Do you like PE Paladin class concept?

[Heresiarch]

Let's face it, guys, the whole concept of DnD paladins is pretty stupid. With abundance of chaotic and evil gods around, it makes no sense what-so-ever to make a class of faithful warriors, devoted solely to the worship of good. And the whole anti-paladin blackguard concept is outright disgusting. There is no good explanation how they even come to think that the whole lawful-good only paladin thing would be a good idea.

 

Now, all of a sudden, your paladins have to be DnD-style to qualify as paladins. No, they don't. A paladin is just a high-born knight and palatinus is nothing, but a high military rank in Byzantium. You don't have to worship gods or lay on hands every now and then to be one.

 

So yes, I like how paladins are supposed to look like in PE very much.

Edited November 22, 2012 by Heresiarch

[TrashMan]

I wonder if the historical concept of a palatine is more what PE draws from, "warlord/charismatic general" sounds pretty much spot on.

I like that. The holy warrior archetype is probably my least favourite in all fantasy games. Bah.

 

And conversely, it is my favorite archetype.

[TrashMan]

I severely dislike the "God's Warrior" archetype that Paladins usually are. A person who has decided to become a charismatic and chivalrious leader by his own whim rather than because God told him so is a lot more interesting. Speaks more about what kind of person he is rather than being another brainwashed zealot.

 

 

Because being religious and devoted = being a brainwashed zealot?

 

Well, that didn't come across condescending or bigoted at all.

[Alexjh]

Let's face it, guys, the whole concept of DnD paladins is pretty stupid. With abundance of chaotic and evil gods around, it makes no sense what-so-ever to make a class of faithful warriors, devoted solely to the worship of good. And the whole anti-paladin blackguard concept is outright disgusting. There is no good explanation how they even come to think that the whole lawful-good only paladin thing would be a good idea.

 

Now, all of a sudden, your paladins have to be DnD-style to qualify as paladins. No, they don't. A paladin is just a high-born knight and palatinus is nothing, but a high military rank in Byzantium. You don't have to worship gods or lay on hands every now and then to be one.

 

So yes, I like how paladins are supposed to look like in PE very much.

 

I think this is one of those cases where the difference between the general word and the class name have to be viewed as independent, being a fighter is not the same as being a Fighter, being a park ranger is not the same as being a Ranger, being a Benadictine monk is not the same as being a Monk etc.

 

I would say that really, the D&D Paladin would make more sense being spread down all the lawful alignments but with mechanical differences for each. Paladins should in my view, always be about someone with a code, whether it be one they've made up for themselves, one given to them by a God or one given to them by a political organisation. Even if the God is Chaotic Evil, if they want to produce a holy warrior that abides by the themes of their religion that makes them lawful in a way. But chaotic deities would be less inclined to creating "orders" anyway as that's very much a lawful thing to do.

 

Blackguards are a bit of a weird concept, but I concieve them as being evil deities reaction to the creation of paladins - the idea of holy knights is nothing new, but in a world where there are literal gods and goddesses of evil around, it could only make sense for them to react. In the real world, as we don't have many deities that are explicitly evil, the closest we come is deities that are percieved as evil from the outside - so the Aztec sacrifice-capturing Jaguar Warriors might be an example of a Blackguard. They are seen as holy warriors, its just that their particular brand of "holy" revolves around slavery and human sacrifice.

[TrashMan]

Waht is it with all the people caliming "Paladins are jsut Fighter/Clerics"?

Have any of you even played te later editions? Pathfinder?

They get their own special abilities and skills.

 

Paladins always were different. Not only from a gameplay standpoint and skilsl standpoint, but also from the "atmosphere/flavor" standpoint.

 

And no, you don't necessarily have to have powers come directly from God for the class to work. Like I said - Templars in DA:O get their pwoers trough rituals, trainign and lyrium.

[Heresiarch]

I think this is one of those cases where the difference between the general word and the class name have to be viewed as independent, being a fighter is not the same as being a Fighter, being a park ranger is not the same as being a Ranger, being a Benadictine monk is not the same as being a Monk etc.

Well, being a fighter is not like being a street fighter, but pretty much the same as being a warrior. Being a ranger is nothing like a park ranger, but a lot like being a tracker. Being a monk is far from being a Benedictine monk, but pretty much the same as being a shaolin monk. All the while being a paladin is very unlike anything that has ever been called by that name. This is no surprise, since the word itself translates as 'courtier' and has no relation to religion at all.

 

So we end up with a silly concept and an unfitting name. PE will change both of this facts, what's more to desire?

[Karkarov]

It's hard to imagine that the concept of a lawful good character who always wants to remain within the laws of the land and his god and never falter from the tenets of good as he understands them and almost always carrys a huge blessed sword would not be the most popular and emulated of all options in video games -

 

I guess it's just because most gamers live this way every day in real life and when it comes to gaming they want to try something different...

