On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

You have questions? We may have answers.

Moderators: Forum Moderators, Active DMs

Sartain
Posts: 180
Joined: Fri Feb 15, 2019 3:34 pm

On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Sartain » Sun Mar 24, 2019 2:52 pm

So I guess I got a bit carried away with moral philosophy in a mechanics thread, so I'll take it here instead:

The practice of Necromancy, as a general rule, is typically considering morally objectively Evil by the source material that this game is based on (D&D, numerous editions but I take my cues from 3.5 ed. since that is arguably the closest to what we're playing). Yet Necromancy as a spell school is not, in itself objectively Evil as it also consists of plenty of non-undeadifying spells, like wards against negative energy and such. Really, they probably should have made the Evil, undeath-related part of Necromancy a separate spell school completely. Black/White Necromancy anyone?

Anyway, It is implied that a Necromancer can, in theory, practice raising the undead once in a while without necessarily being considered Evil, as graverobbing and defilement of corpses are, in fact not considered objectively Evil but merely socially taboo.
Animating or creating any undead above the level of a Zombie does however heavily imply wresting dead souls from their rightful rest against both their and possibly their patron deity's will, and any undead is considered a great travesty and crime by the Neutral-aligned god of Death (Kelemvor).

Anything pertaining to liches and Dracoliches requires the willing murder and sacrifice of beings of pure heart and the obliteration of souls by feeding them to the phylactery, so that's pretty much unavoidable objectively Evil, no discussion, as far as I see it.

On Arelith Necromancy Arelith seems to IC'ly be considered objectively Evil no matter the level or scope of it. Mechanically though there are no such limitions as any regular necromancer can be of whatever alignment they feel like whilst summoning any and all undead, and even the Pale Master can get away with a Neutral alignment even though one of the core features of the (epic level) class is the ownership of an always-evil Dracolich.

What I'm curious about is, do you see Necromancy as objectively Evil, or not? Can arguments for "the greater good" and such excuse the violation of the peace of the grave? Will your Lawful Good deity think it's alright that your turned the mortal remains of somebody's dad into a shambling mockery of life, just because you made it kill Orcs? Or is the act of creating undead (which is suppose is the real crux of 'Black Necromancy') objectively Evil in itself? Should such Necromancy have in-game repercussions to a characters alignment?
One thing the game engine tends to gloss over is that there is a rather grisly task behind animating the dead: either you exhume the graves of the dead for materials, or you literally use negative energy to animate things you just killed, or you bind the souls of the dead (meaning people who passed on) to some task or object.

Also, if Necromancy is not to be considered Evil what of Warlocks, Blackguards and other summoners?
Fiendlocks are locked to the evil alignment IC'ly although technically you could argue that their summons are a lot less hurtful than Necromancers. After all, any fiend is completely deserving of it's fate in the afterlife. Of course there's the whole bit with being pacted to a powerful fiend for Warlocks but that is in fact not prohibiting Fiend-pacted warlocks being of neutral or even good alignment in the Pen & Paper source material. Blackguards, of course, are pretty much meant as champions of objective Evil so I guess them being alignment locked makes sense.

Personally I don't mind a bit of moral relativism in my RP but in a world where there is objective Evil I have a hard time understanding why some classes are held to this standard but others are not.

As I mentioned in the Pale Master thread that spawned this train of thought, there seems to be some cognitive dissonance in the design philosophy of a couple of classes, specifically the ones dealing with Evil summons. Personally I don't understand how the Pale Master gets to be Neutral but Fiendlocks don't. I suppose its mostly a matter of whoever designed them really had a thing for the class :)

Shadowy Reality
Arelith Gold Supporter
Arelith Gold Supporter
Posts: 1237
Joined: Mon Sep 08, 2014 9:56 am

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Shadowy Reality » Sun Mar 24, 2019 3:20 pm

First of all Necromancy isn't inherently evil, Animation is. Whoever says otherwise is wrong. Mind you, characters can argue this point ICly, that is fine and expected, but at an OOC level they must know that is not canon in any way.

Now, Animation isn't inherently evil because of Soul tampering, in fact, Animation does not involve souls in any way.
When you animate a zombie the soul that once belonged to that corpse does not come back in any way. That is what Resurrection does and even that has restrictions (the soul must be willing and it must not have been Judged yet).

