinion with anything you've said up to this point.I believe you. And if it were merely your opinion you were offering, I would gladly ignore you. But you are not offering your opinion in answer to the OP. You are arguing with the opinions others have offered. You came into this thread asking questions about other people's answers. When folks answered your questions (including my own answer in reply to your question, explicitly stating...It is not that a LE charmed opponent would *want* to kill you. It is that a LE charmed opponent might still be duty-bound to kill you despite their wants. It is not because they are evil as much as it is that they are lawful.52 posts later, when ArcTan says the same thing, you agree with him. The world is not really out to get you. But when you throw down in a discussion, at least expect others to respond in kind. |
| ArcTan07-08-07, 12:32 AM | 52 posts later, when ArcTan says the same thing, you agree with him. The world is not really out to get you. But when you throw down in a discussion, at least expect others to respond in kind. Seeker, the point is that people have been acting like the rule is that "Lawful Evil people always obey orders to kill their best friend, therefore this is a special consideration for Lawful Evil opponents" -- which is totally off-base. The rule is that people who would kill their best friends when ordered to will kill a charmer when ordered to. That has *nothing* to do with being Lawful Evil, Lawful Good, Chaotic Evil, True Neutral or anything else. One can make an argument that *some* LE people would be more likely to do it than some TN people, *maybe* -- but it's *not defined by alignment*. Which is the point DarkPawn was making and people were ignoring. At no point was DarkPawn arguing the strawman you're putting in his mouth, which is that it's a rule that LE characters -- or any character -- *never* kills his best friend when ordered to by an authority figure. FWIW, I can imagine anyone of any alignment killing their best friend when ordered to, if they happen to be a coward and the person ordering them to do so has the power of life and death over them. (It means they're probably not *very* Good, if they're Good, but still.) |
| DarkPawn07-08-07, 03:07 AM | Seeker, the point is that people have been acting like the rule is that "Lawful Evil people always obey orders to kill their best friend, therefore this is a special consideration for Lawful Evil opponents" -- which is totally off-base. The rule is that people who would kill their best friends when ordered to will kill a charmer when ordered to. That has *nothing* to do with being Lawful Evil, Lawful Good, Chaotic Evil, True Neutral or anything else. One can make an argument that *some* LE people would be more likely to do it than some TN people, *maybe* -- but it's *not defined by alignment*. Which is the point DarkPawn was making and people were ignoring. At no point was DarkPawn arguing the strawman you're putting in his mouth, which is that it's a rule that LE characters -- or any character -- *never* kills his best friend when ordered to by an authority figure. FWIW, I can imagine anyone of any alignment killing their best friend when ordered to, if they happen to be a coward and the person ordering them to do so has the power of life and death over them. (It means they're probably not *very* Good, if they're Good, but still.) I couldn't say it better myself...so I won't. Thanks again. I'm glad someone is getting the point I'm trying to make. |
| Seeker9507-08-07, 10:18 AM | Seeker, the point is that people have been acting like the rule is that "Lawful Evil people always obey orders to kill their best friend, therefore this is a special consideration for Lawful Evil opponents" -- which is totally off-base.That may be the point you wish to make, but DarkPawns's replies to my comments ignored that at every point in which I argued the charm would not work, I included the entirety of the OP's circumstances: lawful evil soldier commander present direct order The rule is that people who would kill their best friends when ordered to will kill a charmer when ordered to. That has *nothing* to do with being Lawful Evil, Lawful Good, Chaotic Evil, True Neutral or anything else.And has everything to do with the combination of: lawful evil soldier commander present direct order One can make an argument that *some* LE people would be more likely to do it than some TN people, *maybe* -- but it's *not defined by alignment*. Which is the point DarkPawn was making and people were ignoring.People were not ignoring DarkPawns poorly presented point. They were pointing out that he is basing his conclusions on very blind readings of the posts he was supposedly refuting. At no point was DarkPawn arguing the strawman you're putting in his mouth, which is that it's a rule that LE characters -- or any character -- *never* kills his best friend when ordered to by an authority figure.DarkPawn made the strawman arguments. To bolster his sometimes very valid point, he turned to red herrings, hyperbole, insults and insinuations: If you want to argue rules and say chaotic evil must always break laws, and kill people, that is fine. I'm a pretty lawful person but if I caught my mother stealing, and the punishment was death, I wouldn't be jumping to a decision on what to do anytime soon. Do you honestly think an evil person can't love, can't have friends, has to "ALWAYS" act evil, and never show any kindness or compassion? Perhaps you and I have very different views of what evil is, or perhaps you're just extremely naive. You're obviously the one that didn't read enough Dragonlance to make this comment. What is your malfunction? What is so hard to figure out about this? And why do you keep saying I'm ignoring the OP. Are you just trying to irritate me or are you this daft? So who is not reading RAW? Where do you see a lawful evil character will kill their friends typically all the time? You show me where it says lawful evil characters will generally kill their friends if ordered to and I will shut up. You're putting your personal feelings of how this alignment should act and thrusting it upon me. You want to change that now by reading more into it, go for it. They are basically saying that all evil creatures would normally kill friends I was starting to lose my mind thinking the whole world had gone mad. For the 100th TIME!! I don't feel anyone is any more likely to kill their friend, no matter what their alignment. Get that?? Do you GET that? I personally think you are wrong, not going by RAW, and reading far more into a "few words" in the spell, and ignoring the obvious. So what are you going to do about it? ..and you accuse me of reading more into it? Pot calling the kettle black eh?DarkPawn hid his legitimate on-topic comments amidst a great number of insults and insinuations and hyperbole and word twisting. And in his replies to the conclusions offered by posters on this thread, he consistently omitted the full context of the argument: lawful evil soldier commander present direct order A lawful evil soldier is going to obey a direct order from his standing-right-there commanding officer, even if that order is to kill his friend, charmed or not. DarkPawn skipped a few of the words in my argument in order to make accusations of blanket statements. When called on these, he continued to quote out of context (ironically, accusing others of quoting out of context when his entire post is quoted), skip select words, and add insults. His argument became secondary to his style. |
| DarkPawn07-08-07, 10:57 AM | That may be the point you wish to make, but DarkPawns's replies to my comments ignored that at every point in which I argued the charm would not work, I included the entirety of the OP's circumstances: lawful evil soldier commander present direct order And has everything to do with the combination of: lawful evil soldier commander present direct order People were not ignoring DarkPawns poorly presented point. They were pointing out that he is basing his conclusions on very blind readings of the posts he was supposedly refuting. DarkPawn made the strawman arguments. To bolster his sometimes very valid point, he turned to red herrings, hyperbole, insults and insinuations: If you want to argue rules and say chaotic evil must always break laws, and kill people, that is fine. I'm a pretty lawful person but if I caught my mother stealing, and the punishment was death, I wouldn't be jumping to a decision on what to do anytime soon. Do you honestly think an evil person can't love, can't have friends, has to "ALWAYS" act evil, and never show any kindness or compassion? Perhaps you and I have very different views of what evil is, or perhaps you're just extremely naive. You're obviously the one that didn't read enough Dragonlance to make this comment. What is your malfunction? What is so hard to figure out about this? And why do you keep saying I'm ignoring the OP. Are you just trying to irritate me or are you this daft? So who is not reading RAW? Where do you see a lawful evil character will kill their friends typically all the time? You show me where it says lawful evil characters will generally kill their friends if ordered to and I will shut up. You're putting your personal feelings of how this alignment should act and thrusting it upon me. You want to change that now by reading more into it, go for it. They are basically saying that all evil creatures would normally kill friends I was starting to lose my mind thinking the whole world had gone mad. For the 100th TIME!! I don't feel anyone is any more likely to kill their friend, no matter what their alignment. Get that?? Do you GET that? I personally think you are wrong, not going by RAW, and reading far more into a "few words" in the spell, and ignoring the obvious. So what are you going to do about it? ..and you accuse me of reading more into it? Pot calling the kettle black eh?DarkPawn hid his legitimate on-topic comments amidst a great number of insults and insinuations and hyperbole and word twisting. And in his replies to the conclusions offered by posters on this thread, he consistently omitted the full context of the argument: lawful evil soldier commander present direct order A lawful evil soldier is going to obey a direct order from his standing-right-there commanding officer, even if that order is to kill his friend, charmed or not. DarkPawn skipped a few of the words in my argument in order to make accusations of blanket statements. When called on these, he continued to quote out of context (ironically, accusing others of quoting out of context when his entire post is quoted), skip select words, and add insults. His argument became secondary to his style. The OP and I have conversed and other then you, you're the only one that feels this way about me personally (not meaning he agrees with my stance). Now you're insulting me when addressing other people. Oh joy. You're making comments about your opinion of me, and making it sound like everyone feels like you do. Stop saying, "people" and replace every usage of such as "I". You didn't get it. You are ignoring. You think I am not answering the OP. You think my points are poorly argued. I am not sure who you are trying to impress with these long posts. I say you're quoting me out of context and you say I'm quoting you out of context. That is funny. We can go back and forth accusing each other of the same thing but that is rude to other people here and is pointless. What is really funny is you're the one with the poorly presented point. You started this whole topic answering the OP with these statements: 1. If your opponent is a career soldier, you're dead*. 2. If your opponent is weak-willed, you're dead*. I would suggest your opponent must make a will check against the charisma of the ordering officer in order to overcome the command. *Dead = attacked and, if successful, dead. I guess you just expected everyone to say, well since you say it, it is obviously right. You were pretty straight forward on your opinion that "you're dead." I thought that was absurd and I think you're wrong. Do you have an issue with people not agreeing with you? |
| EvilVegan07-08-07, 01:16 PM | Ok, so they stop trying to kill you. But what if they're a lawful evil soldier and their commanding officer orders them to kill you? They would normally kill their trusted friend or ally if ordered to do so, so does this spell override their natural predisposition towards killing their friends? I just wanted to back up Seeker with an additional reference to my initial post in bold lawful evil soldier would normally kill friends if ordered to do so commander present ordered to do so So it doesn't even come down to whether or not he's lawful or evil, he is, but additionally his personality includes the fact that he would normally kill friends under orders. My question wasn't "would a guy ordered to kill you still kill you?" It was "does it change a guy to the point that they won't kill their friends under direct orders even though they normally would do so?" And personally I don't even think that it matters if the commanding officer is present. Even if he has standing orders to kill the charmer, an order is an order. Depending on his personality, his alignment may sway him to contine with orders, if you fail your charisma check to stop him from doing something he would normally do. |
| DarkPawn07-08-07, 02:10 PM | My question wasn't "would a guy ordered to kill you still kill you?" It was "does it change a guy to the point that they won't kill their friends under direct orders even though they normally would do so?" ...and I would again say no I don't think he would kill you. Like mentioned under alignment, it says people are different day to day or under certain circumstances. That they aren't always this way or that way. I think charm person qualifies for one of those certain or "unique" situations where someone acts opposed to their alignment (or what they would normally do). In almost every D&D based novel I've read with charm spells, this is how they have been portrayed. Think about it this way, if a paladin is charmed by an evil person, and they ask you to help them (with whatever), wouldn't this be completely against their nature? What paladin would ever willingly help an evil person (unless there was a really "GOOD" reason to do so)? This adds an entirely different element since most encounters in D&D are typically viewed as Good vs. Evil. I admit this isn't always the case but it the predominate theme in most settings. This basically means every evil character charmed could potentially ignore the consequences and every good character charmed by an evil character could do likewise. Delving too much into the nature of a person as opposed to the spirit of the spell seems wrong to me. This is my personal opinion. |
| Seeker9507-08-07, 02:17 PM | I guess you just expected everyone to say, well since you say it, it is obviously right. You were pretty straight forward on your opinion that "you're dead."Yup. I was pretty straight forward on my opinion. I offered my opinion on what would likely happen given the exact contex offered by the OP. I thought that was absurd and I think you're wrong.Of course you do. Nearly all of your responses ignore the context of the OP's question: lawful evil soldier commander present direct order Do you have an issue with people not agreeing with you?None at all. My issue is one in which the disagreement is offered as if my opinion is wrong. Right and wrong are related to fact. You disagreed with my opinion *and* labeled my opinion as wrong. Even this would not have been a big deal, except for your ignoring 60% of the conditions on which the OP's question was based. You focused your entire disagreement on the alignment of the soldier, and ignored that he was a soldier, given an order, by a commanding officer. Anyway, EvilVegan has replied to the thread, indicating that he appreciates the responses offered. He even confirmed that the answers focusing solely on alignment did not address the entire context of his question. So while there may be some in this thread who wish to continue the discussion, EvilVegan's reply (acknowledging that he has received the answer(s) to his original question) has concluded my interest in participation. Have a wonderful day. :tiphat: |
| DarkPawn07-08-07, 02:35 PM | Anyway, EvilVegan has replied to the thread, indicating that he appreciates the responses offered. He even confirmed that the answers focusing solely on alignment did not address the entire context of his question. So while there may be some in this thread who wish to continue the discussion, EvilVegan's reply (acknowledging that he has received the answer(s) to his original question) has concluded my interest in participation. Have a wonderful day. :tiphat: I did not ignore the original post. There were three points to what he posted. One was alignment based, another order based and the last was a specific scenario that happened in game. My response most definately addressed points of all three aspects. Not specifically each on its own merit. |