 

lawful does not mean to abide the laws of the land, if the laws are unlawful in view of the "greater picture" (which in DnD have specific alignments) then the paladin fallows only his code... that's the lawful thing for him. The code of the order, the vows, the virtues of his god

Uh no not quite...... it depends 100% on the paladin in question and what cause they are in service to. A Lawful Good 2nd Edition Paladin who is sworn to serve a royal family whose current head happens to be an evil scumbag he will be forced to do evil deeds to a point to keep his oaths. The paladin won't like it, but as long as their lord doesn't try to force them into an alignment death trap (break your codes of morality to stay true to your oath to me, or break your oath to keep your code) they will likely tolerate it.

 

Example. Forcing the Paladin to execute someone who evaded taxes. The person who did it is crippled and cant work, therefore never had a way to make money. The paladin may run into a conundrum here. But if say the poor crippled tried to steal the money to pay his taxes.... suddenly the paladin doesn't "like it" but he can justify killing the guy.

[Alexjh]

I think this is one of those cases where the difference between the general word and the class name have to be viewed as independent, being a fighter is not the same as being a Fighter, being a park ranger is not the same as being a Ranger, being a Benadictine monk is not the same as being a Monk etc.

Well, being a fighter is not like being a street fighter, but pretty much the same as being a warrior. Being a ranger is nothing like a park ranger, but a lot like being a tracker. Being a monk is far from being a Benedictine monk, but pretty much the same as being a shaolin monk. All the while being a paladin is very unlike anything that has ever been called by that name. This is no surprise, since the word itself translates as 'courtier' and has no relation to religion at all.

 

So we end up with a silly concept and an unfitting name. PE will change both of this facts, what's more to desire?

 

If we are going down the semantic argument route, all the divine classes have the same problems, D&D Clerics and Druids are in no way related to any normal sort of concept of those things. Also we must bear in mind that derivation of a word isn't the same as contemporary meaning, if you have a quick skim around online dictionaries you'll see 3 definitions:

 

1) Any one of the 12 legendary peers or knightly champions inattendance of Charlemange. Not only does this specify knightly right off the bat, but if you read into these specific guys, via the lazy option of wikipedia we get the phrase "...where they represent martial Christian valor..." in reference to their first appearances.

2) any knightly or heroic champion

3) any determined advocate or defender or a noble cause.

 

Now, personally those all sound pretty much like things that connect to the D&D concept of a Paladin, and indeed, all the references to real world Paladins/Palatine at a quick skim are connected to Christianity.

 

Out of a bit of interest, as etymology is a vague interest of mine and I'm a little bored, here's the distant starting points of the other class names as I'm looking them up:

 

Barbarian: theorised to be from "barbar", a word vaguely equivelant to "blahblahblah" (representing unintelligble foreign languages) in the form of languages that formed the basis of indoeuropean languages.

Chanter: Chanting seems to be fairly similar, the only difference is the word derrives from singing in general, not a specific form.

Cipher: Originally meant "zero" in arabic

Druid: Apparently from Gaulish via latin, something along the lines of "they who know the oak".

Fighter: Couldn't quite understand the description, but sounds like the word "fight" comes from something along the lines of "to pluck"

Monk: Comes from words meaning alone/solitary.

Priest: Again, only going on a few seconds of research is fairly murky, but looks like it comes from something meaning "elder" eventually.

Ranger: Again my lightning research not entirely fruitful, but from a row or line, via row or line of people, especially hunters or soldiers, largely via French

Rogue: Seems to be primarily from "idle vagrant/beggars"

Wizard: From the word "wise", apparently the specific connection to magic wasn't distinct until the 1550s.

 

Now that had nothing greatly to do with anything really beyond a bit of research whimsy, but just goes to show that original meanings change.

[NerdBoner]

DnD Paladins? *yawn*... then kill with fire.

 

 

worst rpg class/concept ever created...a much better way to go about this Fighter sub-class is call it a Knight or a Champion which means that not only can you play it as some brain dead religious zealot (what Paladins were created for), but you can also rp it as a Knight in service to a king or an order, a champion of the weak and the innocent or a heroic leader of men etc.

 

bleh, even the name Paladin pisses me off...they changed Bard to Chanter but not Paladin? come now...

Edited November 23, 2012 by NerdBoner

[wanderon]

It's hard to imagine that the concept of a lawful good character who always wants to remain within the laws of the land and his god and never falter from the tenets of good as he understands them and almost always carrys a huge blessed sword would not be the most popular and emulated of all options in video games -

 

I guess it's just because most gamers live this way every day in real life and when it comes to gaming they want to try something different...