Animation is considered Evil mostly because you are willingly creating an Evil creature. And one that is directly linked to the Negative Energy Plane, and thus spreading negative energy wherever is resides. And of course, it is creepy as hell.

You ask, how can an Animator be neutral then? In many ways. First, a single Evil action does not make you evil. Occasional undead creation, specially when not done with the purpose to do evil is alright, so long as your character's other actions are mostly neutral. Second, you can use undead to go Good acts. An evil method to do a Good (for the greater good) action is inherently neutral.

If you are making frequent use of undead for selfish (see neutral) reasons, such as treasure hunting, protecting yourself, you will eventually be considered Evil.

Sartain
Posts: 180
Joined: Fri Feb 15, 2019 3:34 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Sartain » Sun Mar 24, 2019 3:55 pm

So Evil actions have different magnitudes of Evil, I suppose? Will killing a few innocents for the greater good make you evil even if creating undead for the same reason does not? In a world where Evil is quite objective, how is performing an objectively Evil act not making you Evil? Who decides where the line is, in this regard?

Edit: As an aside, if Necromancy (animation) isn't strictly Evil, why is summoning Fiends considered to be?

User avatar
CosmicOrderV
Arelith Silver Supporter
Arelith Silver Supporter
Posts: 389
Joined: Tue Oct 23, 2018 5:35 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by CosmicOrderV » Sun Mar 24, 2019 5:25 pm

Shadowy Reality nailed it. I've always thought necromantic animation was best viewed as more "irresponsible" than anything else. It may not be explicitly evil, but there's a certain point where you're just purposefully making irresponsible choices, and veering into 'evil' territory. Same goes for summoning fiends, actually. Maybe an ignorant summoner could get away conjuring a fiend with good-hearted intentions, but at a certain point, especially for someone learned like a wizard, you're willingly conjuring these creatures that have an eternal reputation for corrupting the material plane. Sure, you might briefly use it to accomplish something worthy, but at some point if you keep this up, it's just becoming irresponsible, and then eventually willfully selfish, at the cost of whatever greater scheme you're inadvertently enabling the fiends to accomplish.

As for your query of magnitudes of evil, that is, unfortunately more something that would require a tabletop DM, or very dedicated Dev. Here on arelith we don't quite have the luxury of a coherent DM team who's all on the same page for these things. It's understandably difficult to accomplish to get everyone on the same page, unlike a tabletop game where you just have one person in charge of this, who makes the rule and sticks to it. So you'll probably never get any clear answer.

One thing I would keep in mind about the nature of morality in D&D, however, is that it's normative. There's an objective measure, hidden behind the veil of cosmic order (the DM's screen), that tends to parody questions of real life morality, and fuels the construction of the universe.

If you dig deep into Forgotten Realms lore, it's somewhat interesting to note the sort of lifeforms present at the beginning. The first creatures (some humanoid, and some like the chuul) were actually created by the aboleth, while primitive elemental lifeforms quarreled across the universe, creating the known physical universe. The aboleth settled the leftover battlefields of the elemental's quarreling, making colonies. If I remember correctly, it was the Dukes of Aether (the Vaati), a lawful aligned group of air elementals, who were most victorious. Sort of paving the way for air breathing lifeforms to develop later down the line. So at this point, you have what is essentially a creation myth, about the elements churning and forming into two distinct groups: Law and Chaos.

Then at some point in there, good and evil begin to become defined anthropomorphic personifications, as the gods come about. And then even the gods become more defined, as they embody specific ideals, or portfolios. They give the aboleth the boot, and start creating their own lifeforms. And it's at this point, you get some of the more well known myths about how each god created their associated race.

I think an important take away from this all, that I find entertaining, at least, is that there's a progression and development of these panpsychic notions. Law. Chaos. Good. Evil. They develop and are refined. The deific personification that holds any given portfolio, can and does change. It's something that's usually missed on the surface. For example, people like to complain about the alignment system being too general or restrictive, but really... what's to say a creature's alignment doesn't shift many times over their life-time? I think the alignment system is great, but it does, perhaps unfortunately, require a very dedicated DM, which just isn't practical here on Arelith for the reasons stated above. Perhaps one day there might be a secret list of objective rights and wrongs, but I don't see that happening anytime soon. I think it's also why you don't see a huge focus on Alignment. Major actions might get an alignment shift by a DM, but it's no where near the sort of minute gritty level of immersion that 'realism' would really call for.