| DarkPawn07-08-07, 02:42 PM | Of course you do. Nearly all of your responses ignore the context of the OP's question: lawful evil soldier commander present direct order Really that was all the OP's post contained? If someone is trying to kill you and you charm them, they now treat you as a trusted friend and ally. That seems like one complete statement, which I completely agree with. Ok, so they stop trying to kill you. But what if they're a lawful evil soldier and their commanding officer orders them to kill you? They would normally kill their trusted friend or ally if ordered to do so, so does this spell override their natural predisposition towards killing their friends? Okay an added element. I think I again gave an opinion of how I felt. Or more importantly, this came up when my party was trying to get past some guards who were forbidden from letting anyone entering without proper identification (which they didn't have). They charmed the guard and asked to be let in, and in a very friendly manner the guard told the "no". More importantly would indicate this was the true point of the post. Nowhere, here does it say the order is being directly given. Sure seems like two guards were left with orders to guard the door. Nowhere does it state the guards are any alignment either. There was a lot more to the post then what you highlighted. You're adding it all together in one scenario/question. That is fine, I don't begrudge you that. When I read that, I see a few different parts to a more complex question. Apparently because I read something broken into paragraphs as different topics or at least related and not the same, I am wrong? Apparently everybody has to play by your rules. ...well you're done so I guess that is that. I'll make sure to clear my responses with you next time to make sure they confirm to your standards. Let me know when I can participate with you next too. |
| DarkPawn07-08-07, 02:49 PM | The funny thing is by RAW you are completely wrong. Read the spell: Charm Person This charm makes a humanoid creature regard you as its trusted friend and ally (treat the target’s attitude as friendly). If the creature is currently being threatened or attacked by you or your allies, however, it receives a +5 bonus on its saving throw. The spell does not enable you to control the charmed person as if it were an automaton, but it perceives your words and actions in the most favorable way. You can try to give the subject orders, but you must win an opposed Charisma check to convince it to do anything it wouldn’t ordinarily do. (Retries are not allowed.) An affected creature never obeys suicidal or obviously harmful orders, but it might be convinced that something very dangerous is worth doing. Any act by you or your apparent allies that threatens the charmed person breaks the spell. You must speak the person’s language to communicate your commands, or else be good at pantomiming. The opposed charisma check only applies when you give it an order to do something it normally wouldn't do. It does not say they make opposed charisma checks if someone else gives them an order, and blah blah blah it is in their nature to follow it. That is kind of a huge part to overlook. You've read way too much into the spell and are ignoring the obvious RAW. So if you gave him an order to kill the commanding officer, yes he would make an opposed charisma check. But by RAW, if you charm the person and they are ordered to kill you, this does not require an opposed charisma check. Adding one is purely a house rule. Because you know what? It is normally against ones actions to help the enemy period. So I guess everyone should always make opposed charisma checks. :eek: |
| HellflameArcanite07-08-07, 02:54 PM | If the guard would ordinarily obey an order from his commanding officer to kill his best friend, you're out of luck. But if he wouldn't, you're in the clear. Likewise for the guard at the door: just have him treat you like an ordinary friend, as opposed to a mindless puppet. If he would ordinarily jeopordize his job to let his friend have a peek at what he's guarding, go ahead and have him let you through. However, if he wouldn't, have him put up a fight - verbally. Have him argue that he would lose his job, that what you're doing isn't right (ethically or morally), have him try to convince you to leave. |
| DarkPawn07-08-07, 03:02 PM | If the guard would ordinarily obey an order from his commanding officer to kill his best friend, you're out of luck. But if he wouldn't, you're in the clear. Now this I would say is absolutely incorrect according to RAW. For the reasons I posted above. Likewise for the guard at the door: just have him treat you like an ordinary friend, as opposed to a mindless puppet. If he would ordinarily jeopordize his job to let his friend have a peek at what he's guarding, go ahead and have him let you through. However, if he wouldn't, have him put up a fight - verbally. Have him argue that he would lose his job, that what you're doing isn't right (ethically or morally), have him try to convince you to leave. That is pretty much exactly how it should work . I used the same point about the guard telling his friend to get lost. Even if ordered to kill any trespassers on sight. But then I was told I missed the whole point of the OP's post. |
| ArcTan07-08-07, 08:28 PM | DarkPawn hid his legitimate on-topic comments amidst a great number of insults and insinuations and hyperbole and word twisting. And in his replies to the conclusions offered by posters on this thread, he consistently omitted the full context of the argument: lawful evil soldier commander present direct order A lawful evil soldier is going to obey a direct order from his standing-right-there commanding officer, even if that order is to kill his friend, charmed or not. My point is that it's not necessarily true. You could argue that these *three* facts make it likely the guy would kill you: Soldier Commander present Direct order And that's mainly because soldiers know if they refuse a direct order with a commander present they're going to die. Lawful Evil, like I said, has nothing to do with it. A very Lawful person is exactly the kind of person who might *refuse* a direct order from a superior officer if that order violates the rules of engagement or the law of the land or his sense of universal sacred honor. A very Evil person is exactly the kind of person who might refuse a direct order from a superior if he thinks he can get away with it because he ultimately cares only for himself and his own goals. Not that every Lawful Evil person would be the kind of person to frag his superior officer for violating the rules of engagement and twist the situation around to get himself a promotion. But it's certainly *possible* with Lawful Evil. His argument became secondary to his style. Arguing with someone's style and arguing with someone's argument should be two separate things. |
| ArcTan07-08-07, 08:31 PM | Again, OPPOSED CHARISMA CHECK. You can get a charmed victim to do *anything* if you succeed on an opposed Charisma check. The only thing you can't get him to do is do something that would be obviously harmful to himself. The only absolute, you're-out-of-luck reason that you'd get killed would be if he *knew* for an *absolute fact* that he was going to die if he didn't kill you (i.e. if "Don't kill me" becomes an "obviously suicidal order"). However, if not killing you is merely "very risky", you can *always* get him to not kill you by succeeding on an opposed Cha check. |
| ArcTan07-08-07, 08:31 PM | If the guard would ordinarily obey an order from his commanding officer to kill his best friend, you're out of luck. But if he wouldn't, you're in the clear. Likewise for the guard at the door: just have him treat you like an ordinary friend, as opposed to a mindless puppet. If he would ordinarily jeopordize his job to let his friend have a peek at what he's guarding, go ahead and have him let you through. However, if he wouldn't, have him put up a fight - verbally. Have him argue that he would lose his job, that what you're doing isn't right (ethically or morally), have him try to convince you to leave. And then you beat him on an opposed Cha check and he lets you in anyway, despite the fact that doing so is against his nature and very risky. Reading the fine print is important here. It's one reason that charm person is a much, much better spell in the hands of Sorcerers and Bards than Wizards. |
| Vaelan07-08-07, 09:31 PM | This is a simple matter of attitude. The Friendly attitude means that they will not take risks to help you. Not killing you despite orders? That is taking a risk to help you. Thus, you need to make a Charisma check to make them comply. All of this other crap is irrelevant. |
| DarkPawn07-08-07, 10:03 PM | This is a simple matter of attitude. The Friendly attitude means that they will not take risks to help you. Not killing you despite orders? That is taking a risk to help you. Thus, you need to make a Charisma check to make them comply. All of this other crap is irrelevant. Sure but by RAW it isn't irrelevant. Nothing says they must make an opposed charisma check in your example. They only make an opposed charisma check if "you" give them a "command" opposed to what they normally would do. If you command them to kill their friend, now that would require an opposed charisma check. If their friend commanded them to kill you, that would not by RAW require an opposed charisma check. |
| EvilVegan07-09-07, 08:22 AM | If their friend commanded them to kill you, that would not by RAW require an opposed charisma check.What makes you think that? It says you can give them orders, it doesn't say that they don't still obey orders from other people. It isn't a dominate spell. You could order the charmed LE soldier to kill his commander with an order from you (charisma check) or you could order the LE soldier to ignore his commander's order to kill you (charisma check). It doesn't stop him from hearing or obeying other people, it just lets you override that with an order. If you don't have time/forethought to order him not to kill you, you might just be dead. |
| Leilond07-09-07, 08:29 AM | It hardly depens on the nature of the charmed soldier Do the charmed soldier is so "legal" and so "rule follower" to kill his best friend if ordered to do so from his commander? If it is a such character, that soldier will try to kill the caster that charmed him if the commander order so I will surely "stop" him from attacking when the charme come in effect, because he will surely think there's something wrong in what he's doing. He will turn to his commander to convince him that there's a mistake in attacking his friend, that must be innocent for sure. At this point the nature of the soldier become the issue - He's a rigid follower of the military rule and will obey to any commander order: the commander order him to kill the caster and, pheraps with sad in his heart he will start to fight his "best friend ever" - He's a good follower of the military rule, but he won't kill his brother or mother if ordered so. He won't attack, and he will try to stand between the caster and the soldiers without fighting anyone - He hates the commander since a lot, he will try to make the commander stop is stupid crusade against his friend, risking the martial court for that Various degrees of this 3 interpretation can happen, some of which will require a charisma check, others can give the soldier a new save and so on As always happens when charme come in play, it is required a good DM call |
| DarkPawn07-09-07, 02:22 PM | What makes you think that? It says you can give them orders, it doesn't say that they don't still obey orders from other people. It isn't a dominate spell. You could order the charmed LE soldier to kill his commander with an order from you (charisma check) or you could order the LE soldier to ignore his commander's order to kill you (charisma check). It doesn't stop him from hearing or obeying other people, it just lets you override that with an order. If you don't have time/forethought to order him not to kill you, you might just be dead. <sigh> The RAW makes me think so. Opposed charisma checks only apply when you command them to do something they wouldn't normally do. There is no game mechanic or opposed charisma check when they are ordered by someone else to do something. So they are your friend and will treat you with a "friendly" attitude. Lets look at what this means exactly. Page 72 PHB: Attitude Friendly Means Wishes you well Possible Actions Chat, advised, offer limited help, & advocate The bold print are the key parts of the friendly attitude. 1. They wish you well. Meaning they aren't going to kill you, since this would hardly be wishing you well. 2. They offer limited help. Not attacking you is limited help. Attacking you doesn't seem to be helpful, even in a limiting way. 3. They are your advocate. What is an advocate? It is a supporter or defender. So there is NO way they would kill you. No matter what they were ordered to do. Attacking you doesn't seem to fit into the support or defend categories. So RAW makes me think so. No rules by RAW that requires them to make an opposed charisma check when someone else commands them & they have friendly attitude toward you. By RAW, that means they won't kill you and should actually protect you. |
| ArcTan07-09-07, 09:55 PM | Well, DarkPawn, now you're the one being stiff and legalistic. The definition of "Friendly" can include many different things just as much as the definition of Lawful Evil, and trying to parse it to *one absolute unbreakable course of action for all situations* by playing the dictionary game is equally annoying whichever one you do it for. FWIW, nothing in the definition says that they wouldn't kill you if they absolutely had to. The definition of "absolutely had to" varies from person to person, but is rarely so narrow that it's impossible to come up with a situation where it wouldn't happen. A Lawful Good character who's Friendly to you may well still stab you in the face if it's the only way to stop you from firing your Maximized Fireball into an orphanage while laughing hideously about the carnage you're about to cause. An ordinary soldier who's Friendly to you may well still kill you if the choice is between killing you and betraying everything he's ever been trained to do and facing his own immediate death and dishonor for his entire family. To say that Friendly is a kind of mind-control that means a character who's Friendly to you will *never ever* kill you, *ever*, is stupid. Note that this wouldn't apply just to charm spells -- it'd mean that I could absolutely totally rely on the fact that my best friend would never ever raise a hand against me *no matter what I did*, even if, say, he's a Paladin and I'm biting the heads off of little crying babies to appease the dark god Nerull. Specific quibbles with dictionary-chopping, saved for the end because I think dictionary-chopping is a stupid game to play in the first place: "Wishes you well" does not mean "will sacrifice all other concerns for your welfare". A character who wishes you well may still kill you. They will *wish* they didn't have to. They will be very upset about killing you. But if it's a choice between killing you and something else they care very, very deeply about -- a choice between your life and that of their firstborn child's, a choice between your life and the safety of the nation they are sworn to protect, a choice between your life and their own life that they've lived a coward's life protecting for years -- then yes, they may cause you harm. "Limited help" means *precisely* that they will help you up to a certain limit and no more. It means that there are some things -- disobeying a direct order from a commander, letting their firstborn child die, watching you caper and laugh while flinging excrement into the temple of their god -- that they won't tolerate on your behalf. "Advocate" doesn't mean they become your bonded attorney and will be your advocate from now until death do you part. "Advocate" is a *verb* here, not a noun. They don't become "your advocate", they will instead "advocate" on your behalf. It is *possible* -- look at the line "possible actions", meaning that this won't always happen -- that they will argue for your life if it is threatened. A soldier Friendly to you may well raise an objection to the order to take your life -- at risk to