 

lawful does not mean to abide the laws of the land, if the laws are unlawful in view of the "greater picture" (which in DnD have specific alignments) then the paladin fallows only his code... that's the lawful thing for him. The code of the order, the vows, the virtues of his god

 

Yes I understand the typical D&D concepts of paladins but I was speaking in general terms not out of the D&D handbook - how many fantasy worlds are going to exist where the laws of the common man are going to differ in any great degree from the code of any paladin order that exists there?

 

My point (in case you missed it) was to mock the fact that people playing computer games in general (especially those present on gaming forums) seem much more interested (and vocal) in kick the puppy evil characters then aligning themselves with some goody-two-shoes fantasy hero type and went on to mock the fact that perhaps a small portion of that might come from someplace closer to home than some may wish to admit.

[Barothmuk]

My point (in case you missed it) was to mock the fact that people playing computer games in general (especially those present on gaming forums) seem much more interested (and vocal) in kick the puppy evil characters then aligning themselves with some goody-two-shoes fantasy hero type and went on to mock the fact that perhaps a small portion of that might come from someplace closer to home than some may wish to admit.

What forums have you been hanging around on?

 

Everywhere I've seen the overwhelming majority play a stupid-good lawful-good, idealized self-insert. If you dare make a choice that does not conform to their black and white morality you're met with hatred and vitriol.

Edited November 23, 2012 by Barothmuk

[jezz555]

In AD&D, paladins were originally essentially the group censor/parole officer who would kick your ass any time you tried to do anything he didn't approve of. Because it was the class that demanded the highest stats and was unabashedly the most powerful, but with the stipulation that you had to be good. So you essentially had one goody-two-shoes moralizing jerk-bag threatening to smite anyone else in the party who wanted to loot bodies or get ahead through duplicity, most old school D&D players have a few horror stories to that effect.

 

Sounds more like Lawful Stupid than Lawful Good. Characters like that are just annoying.

 

My thoughts exactly, but the worst part was that most of it was enforced by the rules.

 

it was not enforced, it was simply misunderstood by players I would guess... LG Paladin does not equal stupid character or straight up lawful stupid

 

It was unfortunately, you lost your powers for not adhering to the rules of paladin-hood. Which meant no looting/no evil actions. In the earlier editions, though, they of course changed this in later editions.

 

 

Because being religious and devoted = being a brainwashed zealot?

 

Well...yes it does.

[AGX-17]

The Paladins were a Holy Roman/Germanic analogue to King Arthur's Knights of the Round Table. Fables about a band of heroic knights who fought the heathen Muslims. There is a justification for the zealous piety associated with them, but there's little more to them than that in reality. Eventually the term just came to mean a chivalrous knight.

 

There is justification for the P:E definition, though. The Protestant military leaders in the Thirty Years War were called Paladins. There's a great deal of overlap there, with the old meanings.

Edited November 23, 2012 by AGX-17

[Felithvian]

The Paladins were a Holy Roman/Germanic analogue to King Arthur's Knights of the Round Table.

 

English this, english that... You're not the center of the world, you know.

 

The word "Paladin" has been applied long before the Arthurian legend. As I mentioned previously, David of Israel was considered the Paladin of the Weak. And it somehow makes more sense than the Round Table nonsense, because he clearly establishes a direct relationship with a God, granting him the necessary powers to hold such title.

Edited November 23, 2012 by Felithvian

[kenup]

-snip-

Wow, just wow. You really need to lay off a bit.

 

-snip-

There was also the Teutonic Knights(which were used in crusades) and the Teutonic order, which I think was created to stop(or something) the then pagans of Lithuania.

[Alexjh]

Because being religious and devoted = being a brainwashed zealot?

Well...yes it does.

 

OK can we stop this idiotic assumption now, I've seen it far too much and it's offensive to real world people who have religious beliefs. Religious does not mean the same thing as zealot, the former meaning "one who has a religion" the latter meaning "extreme or fanatical devotion to a cause". I'm an atheist, but I have friends and acquaintances who include Christians both CoE, Catholic and assorted other, Muslims, Jews and Jains, and they are all perfectly reasonable people who just happen to have spiritual beliefs, which is frankly no one's business except their own. The only zealots I'm seeing around here are the atheist ones under the very medieval assumption that any belief system other than their own (atheism) are fundamentally bad things to be wiped out. It frankly makes me embarrassed to call myself an atheist.

[Merlkir]

The Paladins were a Holy Roman/Germanic analogue to King Arthur's Knights of the Round Table.

 

English this, english that... You're not the center of the world, you know.

 

The word "Paladin" has been applied long before the Arthurian legend. As I mentioned previously, David of Israel was considered the Paladin of the Weak. And it somehow makes more sense than the Round Table nonsense, because he clearly establishes a direct relationship with a God, granting him the necessary powers to hold such title.

