This may be a kick of the proverbial hornets nest but seemed to be worth a discussion.
The issue I see is a very selective IC response to use of either evil or “dubious” Magics to the point or absurdity. To start with a disclaimer, I have played an epic necromancer, I understand that necromancy is not inherently evil, and that there are “evil spell tags.” And I think it’s fantastic that it appears these days, the use of a given spell/ability is not being metagamed to determine alignment. That said, there’s some patently absurd stuff happening especially around the hemo.
Take a pvp tourny in a surface settlement for example. Say the victor of said tournament dumpsters the opposition with a mostly hemomancy and necromancy toolkit. And this is not a open minded mage using the odd necro spell, it’s obviously an extremely invested necromancer/bloodmage unleashing everything they have.
PCs are throwing really nasty magic around in its most potent and practiced forms (including vampiric feast), all in front of paladins and other good aligned PCs. Yet no one even bats an eyelash or says a thing. Now I get it, we all want to use the useful spells that actually work in PVP and not really worry about tedious IC implications, but it’s pretty out of control and immersion breaking.
That doesn’t mean we should all shout “evil necromancer, kill them” or meta them, but if someone is throwing around epic necromancy spells and is a public figure in a settlement occupied and run in part by good aligned PCs, that should create some issues/cause for concern. They are an EPIC NECROMANCER at even a casual glance, but no one even treats it as such. That means we don’t actually have to think about using these things IC, and it waters down the setting.
Seriously, try to imagine you’re in the bleachers as some paladin watching a tourney. A well known noble and member of the state government rolls up and proceeds to use the most horrific magic you’ve seen used on another member of society in law abiding territory, bleeding themselves dry to unleash high circle death magic and other gruesome spells. That would be SCANDALOUS unless it happened in Thay or another region like it. 10/10 times there’s gonna be a meeting after between some very concerned paladins discussing necromancers infiltrating the government, let alone suspicion cast on the entire family. Too much of your neighborhood friendly hemomancer trope going on.
Can we try to navigate back to a server culture where we don’t just ignore blatantly ridiculous alignment implicated things because it’s inconvenient, we’re OOC friends with someone or we want to use powerful new cookies? I acknowledge this may be a bit of a rehash of the old “enforce paladin alignment” discussion but a different flavor.
Do others see this as a persistent and impactful issue?