his own life -- and try to make an argument in your defense. If this argument *fails*, however, it doesn't mean he'll disobey the order to kill you. Just like someone who literally "advocates" for you in a court of law may stand up to testify to your innocence because they're Friendly to you, but if you're nonetheless convicted, it doesn't mean they're going to kill cops and prison guards in order to break you out of prison and smuggle you out of the country. |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 12:56 AM | Well, DarkPawn, now you're the one being stiff and legalistic. The definition of "Friendly" can include many different things just as much as the definition of Lawful Evil, and trying to parse it to *one absolute unbreakable course of action for all situations* by playing the dictionary game is equally annoying whichever one you do it for. FWIW, nothing in the definition says that they wouldn't kill you if they absolutely had to. The definition of "absolutely had to" varies from person to person, but is rarely so narrow that it's impossible to come up with a situation where it wouldn't happen. A Lawful Good character who's Friendly to you may well still stab you in the face if it's the only way to stop you from firing your Maximized Fireball into an orphanage while laughing hideously about the carnage you're about to cause. An ordinary soldier who's Friendly to you may well still kill you if the choice is between killing you and betraying everything he's ever been trained to do and facing his own immediate death and dishonor for his entire family. To say that Friendly is a kind of mind-control that means a character who's Friendly to you will *never ever* kill you, *ever*, is stupid. Note that this wouldn't apply just to charm spells -- it'd mean that I could absolutely totally rely on the fact that my best friend would never ever raise a hand against me *no matter what I did*, even if, say, he's a Paladin and I'm biting the heads off of little crying babies to appease the dark god Nerull. Specific quibbles with dictionary-chopping, saved for the end because I think dictionary-chopping is a stupid game to play in the first place: "Wishes you well" does not mean "will sacrifice all other concerns for your welfare". A character who wishes you well may still kill you. They will *wish* they didn't have to. They will be very upset about killing you. But if it's a choice between killing you and something else they care very, very deeply about -- a choice between your life and that of their firstborn child's, a choice between your life and the safety of the nation they are sworn to protect, a choice between your life and their own life that they've lived a coward's life protecting for years -- then yes, they may cause you harm. "Limited help" means *precisely* that they will help you up to a certain limit and no more. It means that there are some things -- disobeying a direct order from a commander, letting their firstborn child die, watching you caper and laugh while flinging excrement into the temple of their god -- that they won't tolerate on your behalf. "Advocate" doesn't mean they become your bonded attorney and will be your advocate from now until death do you part. "Advocate" is a *verb* here, not a noun. They don't become "your advocate", they will instead "advocate" on your behalf. It is *possible* -- look at the line "possible actions", meaning that this won't always happen -- that they will argue for your life if it is threatened. A soldier Friendly to you may well raise an objection to the order to take your life -- at risk to his own life -- and try to make an argument in your defense. I pointed to RAW to simply stress my initial point. If you look at the rules of friendly it is pretty clear what that should mean. It is also clear that opposed checks only factor if you give a command against what they would normally do. The rest is just gray, and I concede in very dire circumstances could not fully fall under this. For example you charm someone and their son attacks you. This would be difficult for anyone of any alignment. In this situation I could see an opposed check helping decide the outcome. However, none of this falls under RAW. Like you said, there is nothing that says they wouldn't kill you; however, nothing says they would either. This is where being a DM and making a decision comes into play. If we go for reasons non-RAW why they wouldn't kill you, I've given my opinion in a non-RAW sense. For reasons by RAW I am now pointing out this stuff. Basically I moved into more RAW and strict reading of rules because I am tired of arguing my non-RAW views. Didn't mean to play the word game but it seemed like another tactic that might have stressed my point a bit more. If this argument *fails*, however, it doesn't mean he'll disobey the order to kill you. Just like someone who literally "advocates" for you in a court of law may stand up to testify to your innocence because they're Friendly to you, but if you're nonetheless convicted, it doesn't mean they're going to kill cops and prison guards in order to break you out of prison and smuggle you out of the country. I agree 100%, just because they aren't going to kill you doesn't mean they are going to help you against people that are. In the above situations if you tried to get him to do any of that and it was something they wouldn't normally do, then you would have to make an opposed charisma check. My statements were merely to the point of the original concept, that they wouldn't actively participate in killing you if commanded to do so. That seems pretty clear to me by RAW because there is no mechanic for when someone else orders them to harm you. I could have been a bit more clear. I didn't mean to say that as a friend they would kill their son, a guard attacking you, to protect you. I guess looking at it after the fact it came off that way. That wasn't my intent. I think we basically agree though overall on the main concept. |
| ArcTan07-10-07, 01:29 AM | I pointed to RAW to simply stress my initial point. If you look at the rules of friendly it is pretty clear what that should mean. It is also clear that opposed checks only factor if you give a command against what they would normally do. I never said the commander makes an opposed Cha check to make him attack you. Whether or not he attacks you if his commander orders him to is entirely premised in whether he would kill his friend if his commander ordered him to. The opposed Cha check is to make him *not* kill you if ordered to. The rest is just gray, and I concede in very dire circumstances could not fully fall under this. For example you charm someone and their son attacks you. This would be difficult for anyone of any alignment. In this situation I could see an opposed check helping decide the outcome. Well, now I'm starting to disagree with you. Do you really think that most well-trained soldiers, if directly ordered by their superiors, wouldn't shoot their friend if they had to? (Assume, if necessary, that the superior includes some kind of justification in the order, like "He's a traitor!") I agree 100%, just because they aren't going to kill you doesn't mean they are going to help you against people that are. In the above situations if you tried to get him to do any of that and it was something they wouldn't normally do, then you would have to make an opposed charisma check. My statements were merely to the point of the original concept, that they wouldn't actively participate in killing you if commanded to do so. That seems pretty clear to me by RAW because there is no mechanic for when someone else orders them to harm you. Well, by RAW, nothing says that Friendly characters are absolutely banned from harming you. There are plenty of situations where a character who *really is* Friendly to you, no charming involved, might be induced to kill you anyway. This is important -- this is why when using Diplomacy on a group of soldiers, it's the officer's reaction that's really important, not the soldiers'. I could have been a bit more clear. I didn't mean to say that as a friend they would kill their son, a guard attacking you, to protect you. I guess looking at it after the fact it came off that way. That wasn't my intent. I think we basically agree though overall on the main concept. I think that if a commanding officer ordered an *average* soldier -- Lawful Evil or Lawful Neutral or *whatever* -- to kill you right there, a direct order, at least half of them would end up doing it. Like I said, in a military structure, commanders have the power of life and death over you. |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 01:49 AM | I never said the commander makes an opposed Cha check to make him attack you. Whether or not he attacks you if his commander orders him to is entirely premised in whether he would kill his friend if his commander ordered him to. The opposed Cha check is to make him *not* kill you if ordered to. Well, now I'm starting to disagree with you. Do you really think that most well-trained soldiers, if directly ordered by their superiors, wouldn't shoot their friend if they had to? (Assume, if necessary, that the superior includes some kind of justification in the order, like "He's a traitor!") Well, by RAW, nothing says that Friendly characters are absolutely banned from harming you. There are plenty of situations where a character who *really is* Friendly to you, no charming involved, might be induced to kill you anyway. This is important -- this is why when using Diplomacy on a group of soldiers, it's the officer's reaction that's really important, not the soldiers'. I think that if a commanding officer ordered an *average* soldier -- Lawful Evil or Lawful Neutral or *whatever* -- to kill you right there, a direct order, at least half of them would end up doing it. Like I said, in a military structure, commanders have the power of life and death over you. Ugh, this is starting to spin out of control again and I think the horse is quite dead. We've been beating it for days now. :P As I read RAW on the spell Charm Person and what Friendly is, it really appears apparent (to me) that someone under the effect of a charm person would not kill you if ordered. The reason I state this is because the only time they have to make an opposed charisma check is when you order them to do something against their normal behavior. Since their normal behavior while under the spell is to be your friend, they would normally protect you (whether physically, verbally, or by doing nothing at all). So they should do just that. Being ordered to kill you by their superior officer does not factor into this because the person giving the command does not have a charm spell on the person they are now ordering. Now if you really want to mix it up, what happens when you and the commanding officer both charm the soldier...both successfully? By RAW I would say you would both be making opposed checks, basically trying to convince the person to protect you over them. |
| Leilond07-10-07, 06:32 AM | Being ordered to kill you by their superior officer does not factor into this because the person giving the command does not have a charm spell on the person they are now ordering. Now if you really want to mix it up, what happens when you and the commanding officer both charm the soldier...both successfully? By RAW I would say you would both be making opposed checks, basically trying to convince the person to protect you over them. Reply With Quote You're assuming that the soldier will not kill his best friend if ordered so. It hardly depend on that soldier. Is that soldier so follower of the rules to kill his best friend if ordered so? If that soldier is so followers of military rules, he will try to kill you if ordered to do so, because charme do not say anywhere that the charmed will never attack you, only that you're the best friend and will interpret your word in the better way possible. So he can think you're his friend, that you're innocente, and doesn't deserve to die, but the order say him to kill you and he will That only work, obviously, for very followers of rules, but the RAW do not prevent anywhere this scenario |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 11:44 AM | You're assuming that the soldier will not kill his best friend if ordered so. It hardly depend on that soldier. Is that soldier so follower of the rules to kill his best friend if ordered so? If that soldier is so followers of military rules, he will try to kill you if ordered to do so, because charme do not say anywhere that the charmed will never attack you, only that you're the best friend and will interpret your word in the better way possible. So he can think you're his friend, that you're innocente, and doesn't deserve to die, but the order say him to kill you and he will That only work, obviously, for very followers of rules, but the RAW do not prevent anywhere this scenario I really don't understand this interpretation at all. I don't understand where anyone is getting this idea that a charmed person would attack you. Where are you seeing anything that would imply such a thing? The spell says they regard you as a trusted friend and ally. That their attitude toward you becomes friendly. It seems like everyone is getting hung up on factoring how someone lawful evil would treat a trusted friend and ally. I don't think the rules show any indication though that a good or evil, lawful or chaotic, person would act any differently. The mechanics are in place to impose an opposed charisma check if you as the charming person, command them to do something they normally wouldn't do. Or command them to do something suicidal or obviously harmful. There is nothing in place that says how they would react when someone else commands them to do something they would "normally" do. Like kill you. It isn't even factored in because a friendly person shouldn't be doing that. They should be protecting you and offering you help, well limited help. I can't really argue this anymore because the assumption that a lawful evil character would kill you if ordered by a commanding officer, even while charmed is not shown or even implied by any rules in the game that I see. Apparently some of you are seeing something I am not. So either I'm a complete idiot, or I just don't see what you're reading that makes you believe this. If you can show me what you are reading that is making you believe this is the case, please show me so I can better understand. I think by making this ruling you're completely destroying the entire line of charm spells. -If you charm animal on a tiger and it is hungry, it should eat you still because honestly, a tiger would eat it's friend. -If you charm a chaotic evil person, he should be willing to stab you in the back whenever he wants because he normally would to a friend. -If you charm a lawful evil soldier, he should still kill you because he was ordered to do so. He won't like it but he will follow orders. -If you charm a good character, as an evil one...and you start harming villagers or stealing, he should attack you because he would normally do so if he found out his friend was evil. -If you charm a monster, the majority will eat you anyway because they are monsters afterall and would do so to their friends. -Wait, the creature is solitary so it has never had friends. So this spell becomes moot since it doesn't care nor ever will have a friend anyway. This could go on and on and on...and the spell becomes useless. I think the intention of the spell is pretty clear by RAW, and this type of second guessing or adding interpretations on how someone would act to their friend is wrong. |
