KOBAYASHI MARU SCENARIO!!! the answer is of course to cheat. This is why all my characters max out disguise and forgery. Gives DMs a hell of a headache because I've yet to meet one that accounts for that angle despite its obviousness.
That said, intentions don't define the morality of the act. creating evil by action or inaction regardless of intention is evil. Good intentions don't mean shit if you fuck it all up for everyone. This isn't the special olympics where just trying really hard gets you the prize even if you lose. This isn't to say that there is no hope. but true goodness is the wisdom and forethought to prevent the your fuckups from being catastrophic. Then when they occur (as they inevitably must on occasion)you take responsibility for them. Correct them, repair them destroy them or redeem them.
You rescue those damn innocent people. and you do it without killing guards. Bonus points for kidnapping the cultists and deprogramming/changing their sexual preference regardless of what it originally started out as. obviously you can't do all of that so you shoot for the maximum amount of good without sacrificing the operation. if you're a kickass party of awesome dudes, you go in and effortlessly do it all. if you think you're capable but not great, you just try to rescue the people. if you think you're a party of barely functional trainable retards then you settle for not accidentally falling on your longsword and kicking a pregnant hostage when you charge in.
in short Your morality is determined by how many objectives you can manage to successfully accomplish without wizzing the whole thing down your be-chainmailed leg. not by how good you think you are or how good you intend to be. (behold! the objectivist dungeon rogue) as a footnote, rx_ritalin is my new hero.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2005-06-13 12:32 pm (UTC)That said, intentions don't define the morality of the act. creating evil by action or inaction regardless of intention is evil. Good intentions don't mean shit if you fuck it all up for everyone. This isn't the special olympics where just trying really hard gets you the prize even if you lose. This isn't to say that there is no hope. but true goodness is the wisdom and forethought to prevent the your fuckups from being catastrophic. Then when they occur (as they inevitably must on occasion)you take responsibility for them. Correct them, repair them destroy them or redeem them.
You rescue those damn innocent people. and you do it without killing guards. Bonus points for kidnapping the cultists and deprogramming/changing their sexual preference regardless of what it originally started out as. obviously you can't do all of that so you shoot for the maximum amount of good without sacrificing the operation. if you're a kickass party of awesome dudes, you go in and effortlessly do it all. if you think you're capable but not great, you just try to rescue the people. if you think you're a party of barely functional trainable retards then you settle for not accidentally falling on your longsword and kicking a pregnant hostage when you charge in.
in short Your morality is determined by how many objectives you can manage to successfully accomplish without wizzing the whole thing down your be-chainmailed leg. not by how good you think you are or how good you intend to be. (behold! the objectivist dungeon rogue) as a footnote, rx_ritalin is my new hero.