In any case, this stuff is hella fun to talk about IC'ly. Since there isn't a major focus on alignment in-game, it somewhat ironically gives more perceived power to what /other people/ think is moral, rather than what any cosmic order may dictate. So there's definitely some fun to be had here :D
Aodh Lazuli wrote:
Wed Apr 10, 2019 6:22 pm
I, too, struggle to know what is written in books without first reading them.

Sartain
Posts: 180
Joined: Fri Feb 15, 2019 3:34 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Sartain » Sun Mar 24, 2019 5:52 pm

Cool stuff about proto-Forgotten Realms, I didn't know that.
I agree that alignments should be less set in stone, but I also realise that is a tough nut to crack for any Persistent World. As already mentioned though I feel like some classes are held to different standards, which annoys me 😅
It might be interesting if in-game alignment wasn't restricted but stuff like animate dead, fiend summoning and such would move you slightly towards evil every time you used it... And the only way to gain good points was through DM intervention! How far will you go down the road of good intentions?

User avatar
Ork
Arelith Gold Supporter
Arelith Gold Supporter
Posts: 2488
Joined: Sun Nov 02, 2014 8:30 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Ork » Sun Mar 24, 2019 6:28 pm

There is a pretty explicit reason why alignment changes are handled by the DMs and that is because classes themselves have alignment restrictions. If there were mechanically coded alignment changes in game, players would abuse that mechanic in order to create class combinations that shouldn't be allowed (paladin & BG spring to mind). While DMs could manage these cases when they arise, unless they're actively looking at a players character sheet there may be no way to tell, at least until someone reports it.

One of the main aspects of Arelith is player-driven roleplay, and with that players should be allowed to make conscious decisions based on their alignment. If you're playing a PM that is chaotic neutral but you are persistently doing evil things, you should definitely re-evaluate your alignment.

Now, some players will also abuse the current alignment system and claim they are CN when infact they're acting CE. These situations the DMs will be able to change alignment if the character is repetitively roleplaying an alignment counter to what it says on their character sheet. Report these incidents if you're suspicious someone isn't roleplaying their alignment. In most cases, it will be pretty obvious to the players that there is some abuse going on.

Xarge VI
Posts: 474
Joined: Mon Sep 08, 2014 8:05 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Xarge VI » Sun Mar 24, 2019 10:39 pm

I think worth noting is that while the rules of the universe may be definite. Good, evil, etc. But the characters themselves are not all knowing.

You could consider Wizards as comparison to scientists who are trying to understand the the universe. With emphasis on the word Try.

While a cleric, paladin, knight, blackguardm etc. may have a firm belief in their moral codes, to others they are just beliefs and a neutrally aligned person might consider their views naive.

Aelryn Bloodmoon
Arelith Supporter
Arelith Supporter
Posts: 2028
Joined: Thu Sep 11, 2014 4:57 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Aelryn Bloodmoon » Mon Mar 25, 2019 6:27 am

According to the rules, a creature that has been turned into an undead creature must first be destroyed to be raised from the dead. This does, in fact, imply that turning someone into a zombie or other undead creature inhibits their soul from coming back in some way, as True Resurrection also follows this restriction even though it doesn't require a body to raise the target dead creature.

Animation is evil- most necromancy is not. Negative energy is not evil- but giving it a host (sentient or otherwise) where its nature drives that host (the undead creature) to devour and destroy the sanctity of life and in some cases souls, is an inherently evil act that requires the defiling of a corpse- which is considered evil. "Looting" a corpse isn't considered defilement in many circumstances (as the to the victor go the spoils trope is very dominant in FR), but the kind of defilement we're talking about in animation rituals is unnatural and completely evil.

It's perfectly fine for characters to have all sorts of arguments based around relativity and their personal circumstances. But whether you interpret it as the gods/powers of the universe being cold, heartless bastards, or whether you embrace the high-fantasy trope of chivalrous heroism vs. absolute evil, the universe your character lives in claims they are wrong. Literally. Good and evil are primal forces that have power and affect the world in tangible ways, as is neutrality.

Very few single acts completely define a character's entire alignment- but some acts are so egregious/upstanding that only a couple of repeats will certainly shift what the universe/gods view you as.
Bane's tyranny is known throughout the continent, and his is the image most seen as the face of evil.
-Faiths and Pantheons (c)2002

User avatar
Drowble Oh Seven
Posts: 427
Joined: Fri Sep 29, 2017 11:36 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Drowble Oh Seven » Mon Mar 25, 2019 9:01 am

It's easy to hate necromancers, but they're just trying to do the wight thing.