| Leilond07-10-07, 11:57 AM | I really don't understand this interpretation at all. I don't understand where anyone is getting this idea that a charmed person would attack you. Where are you seeing anything that would imply such a thing? The spell says they regard you as a trusted friend and ally. That their attitude toward you becomes friendly. I really don't understand this interpretation at all. I don't understand where anyone is getting this idea that a soldier would neve attack a friend Really don't you belive that there aren't soldiers that will attack their friends if ordered to do so? It seems like everyone is getting hung up on factoring how someone lawful evil would treat a trusted friend and ally. I don't think the rules show any indication though that a good or evil, lawful or chaotic, person would act any differently. You cited me, but I never talked about alignements. I simply said that if the soldier is a totally followers of military rules, he can attack his mother if ordered so, why don't attacking a friend? The mechanics are in place to impose an opposed charisma check if you as the charming person, command them to do something they normally wouldn't do. Or command them to do something suicidal or obviously harmful. Stopping to follow his commander order is something he won't normally do. So you need the charisma check to make him stop attacking you, not the commander, if the soldier is a fanatic followers of military rules There is nothing in place that says how they would react when someone else commands them to do something they would "normally" do. Like kill you. It isn't even factored in because a friendly person shouldn't be doing that. They should be protecting you and offering you help, well limited help. It hardly depend on the person. Think about Mafia. Your boss tell to kill your best friend ever. Don't you do it? Pheraps, and pheraps not... it depends on you Same apply to charmed. If the charmed character is a fanatical follower of military rules, friendship doesn't stop from attacking If it is a normal soldier, or not so "fanatical", he will probably stop trying to make all stop fighting I can't really argue this anymore because the assumption that a lawful evil character would kill you if ordered by a commanding officer, even while charmed is not shown or even implied by any rules in the game that I see. Apparently some of you are seeing something I am not. So either I'm a complete idiot, or I just don't see what you're reading that makes you believe this. You quote me, but I've never made that assumption at all I simply said that, if the charmed character is someone that will kill his best friend ever if ordered by his commander, his nature is that, and attacking you while charmed (with crying heart pheraps) is his nature If you can show me what you are reading that is making you believe this is the case please show me so I can better understand. The fact that charme simply make use Friend, no more than very very good friend. But if my Mafia boss order me to kill my friend, I will. So, I'm not saying that charme do not block attacks. I say that do not ALWAYS block attacks. I'm saying that SOMETIMES, for some very particular enemy, it can happen that the charming isn't enought, and you'll need a charisma check to fight against his boss order |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 12:07 PM | I really don't understand this interpretation at all. I don't understand where anyone is getting this idea that a soldier would neve attack a friend Really don't you belive that there aren't soldiers that will attack their friends if ordered to do so? Nobody is saying they wouldn't. But the fact that when charmed they view you as a friend and in the most favorable light sort of implies to me that during the spell, they put you as a priority, not their commanding officer. Nothing by RAW defends your view they would attack a friend. In reality yes I see your point but that isn't a mechanic for how a spell in game should work. Stopping to follow his commander order is something he won't normally do. So you need the charisma check to make him stop attacking you, not the commander, if the soldier is a fanatic followers of military rules If you charm someone you don't have to say anything to them. You don't have to give them a command at all. You can just charm them and then be done with it. This requires no opposed charisma check at all. When they are commanded to kill you now, they also don't have to make any opposed charisma check because that isn't required by rules. You are adding your own spin on the rule by doing this. Honestly again I think viewing you in the most favorable way and being your friend means they put your as a priority over a command from a superior officer, who obviously has lost their mind if ordering them to kill their good friend. It hardly depend on the person. Think about Mafia. Your boss tell to kill your best friend ever. Don't you do it? Pheraps, and pheraps not... it depends on you Same apply to charmed. If the charmed character is a fanatical follower of military rules, friendship doesn't stop from attacking If it is a normal soldier, or not so "fanatical", he will probably stop trying to make all stop fighting You quote me, but I've never made that assumption at all I simply said that, if the charmed character is someone that will kill his best friend ever if ordered by his commander, his nature is that, and attacking you while charmed (with crying heart pheraps) is his nature This is reading way too much into the spell. Adding so much spin and speculation. There is nothing in the rules that even hints at any of this factoring into how the game mechanics work so I have nothing more to say about it. So, I'm not saying that charme do not block attacks. I say that do not ALWAYS block attacks. I'm saying that SOMETIMES, for some very particular enemy, it can happen that the charming isn't enought, and you'll need a charisma check to fight against his boss order That is fine and you have every right to do so as a DM. This is a house rule though, this is you making a decision that even though the spell works this way, you feel in this situation it will not. I respect that...but honestly what you're implying is purely just that, a house rule. Sounds reasonable to me as a house rule, but by RAW I think it is not supported. |
| Derren S.07-10-07, 12:12 PM | Nobody is saying they wouldn't. But the fact that when charmed they view you as a friend and in the most favorable light sort of implies to me that during the spell, they put you as a priority, not their commanding officer. Nothing by RAW defends your view they would attack a friend. In reality yes I see your point but that isn't a mechanic for how a spell in game should work. And nothing in the RAW says that a charmed person will not attack you. The only thing RAW says that the the person treats you as friend and becomes friendly (not helpful! They won't risk anything to help or pretect you). But that is all. When you happen to charm a person who is fanatical and values following orders more than trusted friends then you are out of luck. If ordered to he kills his trusted friend. He might feel bad about it but he will. |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 12:28 PM | And nothing in the RAW says that a charmed person will not attack you. The only thing RAW says that the the person treats you as friend and becomes friendly (not helpful! They won't risk anything to help or pretect you). But that is all. When you happen to charm a person who is fanatical and values following orders more than trusted friends then you are out of luck. If ordered to he kills his trusted friend. He might feel bad about it but he will. And nothing in the RAW says that a charmed person will not attack you. The only thing RAW says that the the person treats you as friend and becomes friendly (not helpful! They won't risk anything to help or pretect you). But that is all. When you happen to charm a person who is fanatical and values following orders more than trusted friends then you are out of luck. If ordered to he kills his trusted friend. He might feel bad about it but he will. First off you're incorrect. It shifts them to friendly attitude. Under that by RAW is says specifically under actions limited help. Keep in mind I'm not saying they have to attack their commanding officer or help you escape. BUT, they won't attack you either! That is completely against the whole point of a charm spell. The issue is whether they will attack you, not if they will help you. To help you, you clearly need an opposed charisma check. I guess to understand how it works look at the definition of enchantment spells, that include charm and compulsion: Enchantment Enchantment spells affect the minds of others, influencing or controlling their behavior. All enchantments are mind-affecting spells. Two types of enchantment spells grant you influence over a subject creature. Although they don't specifically spell it out for every alignment and scenario I don't think they have to. This spell messes with their mind, making them view you as a friend and place you in the most favorable light. Normal behavior is out the window when it comes to how they treat you. The spell charm person only makes an issue of acts against normal behavior if you try and force them to do something they wouldn't. You as the charmer, not anyone else for that matter. This is obviously more of a balance type rule to prevent an evil wizard from charming a paladin for example, and having him kill a child for whatever reason. (This is an example but you get the point why they added that rule). On that theme, situations like let you into the treasure vault, attack their commanding officer, kill their own friend or relative, etc....if these were acts they normally wouldn't do then opposed charisma check would be in order if you commanded them otherwise. The rest of this is horribly off base and we could argue back and forth that it doesn't say they wouldn't kill a friend, or it doesn't say they would kill their friend. The fact of the matter is it doesn't say either. So when in doubt just read it straight up. The intention of the spell is pretty clear so why add more to it on either account? |
| Seeker9507-10-07, 02:05 PM | Folks, I confess, I made the mistake of checking in on this thread. I apologize. But as DarkPawn said many posts ago, nobody is going to change his mind. No matter how reasonable, logical, straight-forward, or rules-supported your post may be. |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 02:20 PM | Folks, I confess, I made the mistake of checking in on this thread. I apologize. But as DarkPawn said many posts ago, nobody is going to change his mind. No matter how reasonable, logical, straight-forward, or rules-supported your post may be. I give up, do what you want. I have pointed to RAW, I have shown you what friendly attitude means, what enchantments do, the exact wording of charm person, and the "ONLY" time that an opposed check is required. Then I pleaded with you to look at the spirit of the spell, what is was obviously intended to do. All of this to no avail. You continue to make it sound like you have RAW or something other then an interpretation (and a very far fetched one at that, like mafia members and such) backing your view. ________________________________________ __________________________________ EDIT: I quit, I'm done, you win. I concede that charm person should not work anymore as stated. Anyone who happens to be willing to kill a friend in any situation should do so against the charmer. This makes much more sense to me then what I have been arguing. Charmed monsters, charmed animals, all such spells are now pointless because monsters and animals don't care about friends, and would eat them out of the law of nature "survival of the fittest". All soldiers should kill you if ordered because that is their nature, tough luck buddy. All evil aligned characters should kill you outright, because that is what evil does, especially to friends. Fine, you're right I'm wrong and concede the argument. |
| Cromage07-10-07, 03:19 PM | Okay. It seems that people are hung up on several points: 1) From the text: you can try to give the subject orders, but you must win an opposed Charisma check to convince it to do anything it wouldn’t ordinarily do. DarkPawn, your argument is that an order from you should not be necessary to prevent a Charmed subject from killing you. This is the point most people don't believe. I don't believe it either. Yes, a person with an attitude of Friendly will, for the most part, not attack you. But notice that "Friendly" isn't even the best you can get in terms of attitude. While they may feel close to you, they will feel EVEN CLOSER to their friends, family, etc. Or possibly their commanding officer. Therefore, the following point: if you cast Charm Person on someone, you will not be the most important person in their life (unless they're a grumpy hermit with no friends). If forced to choose between saving you and saving a loved one, they will save the loved one. EDIT: I quit, I'm done, you win. I concede that charm person should not work anymore as stated. Anyone who happens to be willing to kill a friend in any situation should do so against the charmer. This makes much more sense to me then what I have been arguing. Charmed monsters, charmed animals, all such spells are now pointless because monsters and animals don't care about friends, and would eat them out of the law of nature "survival of the fittest". All soldiers should kill you if ordered because that is their nature, tough luck buddy. All evil aligned characters should kill you outright, because that is what evil does, especially to friends. Now you're ignoring the rules even more (and being a poor sport). Monsters, animals, and (many) evil people care as much about their friends as you and I (and nothing in the rules says otherwise). Even Charming them, however, will not get them to care MORE. |
| Seeker9507-10-07, 03:21 PM | Fine, you're right I'm wrong and concede the argument.I have never claimed I am right and you are wrong in your answer to the OP (we simply have different opinions on that matter). I merely object to your repeated insistence that we are making blanket statements. I object to your twisting of our posts in order to voice those objections. I object to your insulting tone in voicing those objections. Where you have offered your opinion on the actual question asked by the OP, we simply disagree. No "right" or "wrong" about it. |
| ArcTan07-10-07, 03:35 PM | Ugh, this is starting to spin out of control again and I think the horse is quite dead. We've been beating it for days now. :P As I read RAW on the spell Charm Person and what Friendly is, it really appears apparent (to me) that someone under the effect of a charm person would not kill you if ordered. The reason I state this is because the only time they have to make an opposed charisma check is when you order them to do something against their normal behavior. ...WHAT? You're reading it backwards. The *only* person who makes opposed Charisma checks on a target of charm is the spellcaster, and then only to make the target do things against his normal, *un-charmed* nature. Since their normal behavior while under the spell is to be your friend, they would normally protect you (whether physically, verbally, or by doing nothing at all). So they should do just that. Well, they would normally do anything they would normally do for a friend. You're making a huge leap to assume that everyone's normal behavior around friends is necessarily to protect them from all harm. Specifically, you're making a huge leap to assume that it's necessarily "normal" to refuse a direct order from a commanding officer to shoot somebody because he's your friend. Being ordered to kill you by their superior officer does not factor into this because the person giving the command does not have a charm spell on the person they are now ordering. Sure. However, it figures into their *normal behavior*. For some -- perhaps many -- soldiers, it is normal behavior to reflexively obey orders even if the order is one that is personally painful to carry out. Are you purposely misunderstanding what people are saying here? Now if you really want to mix it up, what happens when you and the commanding officer both charm the soldier...both successfully? By RAW I would say you would both be making opposed checks, basically trying to convince the person to protect you over them. Conflicting control by two controllers results in opposed Cha checks against *each other* to maintain control. |
| ArcTan07-10-07, 03:45 PM | I really don't understand this interpretation at all. I don't understand where anyone is getting this idea that a charmed person would attack you. Where are you seeing anything that would imply such a thing? The spell says they regard you as a trusted friend and ally. That their attitude toward you becomes friendly. It seems like everyone is getting hung up on factoring how someone lawful evil would treat a trusted friend and ally. I don't think the rules show any indication though that a good or evil, lawful or chaotic, person would act any differently. Sure. Depending on the situation, anyone of any alignment might disobey an order to kill a trusted friend and ally. Anyone of any alignment might also *obey* such an order. The mechanics are in place to impose an opposed charisma check if you as the charming person, command them to do something they normally wouldn't do. Or command them to do something suicidal or obviously harmful. There is nothing in place that says how they would react when someone else commands them to do something they would "normally" do. Like kill you. It isn't even factored in because a friendly person shouldn't be doing that. They should be protecting you and offering you help, well limited help. I'm not saying that they would react as they "normally" would, i.e. if they weren't charmed at all and you were clearly not their friend but an adventurer come to loot their home. However, it might *still* be "normal" for someone to end up having to kill a trusted friend and ally if forced to do so by a commanding officer. That's what you're not getting. Charming doesn't even come into it. Sometimes someone with a Friendly attitude toward you that they came about honestly -- because you *really are* their friend -- might receive an order to kill you, and if they're a good soldier and scared of the consequences of disobedience, they might do so. If they're a strong-willed person, they might refuse unless given a reason -- unless the commanding officer convinces them to change their attitude toward you (which is impossible when Charm is in effect). But this isn't *all* soldiers -- there are quite a few people who are really well-indoctrinated by the military, or cowards who want to save their own skins, or whatever, and charming doesn't give them an ounce more backbone than they normally have. I can't really argue this anymore because the assumption that a lawful evil character would kill you if ordered by a commanding officer, even while charmed is not shown or even implied by any rules in the game that I see. Apparently some of you are seeing something I am not. So either I'm a complete idiot, or I just don't see what you're reading that makes you believe this. I'm seeing that the Friendly attitude never says that a person will throw away everything else in support of a character they're Friendly to, and disobeying a direct order from a commander is a good way to throw away everything (be, at best, thrown out and disgraced, and at worst killed on the spot). If you can show me what you are reading that is making you believe this is the case, please show me so I can better understand. I think by making this ruling you're completely destroying the entire line of charm spells. -If you charm animal on a tiger and it is hungry, it should eat you still because honestly, a tiger would eat it's friend. If the tiger were starving, yes. Even if you came about the Friendly attitude honestly by taming the tiger and feeding it and taking care of it, this isn't a 100% absolute guarantee the tiger will never harm you if extremely agitated or distressed. (Siegfried and Roy learned this the hard way.) -If you charm a chaotic evil person, he should be willing to stab you in the back whenever he wants because he normally would to a friend. If he's *particularly* sociopathic and incapable of understanding the concept of "friend" the way a normal human being would, sure. (Most Chaotic Evil people are not like this.) -If you charm a lawful evil soldier, he should still kill you because he was ordered to do so. He won't like it but he will follow orders. Not just Lawful Evil. Most soldiers. And we're not talking about a standing order that they could disobey while getting away with it -- we're talking about a situation where the commander's standing right there and are likely to be immediately shot if they don't kill you. -If you charm a good character, as an evil one...and you start harming villagers or stealing, he should attack you because he would normally do so if he found out his friend was evil. Well, yes, he should do whatever he normally would if he found out his friend was Evil. -If you charm a monster, the majority will eat you anyway because they are monsters afterall and would do so to their friends. Most monsters don't eat their friends. -Wait, the creature is solitary so it has never had friends. So this spell becomes moot since it doesn't care nor ever will have a friend anyway. I would say that a monster who had *truly* never experienced the concept of a "friend" -- which is not actually the definition of most solitary monsters, which just means that they tend to hang out by themselves -- would be confused and bewildered by feelings of friendship and its behavior wouldn't be as predictable as that of a social creature. This could go on and on and on...and the spell becomes useless. I think the intention of the spell is pretty clear by RAW, and this type of second guessing or adding interpretations on how someone would act to their friend is wrong. Nonsense. The spell is interesting because all it does is make someone Friendly but you still have to navigate what Friendly means. This is why the spell is better for someone with high social skills (not just because they can "force" things with opposed Cha checks, but because they understand how to use a friend in a meaningful way). Honestly, there's no reason to complain this much about this. The spell is still insanely powerful for a high-Cha character because you can *still ignore* all this crap by the use of the opposed Cha check. ("No, you don't want to stop me, Mr. Paladin, you want to *help* me bite the heads off these babies so we can summon Cthulhu!") Not putting in realistic reactions to being a friend makes dominate person and similar spells useless. Charm isn't domination, and making it as powerful as domination -- making it totally ignore what a target's basic nature is -- would be bad. |
| ArcTan07-10-07, 04:04 PM | First off you're incorrect. It shifts them to friendly attitude. Under that by RAW is says specifically under actions limited help. Keep in mind I'm not saying they have to attack their commanding officer or help you escape. BUT, they won't attack you either! That is completely against the whole point of a charm spell. The issue is whether they will attack you, not if they will help you. To help you, you clearly need an opposed charisma check. What if the commanding officer pulls out his own weapon and says "Either kill them or I will execute you on the spot for treason"? What if this is a Lawful Good soldier, and the commanding officer goes on to say "You have to kill him now or he'll cast the spell that will murder every baby in the country!"? What if you actually *are* visibly about to cast a spell that will murder every baby in the country? Sorry. I don't buy it. You're trying to read what is clearly a subjective and vague definition hyperliterally and interpret it to mean that the creature will never attack you. (And, hell, that definition clearly does *not* say the creature will never attack you, and if that's what they wanted it to say they probably should've said it.) By the same token, the definition says Friendly creatures will offer you "limited help". This is part of the definition of Friendly, and therefore by your definition doesn't require an opposed Cha check, right? So a Paladin will offer me limited help while I'm chowing down on dead babies. ("Want some mustard?") I guess to understand how it works look at the definition of enchantment spells, that include charm and compulsion: Enchantment Enchantment spells affect the minds of others, influencing or controlling their behavior. All enchantments are mind-affecting spells. Two types of enchantment spells grant you influence over a subject creature. Although they don't specifically spell it out for every alignment and scenario I don't think they have to. This spell messes with their mind, making them view you as a friend and place you in the most favorable light. Normal behavior is out the window when it comes to how they treat you. Influence doesn't mean *unlimited* influence. I think we all agree that Charm seriously messes with a person's thought processes. Someone who was eating babies in front of a Paladin could probably get the Paladin to at least leave them alone by twisting things around in the "most favorable light" -- the Paladin would *want* to believe lies like "These aren't real babies, just replicans made out of soybeans", even if you don't win an opposed Cha check. However, the Paladin would still not be okay with killing babies. That's *why* charm person has the line about requiring opposed Cha checks to do things outside of their nature in the first place -- their nature still exists in them and holds sway and makes some tasks harder to order than others. Charm might make a soldier with even a tiny bit of backbone hesitate when ordered to kill you, or talk back to his officer, something he might never consider otherwise -- but if it comes down to "Kill him or face court-martial!" he *will* be stuck and his nature *will* win out if no opposed Cha check is made. The spell charm person only makes an issue of acts against normal behavior if you try and force them to do something they wouldn't. You as the charmer, not anyone else for that matter. This is obviously more of a balance type rule to prevent an evil wizard from charming a paladin for example, and having him kill a child for whatever reason. (This is an example but you get the point why they added that rule). Or the Evil Wizard charming the Paladin and then going on to strangle the Paladin's mother while he watches. It is, in fact, the same thing. You're making a big deal out of the difference between acts of commission and omission but I don't think it really matters that much -- "Do nothing" is, after all, an action, *especially* when doing nothing has very clear and obvious consequences. Disobeying orders is something that some people simply wouldn't do. On that theme, situations like let you into the treasure vault, attack their commanding officer, kill their own friend or relative, etc....if these were acts they normally wouldn't do then opposed charisma check would be in order if you commanded them otherwise. The rest of this is horribly off base and we could argue back and forth that it doesn't say they wouldn't kill a friend, or it doesn't say they would kill their friend. "Let me into the treasure vault" is an act of omission. "Don't attack me like you're supposed to when I walk into the treasure vault" is the same kind of command as "Don't attack me like you're supposed to when your commanding officer tells you you must attack me". The fact of the matter is it doesn't say either. So when in doubt just read it straight up. The intention of the spell is pretty clear so why add more to it on either account? I'm not adding more to it. The spell makes someone treat me as a friend. That's very clear and simple for me to understand. Absolute prohibitions like "Nobody EVER attacks their own friend!" are complications and make the spell very hard to adjudicate. They are, after all, in my *own* experience not true. (I might find it hard to imagine *killing* one of my friends, but I'm not above tackling a friend to the ground and trying to subdue him before letting him do something that would, say, seriously harm himself, or someone I cared about.) |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 04:32 PM | I conceded my point. Honestly, though how do you justify that a lawful evil soldier ordered to kill you would because it was something he would normally do...but then argue that: Charmed monsters (generally evil) and charmed animals (with limited reasoning skills, driven by instincts), would not kill you if they were charmed? Animal is starving...it sees you, you charm it..but it is still starving? Why would it not eat you? Hell there are tons of animals that kill their young for numerous reasons. All evil aligned creatures that view killing you as profitable and beneficial? You charm them and by nature they would kill a friend without question for a profit? Why would they not do so? Wow you got tons of magical items and such. Do you realize what you all are suggesting? Is the lawful evil soldier getting a command to kill you the only scenario you can think of related to this? The subject of someone that would normally do something, would normally do it regardless of viewing you as a friend? Open it up and view what you're really looking at in the grand scheme of game mechanics. Please do that honestly and decide if that is really what you think is right. |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 04:35 PM | ...WHAT? You're reading it backwards. The *only* person who makes opposed Charisma checks on a target of charm is the spellcaster, and then only to make the target do things against his normal, *un-charmed* nature. Dude...I'm tired and this argument it is getting old. What I meant, was the only time an opposed charisma check is involved is when you command the person to do something they wouldn't normally do. There is no mechanic for someone giving them an order to make an opposed charisma check, to do something they wouldn't normally do....like kill you. They wouldn't normally kill their friend. Would you agree that most people wouldn't normally kill their friend? Is that a fair statement? Without any other factors? If we can accept that nobody would normally kill their friend, normally being the keyword, then rules clearly show that if they were then commanded to kill their friend, there is no roll. Again it is only a factor when you order them to do something they normally wouldn't do. Hence, since there is no opposed roll required, couldn't one conclude they therefore wouldn't kill you? There is no opposed charisma check made by anyone other then you, the charmer. That basically implies the reason is they are going to be acting like your friend, unless you do something to change that. Man this seems so clear to me, but obviously I'm missing something if you all see it completely differently. So call it being a baby, but I'll just concede my point and stop arguing. I just can't understand your reasoning. Don't think you have to bash me for it but I'm just being honest. |
| ArcTan07-10-07, 04:48 PM | There is no mechanic for someone giving them an order to make an opposed charisma check, to do something they wouldn't normally do....like kill you. They wouldn't normally kill their friend. Would you agree that most people wouldn't normally kill their friend? Is that a fair statement? Without any other factors? Sure. With the other factor that the person doing so is a commanding officer in the military and that they are loyal, highly disciplined soldiers, though, killing their friend would become the normal response. Not killing their friend would become abnormal. Why is this so hard for you to accept? I might accept that you would argue that killing one's own friend would *still* be very, very hard for a soldier to do and that it might only happen after hesitation or debate or struggle. However, I don't accept this line you're laying down that it would *never happen at all*, especially taking into consideration that various nonhuman fantasy civilizations *are* intentionally inhuman in their outlook -- there might *be* a culture where loyalty to the state is programmed in to be far, far greater than loyalty to friends, where charm would be very hard or dangerous to look. (I wouldn't try it on a Formian, for example.) |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 04:53 PM | Sure. With the other factor that the person doing so is a commanding officer in the military and that they are loyal, highly disciplined soldiers, though, killing their friend would become the normal response. Not killing their friend would become abnormal. Why is this so hard for you to accept? But that is just it man! I do accept that wholeheartedly. I understand that even now charmed, not following their commander would be abnormal. We are on the same exact page there. But killing their friend would also be abnormal now (because getting orders to kill your friend can't be normal anywhere). So they are at a crossroads of conflicting actions. The statement I think trumps all here is the one that says they now view you in the most favorable light. This in my mind, sets priority to you over the commander. There is no opposed charisma check by RAW that the commander can make. People can just not follow orders and do things because they don't want to. Now if you order the soldier to kill his commander, he would outright say no. You could then try to make an opposed charisma check to convince him otherwise. i.e. "Hey he really is plotting to get you killed because...you should kill him first to prevent that." That is my take on it. |