Shadowy Reality
Arelith Gold Supporter
Arelith Gold Supporter
Posts: 1237
Joined: Mon Sep 08, 2014 9:56 am

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Shadowy Reality » Mon Mar 25, 2019 9:06 am

Aelryn Bloodmoon wrote:
Mon Mar 25, 2019 6:27 am
According to the rules, a creature that has been turned into an undead creature must first be destroyed to be raised from the dead. This does, in fact, imply that turning someone into a zombie or other undead creature inhibits their soul from coming back in some way, as True Resurrection also follows this restriction even though it doesn't require a body to raise the target dead creature.
You are correct but I would argue it is mostly because a Soul cannot return to an undead body like that and not because the soul has been hijacked.

It makes no sense to be otherwise, if your Soul has entered the fugue, joined the Deity's realm and eventually dissipated, you cannot bring those back in any way. What happens if I animate that corpse, does it fail because there is no soul anymore? I don't think so.

Reincarnate has nothing specifying undead when reincarnating, because the soul returns to an entirely new body.

User avatar
The GrumpyCat
Dungeon Master
Dungeon Master
Posts: 6572
Joined: Sun Jan 18, 2015 5:47 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by The GrumpyCat » Mon Mar 25, 2019 2:45 pm

Ork wrote:
Sun Mar 24, 2019 6:28 pm
There is a pretty explicit reason why alignment changes are handled by the DMs and that is because classes themselves have alignment restrictions. If there were mechanically coded alignment changes in game, players would abuse that mechanic in order to create class combinations that shouldn't be allowed (paladin & BG spring to mind). While DMs could manage these cases when they arise, unless they're actively looking at a players character sheet there may be no way to tell, at least until someone reports it.

One of the main aspects of Arelith is player-driven roleplay, and with that players should be allowed to make conscious decisions based on their alignment. If you're playing a PM that is chaotic neutral but you are persistently doing evil things, you should definitely re-evaluate your alignment.

Now, some players will also abuse the current alignment system and claim they are CN when infact they're acting CE. These situations the DMs will be able to change alignment if the character is repetitively roleplaying an alignment counter to what it says on their character sheet. Report these incidents if you're suspicious someone isn't roleplaying their alignment. In most cases, it will be pretty obvious to the players that there is some abuse going on.
This.

Also keep in mind, whilat yes, alingment in FR is objective, in Real Life, in the minds of the actual players/Dms it is far more Subjective. As such it can only be reviwed on a case by case basis by Dms, who have access to information at hand.

Also a little bit of moral grey, in my opinion, makes a better story and far better characters.

Edit: And to sort of answer the origional question.
Necromany itself (as in the school) Is not considered objectivly evil on Arelith.
Raising the Dead generally is.
That said, again all cases will be looked at on a case by case basis. There may be a differnece between say, a person using a dracolitch to save a orpahange of terrified children from a gobli hoard,, and Joe who just wants to use his Dracolitch to farm Red Dragon Isle a few times.
This too shall pass.

(I now have a DM Discord (I hope) It's DM GrumpyCat#7185 but please keep in mind I'm very busy IRL so I can't promise how quick I'll get back to you.)

User avatar
Queen Titania
Community Manager
Community Manager
Posts: 3370
Joined: Sun Sep 07, 2014 6:44 pm
Location: The Seeliecourt singing with Tinkerbell

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Queen Titania » Mon Mar 25, 2019 3:28 pm

Exactly as DM Grumpycat pointed out.

A player wanting to play a neutral necromancer can employ very rare, emergency use of using undead for the greater good as very fitting for the alignment, but should avoid using it in daily/general adventuring cases in a sort of general-level advise.

Of course naturally, expect character conflict regardless!
Please don't feed my sister.

User avatar
-XXX-
Posts: 2113
Joined: Tue Oct 18, 2016 1:49 am

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by -XXX- » Mon Mar 25, 2019 5:16 pm

OK, so we're all in agreement that necromancy is evil, our paladins know the mechanics of animation better than actual necromancers as the pages X,Y and Z of the D&D rulebook are actually a part of their order's holy scripture that they've been memorizing since initiation... yada yada yada
Bottom line, when encountered we can finally fast-forward the needless "RP bit" to get to all that sweet smite business sooner!