| ArcTan07-10-07, 04:56 PM | I conceded my point. Honestly, though how do you justify that a lawful evil soldier ordered to kill you would because it was something he would normally do...but then argue that: Charmed monsters (generally evil) and charmed animals (with limited reasoning skills, driven by instincts), would not kill you if they were charmed? Animal is starving...it sees you, you charm it..but it is still starving? Why would it not eat you? Hell there are tons of animals that kill their young for numerous reasons. Yes. Charm animal makes you as safe as you are around an animal you've actually tamed, but *no safer*. Most starving animals who had been domesticated or tamed would still have to be pushed to quite a great degree before they'd turn on their masters, just as starving animals do not generally eat their own mates and pack animals don't turn on their packmates. However, if a tiger were starving, frightened and upset, and I did something to provoke it, I could not guarantee my own safety around it, even if the tiger and I were the best of friends (as much as animals and humans can ever be friends). Again, Siegfried and Roy -- you think Roy, who's worked with tigers all his life, was lying when he said that tiger was his good and trusted companion? A charmed tiger wouldn't just jump on me and eat me for no reason, probably -- trained animals don't do that. But if I kept it locked up with me for a very long time and gave it no food and then did something that provoked or startled it, who knows? All evil aligned creatures that view killing you as profitable and beneficial? You charm them and by nature they would kill a friend without question for a profit? Why would they not do so? Wow you got tons of magical items and such. Because most Evil people aren't *that* Evil. Come on. Most of the genuinely bad, bad, bad people I know personally (and I do know a few) still have good friends, friends they stick up for, and friends they certainly wouldn't *kill*. Screw over, maybe, but not kill. If someone was genuinely totally, absolutely sociopathic and had zero regard for human life -- the most Chaotic Evil on the Chaotic Evil scale -- then no, you might not be safe. Although even then -- quite a few sociopaths are sociopathic to everyone *besides* a few key people they designate as "real people" while everyone else is not. But still, yes, if I used charm person on, say, Sylar, from Heroes, I wouldn't start thinking of myself as safe. Look what the dude did to his own mother. Do you realize what you all are suggesting? Is the lawful evil soldier getting a command to kill you the only scenario you can think of related to this? The subject of someone that would normally do something, would normally do it regardless of viewing you as a friend? Open it up and view what you're really looking at in the grand scheme of game mechanics. Please do that honestly and decide if that is really what you think is right. Absolutely. Charm is not domination. If I use Charm on a very, very dangerous person I should still be very, very wary about what I do around this dangerous person. That's both more realistic-feeling and more interesting than making Charm a discount version of Domination (with a shorter duration and no telepathy). |
| ArcTan07-10-07, 05:06 PM | But that is just it man! I do accept that wholeheartedly. I understand that even now charmed, not following their commander would be abnormal. We are on the same exact page there. But killing their friend would also be abnormal now (because getting orders to kill your friend can't be normal anywhere). Who says? Don't you ever watch old war movies? What if I become best friends with someone from a country we're at war with? And I'm helping hide them in the country at great risk to myself, and constantly wrestling with myself over the risk I'm bringing to myself and my family by harboring the enemy and committing treason, and then they're *discovered* and the commanding officer tells me to kill him? What if I've always been a bit of a coward and I've only given my friend "limited help" because I didn't want to get caught and even though I like the guy he's *not* my *best* friend and even though I know he's done absolutely nothing wrong and doesn't deserve to die, I am, after all, a coward and kind of a jerk? (True Neutral, or maybe very mildly Neutral Evil.) You're assuming that "your friend" means "My ordinary civilian friend who is a loyal citizen of this fair and democratic republic", in which case, sure, getting orders to kill your friend wouldn't be normal. That's not the situation we're probably in, though. If I had to Charm him in the first place, it means that I'm probably someone his commanding officer wouldn't be fond of, and he *knows* that. So they are at a crossroads of conflicting actions. The statement I think trumps all here is the one that says they now view you in the most favorable light. This in my mind, sets priority to you over the commander. They do not view *you* in the "most favorable light", i.e. they do not make *you* the most important person in their universe. Hell, they don't even get Helpful attitude toward you, just Friendly. The fact that it's Friendly and not Helpful *means* that they're only willing to go so far to help you, that there are things more important than helping you. The spell says they view *your actions* in the most favorable light, not you. That is, they think of everything you do as good and helpful and are making the very strong unconscious effort to avoid thinking about things that would change their attitude about you. If their commanding officer told them that you were a traitor, they would probably not believe him. If they saw you trying to eat babies, they might try to rationalize it away and would willingly swallow any lie you told them about the babies being soy replicas. But this doesn't necessarily affect their *priorities* or *actions*. If I'm the kind of guy who'd, say, join the secret police in the first place, I'm the kind of guy who probably accepts that if the government tells me to kill someone I kind of like whom I know has done nothing wrong, I'll have to do it. Moreover, I will probably know for a fact that if I openly refuse to do it, terrible things will happen to me and the people I care about. There is no opposed charisma check by RAW that the commander can make. People can just not follow orders and do things because they don't want to. Now if you order the soldier to kill his commander, he would outright say no. You could then try to make an opposed charisma check to convince him otherwise. i.e. "Hey he really is plotting to get you killed because...you should kill him first to prevent that." Opposed Cha check isn't giving an explanation. Giving an explanation is a way to get around the opposed Cha check. (If he's the kind of guy who'd frag his commander because his trusted friend and ally gives him information that implicates his commander in some kind of treasonous action, then giving him that information circumvents the Cha check. The Cha check lets you make him frag his commander for no reason at all.) Keep in mind, though, the most important restriction -- Charming *never* makes him carry out obviously self-destructive orders. If his commander is *right there*, disobeying or attempting to attack him may well be obviously self-destructive. It depends on how good a fighter he is, but let's say his commander is very powerful and you are weak and unarmed -- "No! Don't kill me!" actually becomes a *suicidal command*, then. Do you deny this fact? |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 05:08 PM | Absolutely. Charm is not domination. That's both more realistic-feeling and more interesting than making Charm a discount version of Domination (with a shorter duration and no telepathy). I don't think this does any of what you're suggesting. The key difference and the main factor is you can't force them or even convince them necessarily, of doing something they normally wouldn't do. They have free will, I haven't argued anything against that. I think I explained my point above this post, so I would regurgitate it all over. I'll just wait for a response if any. |
| Cromage07-10-07, 05:08 PM | Honestly, though how do you justify that a lawful evil soldier ordered to kill you would because it was something he would normally do...but then argue that: Charmed monsters (generally evil) and charmed animals (with limited reasoning skills, driven by instincts), would not kill you if they were charmed? Animal is starving...it sees you, you charm it..but it is still starving? Why would it not eat you? Hell there are tons of animals that kill their young for numerous reasons. No. Most animals, however, do not kill their young just because they are a little hungry. Most animals you will come across in combat will not be attacking you because they are hungry, but because they are territorial, grumpy, defending their young, or afraid of you. If you charm a grizzly bear who sees you with her cub, the bear will assume that you are not a threat to that cub. If a wolf attacks you because you're on the edge of its territory and you charm it, it will assume you are no threat. If you charm a dog and start attacking its master, you shouldn't be surprise if it attacks you back. All evil aligned creatures that view killing you as profitable and beneficial? You charm them and by nature they would kill a friend without question for a profit? Why would they not do so? Wow you got tons of magical items and such. No. Evil creatures don't *always* rend their friends to shreds. Even if you are evil, that's a really bad policy as it shows you aren't trustworthy. Do you realize what you all are suggesting? Is the lawful evil soldier getting a command to kill you the only scenario you can think of related to this? The subject of someone that would normally do something, would normally do it regardless of viewing you as a friend? This stopped being about Lawful Evil 20 posts ago. =P Open it up and view what you're really looking at in the grand scheme of game mechanics. Please do that honestly and decide if that is really what you think is right. Every situation is different, and everything is based on the *situation.* The question is not "will a Charmed person always kill you if they find it convenient to do so" but "can a Charmed person be convinced to kill you in certain situations." If we can accept that nobody would normally kill their friend, normally being the keyword, then rules clearly show that if they were then commanded to kill their friend, there is no roll Unfortunately, in the context of the rules for Charm Person, "normally means" "in an uncharmed state." So what you're really saying is: "If we can accept that nobody in an uncharmed state could kill their friend..." Lore is filled with people who did exactly that. Through jealousy, through dispute, and through war. The statement I think trumps all here is the one that says they now view you in the most favorable light. That exact phrase is not in RAW. Read more closely. |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 05:15 PM | Who says? Don't you ever watch old war movies? What if I become best friends with someone from a country we're at war with? And I'm helping hide them in the country at great risk to myself, and constantly wrestling with myself over the risk I'm bringing to myself and my family by harboring the enemy and committing treason, and then they're *discovered* and the commanding officer tells me to kill him? What if I've always been a bit of a coward and I've only given my friend "limited help" because I didn't want to get caught and even though I like the guy he's *not* my *best* friend and even though I know he's done absolutely nothing wrong and doesn't deserve to die, I am, after all, a coward and kind of a jerk? (True Neutral, or maybe very mildly Neutral Evil.) You're assuming that "your friend" means "My ordinary civilian friend who is a loyal citizen of this fair and democratic republic", in which case, sure, getting orders to kill your friend wouldn't be normal. That's not the situation we're probably in, though. If I had to Charm him in the first place, it means that I'm probably someone his commanding officer wouldn't be fond of, and he *knows* that. They do not view *you* in the "most favorable light", i.e. they do not make *you* the most important person in their universe. Hell, they don't even get Helpful attitude toward you, just Friendly. The fact that it's Friendly and not Helpful *means* that they're only willing to go so far to help you, that there are things more important than helping you. The spell says they view *your actions* in the most favorable light, not you. That is, they think of everything you do as good and helpful and are making the very strong unconscious effort to avoid thinking about things that would change their attitude about you. If their commanding officer told them that you were a traitor, they would probably not believe him. If they saw you trying to eat babies, they might try to rationalize it away and would willingly swallow any lie you told them about the babies being soy replicas. But this doesn't necessarily affect their *priorities* or *actions*. If I'm the kind of guy who'd, say, join the secret police in the first place, I'm the kind of guy who probably accepts that if the government tells me to kill someone I kind of like whom I know has done nothing wrong, I'll have to do it. Moreover, I will probably know for a fact that if I openly refuse to do it, terrible things will happen to me and the people I care about. Opposed Cha check isn't giving an explanation. Giving an explanation is a way to get around the opposed Cha check. (If he's the kind of guy who'd frag his commander because his trusted friend and ally gives him information that implicates his commander in some kind of treasonous action, then giving him that information circumvents the Cha check. The Cha check lets you make him frag his commander for no reason at all.) Keep in mind, though, the most important restriction -- Charming *never* makes him carry out obviously self-destructive orders. If his commander is *right there*, disobeying or attempting to attack him may well be obviously self-destructive. It depends on how good a fighter he is, but let's say his commander is very powerful and you are weak and unarmed -- "No! Don't kill me!" actually becomes a *suicidal command*, then. Do you deny this fact? I'm not denying anything you have valid points. That being said, I think you're nerfing the entire charm school of spells, going against past practice, and making it more complicated then it should be. You charm someone they act as your friend, you order them to do something they wouldn't normally do, they have a chance to break free. That is it...nothing more, nothing less. This would not only nerf charm but would also have effects on compulsion too. A dominated person only gets a new save if they are forced to do something against their nature. Well now with this ruling, you could force that lawful evil soldier to kill EVERYONE, and why bother with an opposed charisma roll, because it is their nature to follow orders. |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 05:18 PM | No. Most animals, however, do not kill their young just because they are a little hungry. Most animals you will come across in combat will not be attacking you because they are hungry, but because they are territorial, grumpy, defending their young, or afraid of you. If you charm a grizzly bear who sees you with her cub, the bear will assume that you are not a threat to that cub. If a wolf attacks you because you're on the edge of its territory and you charm it, it will assume you are no threat. If you charm a dog and start attacking its master, you shouldn't be surprise if it attacks you back. No. Evil creatures don't *always* rend their friends to shreds. Even if you are evil, that's a really bad policy as it shows you aren't trustworthy. This stopped being about Lawful Evil 20 posts ago. =P Every situation is different, and everything is based on the *situation.* The question is not "will a Charmed person always kill you if they find it convenient to do so" but "can a Charmed person be convinced to kill you in certain situations." Unfortunately, in the context of the rules for Charm Person, "normally means" "in an uncharmed state." So what you're really saying is: "If we can accept that nobody in an uncharmed state could kill their friend..." Lore is filled with people who did exactly that. Through jealousy, through dispute, and through war. That exact phrase is not in RAW. Read more closely. So basically you're saying the only time this matters is when a career soldier is ordered to kill you by a commanding officer. That is what you're saying. That is the only situation this factors into? I'm confused because you just argued against making statements in reference to stereotyping normal behaviors, which was my initial argument. |