Also, if their alignment is not set to evil, they're gaming the system to dodge the smite. Best report!



...why do these IC issues have to always be settled and sorted out OOC? Takes away a lot of RP potential IMHO. Sometimes it's more fun to not have all the answers.

Sartain
Posts: 180
Joined: Fri Feb 15, 2019 3:34 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Sartain » Mon Mar 25, 2019 6:09 pm

-XXX- wrote:
Mon Mar 25, 2019 5:16 pm
OK, so we're all in agreement that necromancy is evil, our paladins know the mechanics of animation better than actual necromancers as the pages X,Y and Z of the D&D rulebook are actually a part of their order's holy scripture that they've been memorizing since initiation... yada yada yada
Bottom line, when encountered we can finally fast-forward the needless "RP bit" to get to all that sweet smite business sooner!

Also, if their alignment is not set to evil, they're gaming the system to dodge the smite. Best report!



...why do these IC issues have to always be settled and sorted out OOC? Takes away a lot of RP potential IMHO. Sometimes it's more fun to not have all the answers.
It's a rant, it doesn't have to be solved 😊

Lukkas
Posts: 2
Joined: Wed Feb 27, 2019 8:46 am

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Lukkas » Mon Mar 25, 2019 7:16 pm

-XXX- wrote:
Mon Mar 25, 2019 5:16 pm
Bottom line, when encountered we can finally fast-forward the needless "RP bit" to get to all that sweet smite business sooner!

Also, if their alignment is not set to evil, they're gaming the system to dodge the smite. Best report!
Peak sarcasm is not immediately knowing if this is a joke or not.

Aelryn Bloodmoon
Arelith Supporter
Arelith Supporter
Posts: 2028
Joined: Thu Sep 11, 2014 4:57 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Aelryn Bloodmoon » Mon Mar 25, 2019 9:07 pm

Shadowy Reality wrote:
Mon Mar 25, 2019 9:06 am
You are correct but I would argue it is mostly because a Soul cannot return to an undead body like that and not because the soul has been hijacked.

It makes no sense to be otherwise, if your Soul has entered the fugue, joined the Deity's realm and eventually dissipated, you cannot bring those back in any way. What happens if I animate that corpse, does it fail because there is no soul anymore? I don't think so.

Reincarnate has nothing specifying undead when reincarnating, because the soul returns to an entirely new body.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/reincarnate.htm

This is the opening line of the reincarnate spell, emphasis mine. It's worth noting that the rest of the spell includes details that require the dead target's original body to be touched in order to reincarnate it into a new body- however small a portion of the original body, one must be present.
With this spell, you bring back a dead creature in another body, provided that its death occurred no more than one week before the casting of the spell and the subject’s soul is free and willing to return.
True Resurrection, resurrection, and raise dead all operate on the mechanic that an undead creature must be destroyed before the person they were before animation can be raised. Edit: And True Resurrection follows this requirement even though it doesn't require a body.

Every one of these facts is consistent with the logic that animating an undead creature maligns the soul of the deceased in some way (an act that is explicitly, objectively evil in every single D&D universe), binding it to the body in a twisted perversion of itself that is overridden by the life-hating nature of the negative energy that animates its body.

Even in examples of undead that retain sentience and an aspect of their individuality from before their transformation (most liches and vampires, for example), they inevitably become more corrupt and detached from any previous moral quandaries they may have had as living beings. There is one noteworthy exception with plot armor that I can name from Realmslore named Jared Sunstar, a sun elf who was attacked and turned into a vampire, that later managed to turn on his master and spare innocent lives in the process.
Last edited by Aelryn Bloodmoon on Mon Mar 25, 2019 9:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Bane's tyranny is known throughout the continent, and his is the image most seen as the face of evil.
-Faiths and Pantheons (c)2002

User avatar
Dezarc
Posts: 6
Joined: Thu Apr 05, 2018 2:27 am

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Dezarc » Mon Mar 25, 2019 9:18 pm

just a bit of a correction: no warlock is required to be evil on arelith, just non-lawful non-good for abyssal, non-chaotic non-good for infernal, and non-good for fey

User avatar
CosmicOrderV
Arelith Silver Supporter
Arelith Silver Supporter
Posts: 389
Joined: Tue Oct 23, 2018 5:35 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by CosmicOrderV » Mon Mar 25, 2019 11:25 pm

Towards the point of what -XXX- said, I think while that's not a terrible mind-set, unfortunately it lends itself to nothing ever truly being developed. It always stays nebulous, and over time becomes a stale concept. It's only fun to beat a dead horse for so long.