| Cromage07-10-07, 05:20 PM | I'm not denying anything you have valid points. That being said, I think you're nerfing the entire charm school of spells, going against past practice, and making it more complicated then it should be. More complicated than it needs to be? Possibly. You're free to houserule it if you think the rules are too complicated. It's not a nerf to treat spells as less powerful than another person. It is a nerf if you do something that is not supported by the rules. This would not only nerf charm but would also have effects on compulsion too. A dominated person only gets a new save if they are forced to do something against their nature. Well now with this ruling, you could force that lawful evil soldier to kill EVERYONE, and why bother with an opposed charisma roll, because it is their nature to follow orders. Reply With Quote Charm and Compulsion spells are completely different. Charm does NOT change how a person thinks, merely how they perceive the charmer. Compulsion spells do not change how they perceive the enchanter, but they will follow your orders if they feel unless the action they are instructed to perform goes against their nature. |
| Cromage07-10-07, 05:23 PM | So basically you're saying the only time this matters is when a career soldier is ordered to kill you by a commanding officer. That is what you're saying. That is the only situation this factors into? Nope. I gave another situation. If you can't find it, here's a hint: it involved a dog. I *also* said that *everything depends on the situation.* (thus implying there are more, but that yours are mostly strawmen) This was about 5 lines from the bottom (9 if you count comments) |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 05:24 PM | More complicated than it needs to be? Possibly. You're free to houserule it if you think the rules are too complicated. It's not a nerf to treat spells as less powerful than another person. It is a nerf if you do something that is not supported by the rules. There is no rule on what a charmed person does in the situation presented. There is none! Honestly what are you talking about? All the rule focuses on is how they act if you command them to do something against their normal behavior The rest of this is all speculation. There is no rule that says when even when someone is charmed and then commanded to kill you, they will because....<insert whatever>. |
| ArcTan07-10-07, 05:26 PM | I'm not denying anything you have valid points. That being said, I think you're nerfing the entire charm school of spells, going against past practice, and making it more complicated then it should be. What "past practice"? Not *my* past practice. I've always thought that Charm still allows a person to keep their own personality. It does say, after all, that they do not become an automaton and you do not have absolute control over them. You charm someone they act as your friend, you order them to do something they wouldn't normally do, they have a chance to break free. That is it...nothing more, nothing less. Sure, but how a character treats their friends is dependent on their *character*. This is only as complicated as the character is complicated, but I think that a character being more complicated is generally a good thing for a game that wants to have some kind of entertaining plot and story. This would not only nerf charm but would also have effects on compulsion too. A dominated person only gets a new save if they are forced to do something against their nature. Well now with this ruling, you could force that lawful evil soldier to kill EVERYONE, and why bother with an opposed charisma roll, because it is their nature to follow orders. ...What are you talking about? I never said LE soldiers' nature is to "follow orders" as a general, blind rule. Their "nature" means things they would normally do. If this soldier is the kind of person who likes, say, killing people from an enemy nation, then of course he doesn't get a new save if forced to go out and kill people from an enemy nation. It's what he likes doing. It's what he's used to. However, turning against the nation he's sworn his loyalty to *is* against his nature and *should* require a new save. What's "complicated" about this? It's perfectly natural. All you have to do is keep asking the question "What would they do if not under this spell?" By having to ask that question the character remains a *character*, rather than allowing Charm or even Domination to turn them into a pure puppet of the PC, or having Charm turn every character into the *same* character, which is what I've seen when it's done badly. (Bad DMs let Charm turn everyone, no matter who, into some kind of "Loyal-squire-with-no-self-respect" archetype, like Sancho Panza.) |
| ArcTan07-10-07, 05:29 PM | I don't think this does any of what you're suggesting. The key difference and the main factor is you can't force them or even convince them necessarily, of doing something they normally wouldn't do. They have free will, I haven't argued anything against that. Well, you can force them with Charm, you just need the opposed Cha check. But having free will does, in fact, mean having the free will to attack one's friends. Ordinary free-willed people with friends can and do attack their friends. They won't do it on a whim, but in the right situation, people can even kill their best friends or lovers. *Things happen*. Even though Charm gives you a particularly bulletproof kind of friendship -- they can't ever switch to "not your friend" or lower their *opinion* of you thanks to the mind-control aspect of the spell -- YOU CAN STILL BE FORCED TO KILL SOMEONE YOU REALLY, REALLY LIKE. It's the fact that you keep saying that killing someone you really, really like is impossible and no one would *ever* do it -- not even non-human people from bizarre, non-human cultures -- that's annoying everyone. |
| ArcTan07-10-07, 05:30 PM | There is no rule on what a charmed person does in the situation presented. There is none! Honestly what are you talking about? All the rule focuses on is how they act if you command them to do something against their normal behavior The rest of this is all speculation. There is no rule that says when even when someone is charmed and then commanded to kill you, they will because....<insert whatever>. Sure. There's no rule that they *won't*, either. The rule just says charmed creatures treat you as Friendly. The DM gets to decide what Friendly means in any given situation. Having a set rule for that would be stupid, because people and monsters and animals cross a wide variety of attitudes and personalities and belief systems, and even in real life among ordinary human beings I know, most of the people I know have widely varying standards on what is and isn't acceptable to do to a friend. |
| Cromage07-10-07, 05:32 PM | There is no rule on what a charmed person does in the situation presented. There is none! Honestly what are you talking about? . There are no rules, but I didn't claim there were. My claim is the rules *support* a charmed person killing you *in certain situations.* Most of which is being covered by ArcTan as I type. Eh. |
| ArcTan07-10-07, 05:33 PM | So basically you're saying the only time this matters is when a career soldier is ordered to kill you by a commanding officer. That is what you're saying. That is the only situation this factors into? I'm confused because you just argued against making statements in reference to stereotyping normal behaviors, which was my initial argument. It matters in a lot of different situations. The point is that unless you have absolute mind-control (i.e. Charm with a *really* high Cha to repeatedly make opposed Cha checks, or else Domination) you can never actually predict what *anyone* will do with total accuracy. Even if you know you're someone's best friend, you have no absolute guarantee they'll never do anything to harm you. The guarantee becomes less and less absolute the more pressure you put on the situation (the more competing factors he has along with his friendship to you) and the less familiarly human his outlook becomes. (A lot of *us* think that our own personal bonds of friendship are the most important things in our lives, but plenty of people disagree, and are all about putting friendship after things like an abstract devotion to an ideal, for example, or unbreakable cultural bonds of duty, or whatever.) |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 05:34 PM | What "past practice"? Not *my* past practice. I've always thought that Charm still allows a person to keep their own personality. It does say, after all, that they do not become an automaton and you do not have absolute control over them. Past practice like modules, novels, etc... that have had people charmed. That past practice. I'm sure you've read stories and modules that have touched on this. I have never, in 20 some years of playing D&D and reading novels based on D&D worlds, ever remember someone under a charm spell trying to harm the charmer in anyway. Regardless, I don't want to argue my opinion anymore. When I DM, I will never have a charmed person attack the charmer unless the charmer does something to instigate the spell being broken. I will never have an outside force simply show up and say kill them, and have it happen. That is my opinion, and I think doing otherwise would have millions of players angry (in my opinion). The wreaks of finding loopholes to shaft players and adds to the DM vs. Players mentality that I hate. So as for me, I will treat the spell as I believe it was intended to be used. I respect your opinions but I choose to not consider them for myself, because frankly I think it is wrong and not in the spirit of the game. You're entitled to your opinion, I don't think you're stupid, baseless, or clueless, but I strongly disagree. |
| ArcTan07-10-07, 05:41 PM | Past practice like modules, novels, etc... that have had people charmed. That past practice. I'm sure you've read stories and modules that have touched on this. I have never, in 20 some years of playing D&D and reading novles based in the worlds, ever remember someone under a charm spell trying to harm the charmer in anyway. I agree it's certainly unlikely in the vast majority of situations. The FAQ, for instance, says that in *most* situations where a charmed character has allies who attack the charmer, the charmed character will try to mediate the dispute verbally and only if forced will intervene, trying to use nonlethal means. (I.e. do what most of us would do if two groups of close friends came to blows in real life.) Of course the situations we're talking about are contrived situations, but that's the point. If you contrive a situation where people are put under very strong pressures, then they can be and will be forced to attack their friends. And the thing is that in the interests of drama, sometimes it's interesting for this to happen and *create* such pressures -- if someone you've convinced to be your friend comes and finds you desecrating his most holy sacred relics, or locked in bitter combat with the love of his life, or whatever. If the guy was *really your friend* he might attack you in such situations -- and it'd be scary, and dramatic. Charm creates a whole other layer to this situation that's even more interesting. It's especially relevant if you aren't the spellcaster casting charm -- which is how we've been approaching this situation -- but are the guy's real best friend or real commanding officer trying to protect yourself. Well I can't argue this anymore. When I DM, I will never have a charmed person attack the charmer unless the charmer does something to instigate the spell being broken. I will never have an outside force simply show up and say kill them, and have it happen. That is my opinion, and I think doing otherwise would have millions of players ****** off. The wreaks of finding loopholes to shaft players and adds to the DM vs. Players mentality that I hate. Would it shaft the player if the enemy Sorcerer uses it on a party member and then makes it impossible for the party to get the party member to do something against the Sorcerer, even while the Sorcerer is busy slaughtering the the party member's friends and companions? I know some module writers treat Charm as Domination. I once ran an encounter according to the module advice which basically said to use Charm to get the party tank to let the enemy spellcaster easily pick off the rest of the party with no resistance. That *did* tick off my players, and I really regretted it. If my best friend started shooting my other friends, then damn straight, I would give my best friend a slap upside the head, or at least tackle him to the ground and restrain him. So as for me, I will treat the spell as I believe it was intended to be used. I respect your opinions but I choose to not consider them for myself, because frankly I think it is wrong and not in the spirit of the game. Whatever. I don't think the spirit of the game is to oversimplify and flatten characters so their behavior becomes totally predictable. |
| DarkPawn07-10-07, 05:57 PM | Whatever. I don't think the spirit of the game is to oversimplify and flatten characters so their behavior becomes totally predictable. I see your point and in the example of a group member being charmed could be beneficial. I am not knocking your view. Each of us have different experiences, read different novels, and have different mindsets. I don't think ruling as I do is going to do anything like you're suggesting here. I respectfully against say, interesting point, in your campaign do whatever you want. I just don't agree with doing this to my players. |
| Ragnarok5507-10-07, 06:04 PM | In my opinion charm spells are often abused to create affects similar to the suggestion or dominate spells. Getting into a debate on just what "friendly" means on these boards is waste of time since it should be the DM's call. The DM sets up the game environment (alignments and such). Personally I see no reason why to bar a charmed creature from attacking the charmer in certain circumstances, let the DM decide. To me the "obviously harmful" line in the charm description most definitely applies to any order to engage in combat. This does not mean that they won't agree with you and fight for you. But the charisma check to force them to obey an order should fail. For the same reason a soldier who believes that he must follow orders or be put to death/torture would ignore orders to break an order. It is up to the DM to decide whether this is the case for the specific soldier. Don't make charm person into suggestion. Charm person is a first level spell that lasts for hours...a sorcerer or anyone with a decent charisma can set this up to be a dominate effect if the DM allows it. On to the topic of this thread... IMO the charmer can spend an action (move I'd say) to get the soldier to disregard an order "that he would normally follow against a friend". I would not allow the charmer to attempt to force the soldier to fight for them. That should be up to the DM, and from the OP's situation it looks extremely unlikely that the soldier would take up arms for the charmer. If the soldiers commanding officer than ordered him to attack the pc's it would be up to the soldier whether or not he would attack his friend. Also the charmer's friends are not the charmed creatures friends. If the charmer's companions are there as well the charmed guy would most likely (as he was described) attack these companions if ordered to do so by his superior. A charisma check to stop this by the charmer (unless he believes that this will lead to his being harmed by his superiors/peers). Charm can be a very useful spell to get what you want...but I don't think it has any place in an agitated environment where combat is likely. That is my opinion though. Again, trying to decide who is right on these boards is a waste of time since it is up to the DM to decide. Stating ones opinion is helpful since it can lead to the DM (the only person who's decision matters) coming to a conclusion. |
| ssvegeta55507-10-07, 06:11 PM | There's a reason why I hate charm spells. It just gets ugly quickly. :nonono: |
| ArcTan07-10-07, 06:14 PM | In my opinion charm spells are often abused to create affects similar to the suggestion or dominate spells. Getting into a debate on just what "friendly" means on these boards is waste of time since it should be the DM's call. The DM sets up the game environment (alignments and such). Personally I see no reason why to bar a charmed creature from attacking the charmer in certain circumstances, let the DM decide. To me the "obviously harmful" line in the charm description most definitely applies to any order to engage in combat. This does not mean that they won't agree with you and fight for you. But the charisma check to force them to obey an order should fail. Well, no, it doesn't work like that. The guy won't do anything contrary to his nature, period, unless you make an opposed Cha check. *Over and above* that rule, he won't do anything obviously suicidal or self-destructive -- but it explicitly says that things that are very risky are not the same thing as things that are obviously suicidal or self-destructive. You cannot tell a Charmed person to stick a sword in his own gut, but you can get him to do things that involve a very *high risk* of a sword being stuck in his gut, like engaging in combat. Even if fighting is completely against his nature, you can force him to do so with an opposed Cha check. For the same reason a soldier who believes that he must follow orders or be put to death/torture would ignore orders to break an order. It is up to the DM to decide whether this is the case for the specific soldier. Don't make charm person into suggestion. Charm person is a first level spell that lasts for hours...a sorcerer or anyone with a decent charisma can set this up to be a dominate effect if the DM allows it. Well, sure. The huge advantage of dominate is that it's telepathic and lets you see through their eyes. A Charmed person needs to be kept close to you and you need to keep an eye on them at all times to make sure they're doing what you want them to do. Note that with a very high Cha you still don't have a guarantee of success. You can still fail by rolling low, and, very importantly, if they successfully resist one order with an opposed Cha check, you *cannot* retake that check. The first time they successfully resist being ordered to kill the king, it means you can't ever order them to kill the king again. On to the topic of this thread... IMO the charmer can spend an action (move I'd say) to get the soldier to disregard an order "that he would normally follow against a friend". I would not allow the charmer to attempt to force the soldier to fight for them. That should be up to the DM, and from the OP's situation it looks extremely unlikely that the soldier would take up arms for the charmer. If the soldiers commanding officer than ordered him to attack the pc's it would be up to the soldier whether or not he would attack his friend. Rule as you like, but the opposed Cha check *is* supposed to let you get the guy to take up arms against his former friends. Also the charmer's friends are not the charmed creatures friends. If the charmer's companions are there as well the charmed guy would most likely (as he was described) attack these companions if ordered to do so by his superior. A charisma check to stop this by the charmer (unless he believes that this will lead to his being harmed by his superiors/peers). Charm can be a very useful spell to get what you want...but I don't think it has any place in an agitated environment where combat is likely. That is my opinion though. Enh, I think it does. D&D is a game about combat, after all. Again, trying to decide who is right on these boards is a waste of time since it is up to the DM to decide. Stating ones opinion is helpful since it can lead to the DM (the only person who's decision matters) coming to a conclusion. Sure. I can just state the reasons I hold the opinion I do -- consistent reading of the rules being a main one, but also that I don't like the character-flattening implications of things other people say (that this or that is something *nobody* would *ever* do or that *everyone* of a certain alignment *must* do). |
| DarkPawn07-11-07, 05:33 PM | bah, second time I deleted when trying to quote.... |
| Seeker9507-11-07, 06:08 PM | Key words in bold red:A charmed character fights his former allies only if they threaten his new friend, and even then he uses the least lethal means at his disposal ]as long as these tactics show any possibility of success (just as he would in a fight between two actual friends). The OP did not present a scenario in which the charmed lawful evil soldier is being asked to kill his commanding officer, nor is the commanding officer threatening the new friend. As you noted, lawful evil soldier was charmed and then ordered to kill you he would not. Furthermore, a charmed character will not perform a suicidal act. Disobeying a direct order is suicidal, especially in a lawful evil army. You victory dance is somewhat premature and unwarranted. |
| Vegepygmy07-11-07, 07:11 PM | So I think I can now safely say by RAW, in the original scenario...if lawful evil soldier was charmed and then ordered to kill you he would not.That's not what it means at all. Truly, you have a remarkable ability to twist the meaning of things. (Thank God you're working towards an MBA, and not a JD! You'd make a very good lawyer--and I don't mean that as a compliment. ;) ) Also note that the "least lethal means" at the disposal of a duty-bound soldier who has been ordered to kill somebody are still lethal. Nonlethal means are not at his disposal, by virtue of the fact that he has been ordered to kill, not just "fight." |
| DarkPawn07-11-07, 11:14 PM | Key words in bold red:The OP did not present a scenario in which the charmed lawful evil soldier is being asked to kill his commanding officer, nor is the commanding officer threatening the new friend. As you noted, lawful evil soldier was charmed and then ordered to kill you he would not. Furthermore, a charmed character will not perform a suicidal act. Disobeying a direct order is suicidal, especially in a lawful evil army. You victory dance is somewhat premature and unwarranted. Stumbled on this while looking for something unrelated (DMG page 291): Essentially, a charmed character retains free will but makes choices according to a skewed view of the world. A charmed character fights his former allies only if they threaten his new friend, and even then he uses the least lethal means at his disposal as long as these tactics show any possibility of success (just as he would in a fight between two actual friends). Victory dance? You know you guys are the most stubborn people I have ever met. There is no way on earth to read anymore into that statement. In the original concept the whole issue was if the soldier would attack you if following an order. Obviously he is not. The fact that the commander says kill you, might be enough for the soldier to attack him. I am not saying he is going to kill the commander, but he might knock him out so you can get away. But in no way, in any interpretation is he going to attack you. That was the initial question. I believe I answered it clearly. Now adding this stretch about how not obeying the order is suicidal so he will attack you? Wow you're reaching and basing nothing on RAW when saying such a thing. I've quoted rules, what friendly attitude exactly means, I quoted you what someone specifically does when charmed, and you keep adding...yeah but... You have quoted no rule that in any way shows someone would attack you if unprovoked, and charmed by you. |
| ArcTan07-12-07, 02:17 AM | Stumbled on this while looking for something unrelated (DMG page 291): Essentially, a charmed character retains free will but makes choices according to a skewed view of the world. A charmed character fights his former allies only if they threaten his new friend, and even then he uses the least lethal means at his disposal as long as these tactics show any possibility of success (just as he would in a fight between two actual friends). Again, you're reading this backwards. A charmed character fights his *former allies* -- i.e. the people who were *already his allies* -- only if they threaten his *new* friend -- i.e. the person who charmed him. This one sentence says nothing about under what conditions the charmed character will fight his new friend if ordered to by his former allies. Or, for that matter, by any yahoo who's holding a crossbow to his neck. If you choose to read this as an implication that a charmed character *must always* fight former allies if they threaten his new friend, well, fine -- I'm getting sick of this. The implication here is clearly a *limit* on what *you*, the charmer, can make the charmed victim do, not an absolute declaration of something a charmed victim *must* do. At the very least, this sentence *must* be overridden by the statement that charmed characters will not take actions they deem to be overwhelmingly harmful to themselves or suicidal, and yes, in many situations disobeying a direct order is suicidal. Victory dance? You know you guys are the most stubborn people I have ever met. There is no way on earth to read anymore into that statement. In the original concept the whole issue was if the soldier would attack you if following an order. Obviously he is not. The fact that the commander says kill you, might be enough for the soldier to attack him. The section you're quoting is talking about *allies*, not a commander, or anyone else with the direct power of life and death over the charmed character. I am not saying he is going to kill the commander, but he might knock him out so you can get away. But in no way, in any interpretation is he going to attack you. That was the initial question. I believe I answered it clearly. The RAW here is clearly not taking the OP's question into consideration. It's clearly talking about the far more typical scenario of two groups similar to adventuring parties -- loose affiliations of peers -- coming into conflict. Let me put it this way: The RAW here says that the charmed character acts the way he would if two real groups of friends came into conflict (and, indeed, if two groups of my friends were fighting I would try to stay out of it unless they were seriously threatening to kill each other, and then use the least harmful means I could to subdue them). However, if an ordinary, un-charmed character had two groups of friends, and one of those groups was ordinary civilians and one of them contained his *direct commanding officer in an army*, the situation changes, doesn't it? Now adding this stretch about how not obeying the order is suicidal so he will attack you? Wow you're reaching and basing nothing on RAW when saying such a thing. RAW says that suicidal orders won't be followed. It doesn't matter what kind of suicidal. Look, I can imagine that *some* people -- not all, but some -- would kill their friends if some random stranger they didn't like at all held a gun to their back and said it was their life or their friend's. Do you really think Charm is meant to override this kind of self-preservation? Do you really think that one ambiguous line from the RAW means "A charmed character *never* ever attacks the person who charmed her?" Because they could have *said* that if that's what they wanted to say. Instead, what they said was "If *you* charm someone and try to make her attack her former friends, that's against her nature and she generally won't do it" (with the obvious caveat that an opposed Cha check can make her do anything). I don't see how you're getting one from the other. I've quoted rules, what friendly attitude exactly means, I quoted you what someone specifically does when charmed, and you keep adding...yeah but... You have quoted no rule that in any way shows someone would attack you if unprovoked, and charmed by you. There's a lack of a rule that says that there's an absolute *prohibition* against a charmed character attacking their charmer. In the absence of such a prohibition, I think the character would react normally, as normal as is possible for someone who's been forced to think of someone as a friend who isn't a friend. Charm only makes someone your friend -- it *still doesn't change their own definition of what they do for friends*. Again, you keep at this with the conviction that the rules are supposed to define exactly what a charmed character does in every situation, which I find preposterous and a terrible idea -- it's a way to destroy the individuality of a character completely by using a charm spell, which to me goes absolutely against what charm is about. Charmed greedy bastards are still greedy bastards, charmed psychopaths are still psychopaths, charmed cowards are still cowards, etc. |
| DarkPawn07-12-07, 03:09 AM | Wow I still can't believe you're arguing this. I give up. I can't convince you. It says specifically that they will attack their former allies if they threaten you. A commander giving them an order to kill you is a threat. So right there they could punch the commander in the face and knock him out. Using the least lethal way to protect you first. One could just as easily argue that, as opposed to any suicidal nonsense in disobeying that order...which frankly is absurd. There is nothing that makes someone feel that if they disregard an order they are going to die, no matter what. Yes going against your commander could lead to death, but suicide? Come on...that is so far out there. I'm dropping the entire argument because I really think you're just reaching for reasons to argue, the obvious result of the spell. Charm does cause them to protect you (as friendly attitude stated), they are your advocate. They will not attack you. This is all clearly stated. Now your saying yeah but, they wouldn't do something obviously suicidal. So disobeying an order is obviously suicidal. Blah, that is nonsense. I'm quite shocked because up until now you had a lot of rational arguments. This is beyond silly, and you know damn well what the spell does. |
| ArcTan07-12-07, 03:13 AM | Sometimes disobeying an order *is* obviously suicidal. Sometimes it isn't. It depends. I *know* what the "spirit" of the spell is. I'm saying the spirit of the spell doesn't constitute inviolable law. In many cases a Charmed soldier can and will try to get out of obeying that order. If the situation he's in allows it, he might and probably would object to the order and demand an explanation. If he's the kind of person who might *and the situation allows it* he might punch out the superior officer and try to mount a daring escape. But none of this is *guaranteed* as what *would* happen. (Suppose he *can't* punch out the superior officer because the superior officer has a gun -- or crossbow, whatever -- drawn and pointed at his throat. Suppose he's being given this order precisely because the superior officer suspects this soldier has been charmed or otherwise corrupted and is testing his loyalties. Etc., etc.) Look, my one and only point is that I greatly dislike rulings that turn people into automata, and that's what you're doing -- saying that Charm creates an *absolute and total certainty* that the target will *never, ever, ever* attack you, which I don't believe in doing. I don't like absolute certainties. They make for crappy stories. |
| DarkPawn07-12-07, 03:23 AM | Sometimes disobeying an order *is* obviously suicidal. Sometimes it isn't. It depends. I think this is completely untrue. There is never a 100% chance they will die from not killing you. You both could run and get away. They put that in the description to prevent you from abusing this spell by saying: "Jump in that lava." "Go fight that demigod while I escape." "Cut your own throat." etc..etc... That is suicide. In almost every other scenario there is always hope that they won't die. Unless the person had some kind of future sense and knew they would absolutely die, it isn't suicide. Look, my one and only point is that I greatly dislike rulings that turn people into automata, and that's what you're doing -- saying that Charm creates an *absolute and total certainty* that the target will *never, ever, ever* attack you, which I don't believe in doing. I don't like absolute certainties. They make for crappy stories. I don't like that ruling either and that is not what I'm doing. The person is not an automata. They just won't kill you. That is it. If you are threatened by anyone else they will do what they can to protect you. In most situations it will be simply saying, "No stop." Or trying to grapple the person. I'm not saying they are going to kill all their former allies. Also if you give them an order that is something they normally wouldn't do, you have to convince them with an opposed charisma check to do it. If you give them a suicidal order, or one that seems suicidal...they can outright ignore it. If you attack them or do something they are completely opposed to, more opposed charisma checks are in order. I don't see why you think this is making them a mindless tool that acts like an automata. I don't view it this way at all. |
| Leilond07-12-07, 04:11 AM | In most situations it will be simply saying, "No stop." Or trying to grapple the person. I'm not saying they are going to kill all their former allies. Also if you give them an order that is something they normally wouldn't do, you have to convince them with an opposed charisma check to do it. Exactly, as you said "in most situation" Totally agree It means that in SOME situation the charmed one will try to kill his charmer Rare, difficult to happen, but possible, if the situation is very specific and the charmed nature bring kill a good friend in the specific situation |
| sijigs07-12-07, 06:46 AM | I award a point to DarkPawn... a friend is a friend is a friend. |