All that said, Aelryn, it seems like you're misinformed. The subject's soul being free is typically language used in reference to things like soul-cages or soul entrapment. Just because your original corpse is animated, in no way means someone couldn't try to Resurrect you. The spell simply requires a piece of the host's body. This could be a toe-nail if you wanted to get pedantic, and the DM allowed it. Meanwhile, the rest of your buddy's corpse is walking around animated by negative energy. Yeah, the animated bits cannot currently house the life-force of your friend. It's already inhabited. But the spell Resurrection only requires no extenuated circumstances to have tied up the target soul, and that you have a piece of their original body. True Resurrection doesn't even require you have a piece of their body, just that you identify the deceased in some manner.

The line of text I assume is misunderstood is this bit:
"You can revive someone killed by a death effect or someone who has been turned into an undead creature and then destroyed."

Note, however, the difference between soul and body. An undead zombie is not the person you're trying to resurrect. It just has the body your target 'person' once inhabited. It bears a different animating life-force. It's not the actual 'person' you're trying to bring back. The 'person' you're bringing back, has their soul elsewhere in the cosmos. The exception to this is sentient undead, and it's this exception that the above quote is addressing. You can revive someone who was once undead, but only after they've been destroyed. Which is to say, someone whose actual personage became so suffused with negative energy, they them self became undead and their personality, soul, or self, was changed because of it. These are the normal suspects: Vampires, Liches, and the likes.
Aodh Lazuli wrote:
Wed Apr 10, 2019 6:22 pm
I, too, struggle to know what is written in books without first reading them.

Aelryn Bloodmoon
Arelith Supporter
Arelith Supporter
Posts: 2028
Joined: Thu Sep 11, 2014 4:57 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Aelryn Bloodmoon » Tue Mar 26, 2019 5:19 am

CosmicOrderV wrote:All that said, Aelryn, it seems like you're misinformed. The subject's soul being free is typically language used in reference to things like soul-cages or soul entrapment. Just because your original corpse is animated, in no way means someone couldn't try to Resurrect you.
The spell text of raise dead explicitly prohibits the raising of a slain creature that was turned into an undead creature.

The spell text of Resurrection explicitly prohibits the resurrecting of a creature that has been turned into an undead creature until that creature is destroyed.

The spell text of True Resurrection explicitly prohibits the resurrecting of a creature that has been turned into an undead creature until that creature is destroyed, despite not requiring a body, which in combination with the above two facts very strongly implies that the soul is somehow captivated in the process, otherwise true resurrection should work, but it does not.

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/trueResurrection.htm
You can revive someone killed by a death effect or someone who has been turned into an undead creature and then destroyed. This spell can also resurrect elementals or outsiders, but it can’t resurrect constructs or undead creatures.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/resurrection.htm
You can resurrect someone killed by a death effect or someone who has been turned into an undead creature and then destroyed. You cannot resurrect someone who has died of old age. Constructs, elementals, outsiders, and undead creatures can’t be resurrected.
I don't believe I'm misinformed at all, and strongly believe it likely that you may be skimming the spell text and missing some very important points and restrictions on what can happen after someone has been turned into an undead creature. You yourself were attempting to argue from the stance that True Resurrection works to bring back Tom who was turned into a zombie to life, because it doesn't need the original body, and the soul is free, but the spell text explicitly prohibits that (edit: until you destroy Zombie Tom).

Perhaps because the soul isn't free so long as its body is animated? :geek:
Bane's tyranny is known throughout the continent, and his is the image most seen as the face of evil.
-Faiths and Pantheons (c)2002

User avatar
Eters
Posts: 200
Joined: Wed Dec 21, 2016 1:44 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Eters » Tue Mar 26, 2019 12:31 pm

As interesting as the thread is, and as enlightening as it is. A little clarification or reminder is perhaps necessary. Just because it's in the guidebook, doesn't mean all characters in the world know it.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In a situation where a paladin, who mind you spent X years being indoctrinated by Y church that taught him that all undead are EVIL by nature and should be smitten. Runs into a necromancer who explains why his pack of zombies is not evil using the guidebook explanation (which means that it is 100% correct.) If the paladin decides to ignore that and still smite the dude for the undead he has, It's not necessarily bad. Because for a paladin, the choice between the words of god > The words of some random guy with undead he ran into 5 mins ago.

We have the guidebooks and all the information at our disposal to understand the world we immerse ourselves into better. But it doesn't mean that our characters that live in that world, have the same amount of informations about every subject as we, the players, do.

Morals are subjective, all the more so in the FR setting, evil and good aren't set in stone and the grey areas are many. But we as players should just keep in mind that paladins we are, or necromancers, or just by-passers. That what we know is not what our characters know, nor what other people's characters know. And should not be "angry" and "annoyed" that an X person in the setting refused to believe the explanation we gave even if it's correct.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Now back to the subject of True resurrections, a true resurrection will provide a body if a body is non-existent, if tom is an undead, his body yet exists, it's just being animated, thus the need to destroy the body first, then use true resurrection to revive them as a new body is provided since (old zombie body) was destroyed.

Souls that are taken due to a pact, or something of other nature are not "free", so I can see how you can't resurrect some warlock after their patron claims their soul.

At least, that's how I understood it from skimming around the descriptions of the spells.

Sartain
Posts: 180
Joined: Fri Feb 15, 2019 3:34 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Sartain » Tue Mar 26, 2019 1:50 pm

Eters wrote:
Tue Mar 26, 2019 12:31 pm
As interesting as the thread is, and as enlightening as it is. A little clarification or reminder is perhaps necessary. Just because it's in the guidebook, doesn't mean all characters in the world know it.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In a situation where a paladin, who mind you spent X years being indoctrinated by Y church that taught him that all undead are EVIL by nature and should be smitten. Runs into a necromancer who explains why his pack of zombies is not evil using the guidebook explanation (which means that it is 100% correct.) If the paladin decides to ignore that and still smite the dude for the undead he has, It's not necessarily bad. Because for a paladin, the choice between the words of god > The words of some random guy with undead he ran into 5 mins ago.

We have the guidebooks and all the information at our disposal to understand the world we immerse ourselves into better. But it doesn't mean that our characters that live in that world, have the same amount of informations about every subject as we, the players, do.

Morals are subjective, all the more so in the FR setting, evil and good aren't set in stone and the grey areas are many. But we as players should just keep in mind that paladins we are, or necromancers, or just by-passers. That what we know is not what our characters know, nor what other people's characters know. And should not be "angry" and "annoyed" that an X person in the setting refused to believe the explanation we gave even if it's correct.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
But by this logic church dogma trumps objective alignment. In your scenario a paladin, who is supposed to be Lawful and Good, walks down the road and murders an innocent man because church scripture says so with no repercussions.
I doubt that's how the morality system was intended 😅

User avatar
Eters
Posts: 200
Joined: Wed Dec 21, 2016 1:44 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Eters » Tue Mar 26, 2019 3:13 pm

Note that I never said anything about a lack of reprecussions. Just explained that knowledge our characters have is not always correct. Nor should it always be.

If a paladin goes wrongly killing people following scriptures that he believes are hard truths then yes, eventually he will fall of grace.

But not every paladin/mage/warrior you will run into in arelith knows everything correctly about every subject in every domain and knows everything about every creature and every belief and every god and every spell the same way you, the player, with access to these informations do.

It's all that I wanted to point out.

Aelryn Bloodmoon
Arelith Supporter
Arelith Supporter
Posts: 2028
Joined: Thu Sep 11, 2014 4:57 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by Aelryn Bloodmoon » Tue Mar 26, 2019 5:18 pm

Eters wrote:
Tue Mar 26, 2019 3:13 pm
Note that I never said anything about a lack of reprecussions. Just explained that knowledge our characters have is not always correct. Nor should it always be.

If a paladin goes wrongly killing people following scriptures that he believes are hard truths then yes, eventually he will fall of grace.

But not every paladin/mage/warrior you will run into in arelith knows everything correctly about every subject in every domain and knows everything about every creature and every belief and every god and every spell the same way you, the player, with access to these informations do.

It's all that I wanted to point out.

This is a fair stance and a fine argument to have, but I feel it doesn't really apply to the specific situations called out in this thread- saying that not everyone knows an undead being is an evil abomination is kind of like saying not everyone knows demons are evil or that dragons have treasure hoards. Some facets of FR are just that widely known.

Resurrection magic happens in the realms, and while not everyone may know every single moral determinant of how the universe views them, it's not a stretch to say that if at point A you must destroy an animated creature before it can be affected by the raising spells, that at point B its soul must be affected somehow - the ability to raise the dead is a miracle, but it's a level 9 achievable miracle and there has certainly been some study on the subject in the realms.

The only viable reasons I can think of for someone in the Realms that isn't an uneducated child to know that a demon/devil/undead is an evil reviled throughout the realms by all civilized and goodly peoples....

1: They don't know it's a demon/devil/undead
2: They're so mentally broken they don't understand why it's wrong (which doesn't make them any less evil, objectively)
3: They are from some backwater land that has never seen or heard of any of the thousands of tales of heroism and villainy in the Realms and have never witnessed any of these monsters or known anyone who has. <--- The chances of this happening are, IMO, somewhere in the vein of you finding a Lawful Good bugbear paladin who wants to convince his brothers to stop eating humans.

Edit: I mean, we are playing in a world where village drunks will exclaim things like "Where in the nine hells is my ale?" and "What in the abyss is taking you so long, wench?"
Bane's tyranny is known throughout the continent, and his is the image most seen as the face of evil.
-Faiths and Pantheons (c)2002

User avatar
-XXX-
Posts: 2113
Joined: Tue Oct 18, 2016 1:49 am

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by -XXX- » Tue Mar 26, 2019 6:05 pm

I'd like to muse on two separate points that I've noticed throughout this topic

:arrow: WYS/WYG - you can't use the animate dead line of spells on PC corpses to turn those toons into undead and thereby hindering their player from respawning/getting raised. I'm not stating this because I'd be trying to advocate that it should work that way. I'm pointing it out because according to the sourcebooks it should work that way and it doesn't IG.
There's only so far you can go in RP pretending that something's something else. Clearly NWN animate line of spells does not tamper with souls, nor is there any mechanic in effect that would allow such. That being said, as far as I'm concerned the source material has flown out of the window at this point and undead are little more than rotting corpses, since there's zero mechanical evidence of the contrary.


:arrow: IG Morals - I think that the cultural IG moral standards are way off compared to what they ought to be. Arelith society seems to be struggling with the problems of the RL postmodern society rather than what I'd imagine would really trouble the inhabitants of some makebelief backwater colony at the end of a fantasy world.

Just consider the following: there is a democratic political system in place that masquerades as feudalism, resulting in -> public opinion matters -> everyone tries to pretend that they're LG -> certain practices are taboo or unacceptable

A fine example of this would be slavery - pretty much every modern RL society has been built by slaves. Even though the vast majority of the contemporary civilized people fully embraces the notion that all people are equal, our antique/medieval ancestors did not have such luxury and opted for more pragmatic (albeit morally questionable) arrangements that were more in favor of, well... survival!
...yet our ragtag band of fantasy pioneers that seeks to get by on an island occupied by savage orcs, dragons and demons perceives the notion of slavery as something so utterly immoral an heinous, that they'd seek to abolish it by any means necessary before even considering turning on those aforementioned monsters native to the island.

User avatar
CosmicOrderV
Arelith Silver Supporter
Arelith Silver Supporter
Posts: 389
Joined: Tue Oct 23, 2018 5:35 pm

Re: On the moral implications of necromancy and summoning fiends: a minor rant

Post by CosmicOrderV » Tue Mar 26, 2019 6:33 pm

Aelryn Bloodmoon wrote:
Tue Mar 26, 2019 5:19 am
... because it doesn't need the original body, and the soul is free, but the spell text explicitly prohibits that (edit: until you destroy Zombie Tom).

Perhaps because the soul isn't free so long as its body is animated? :geek:
I believe my point may have been missed. Tom isnt a zombie, in your case. Tom is in 'heaven' let's say. The zombie is a zombie. They are seperate entities. You are not your body. You simply inhabit the physical vessel known as a body. Spells that return a soul to its original body, cannot work if that body is possessed. But several of the resurrection spells only require a little of the original body, or none of it. That little bit, simply need not be animated.

I guess even as -XXX- pointed out, "there's zero mechanical evidence to the contrary".
Aodh Lazuli wrote:
Wed Apr 10, 2019 6:22 pm
I, too, struggle to know what is written in books without first reading them.

Locked