 

Sorry to be picky, but could you provide some kind of a source for this claim? You're being a bit hostile and I know of no such a mention of David as a paladin of the weak.

 

The word comes from Latin - palatinus = from/of the palace (as in the Palatine hill). Ie palace guards. Nothing to do with God of any kind.

Edited November 23, 2012 by Merlkir

[Jojobobo]

I like the idea of P:E's paladins - an influential and charismatic leader rather than a whiter than white saintly type. It seems interesting to have someone who is inspirational because they are a shining beacon of their own ideals (be they religous, chivalrous or similarly dogmatic in regards to some sort of philosophy); their belief - whether others believe in the same things as they do or not and perhaps in spite of it - should be a powerful and rallying force. This also gives them scope to be evil, which shouldn't be barred from any class.

 

Change isn't always a bad thing.

[Agelastos]

The Paladins were a Holy Roman/Germanic analogue to King Arthur's Knights of the Round Table.

 

English this, english that... You're not the center of the world, you know.

 

The word "Paladin" has been applied long before the Arthurian legend. As I mentioned previously, David of Israel was considered the Paladin of the Weak. And it somehow makes more sense than the Round Table nonsense, because he clearly establishes a direct relationship with a God, granting him the necessary powers to hold such title.

 

If King David was indeed called the "Paladin of the Weak", that title must have been given to him during the Middle Ages or later. AFAIK, the oldest written source in which the term could be interpreted to mean "holy warrior" rather than "palace official" is Chanson de Roland.

Edited November 23, 2012 by Agelastos

[Chaos Theory]

As long as they're not just gimped fighters with "turn undead" or "smite", which is really all they are in D&D. I never thought their defensive stats justified their use when a fighter could DPS and tank.

 

And now that it sounds like Priests/Clerics can wear heavy armor and there aren't apparently "healing" spells per se, I wonder what niche Paladins will play beyond pure role-playing.

 

From the PE wiki http://eternitywiki.com/Paladin

 

 

"Despite their often stoic presence and explosive combat style, paladins work best alongside allies. When isolated, they can be vulnerable, especially against singular powerful foes.^"

 

^{This tells me all I need to know. As feared, they will be gimped fighters who can nuke crowds and buff. That makes them a support class, which is silly.}

Edited November 23, 2012 by Chaos Theory

[Felithvian]

Sorry to be picky, but could you provide some kind of a source for this claim? You're being a bit hostile and I know of no such a mention of David as a paladin of the weak.

 

The word comes from Latin - palatinus = from/of the palace (as in the Palatine hill). Ie palace guards. Nothing to do with God of any kind.

 

I'll put it in Castilian ("Official Spanish").

 

1 Samuel 17:23-26

“23 Mientras él hablaba con ellos, he aquí que aquel paladín que se ponía en medio de los dos campamentos, que se llamaba Goliat, el filisteo de Gat, salió de entre las filas de los filisteos y habló las mismas palabras, y las oyó David."

 

The giant philistine warrior named Goliath, is described as a "Paladin". Goliath, the Paladin of the Philistines, comes out between the lines and challenges the Israelites to send out a

Paladin of their own to decide the outcome of the battle. Since David won, and Israel was considered one of the weakest armies of the Old World, David becomes the one and only "Paladin of the Weak".

 

Goliath was a Paladin of Baal, Astarte, and Dagon, while David was a Paladin of God.

[Merlkir]

Well, surely, the Spanish translation is not older than the earliest occurence of the word. If anything, it's shift in meaning of the word in Spanish.

English translation of the same part says:

 

"As he was talking with them, Goliath, the Philistine champion from Gath, stepped out from his lines and shouted his usual defiance, and David heard it. ²⁴ Whenever the Israelites saw the man, they all fled from him in great fear."

 

So, Goliath was a champion of the Philistines. There is no religious connotation.

 

Do we have any Hebrew speaking/reading Bible experts to read the original for us? Look, I would be my last pair of shoes that the Spanish translation and misuse of the word "paladin" in this context is later than the knightly context which you seem to dislike so much.

 

Yep, a quick search confirms that the first translation of the Bible into Spanish happened in the late 13th century. Which is about 100 years later than the earliest known version of Song of Roland. Which uses the term paladin in knightly context, speaking about a dude who lived in the 8th century.

 

So no, you're wrong.

[kenup]

Sorry to be picky, but could you provide some kind of a source for this claim? You're being a bit hostile and I know of no such a mention of David as a paladin of the weak.

 

The word comes from Latin - palatinus = from/of the palace (as in the Palatine hill). Ie palace guards. Nothing to do with God of any kind.

 

I'll put it in Castilian ("Official Spanish").

 

1 Samuel 17:23-26

“23 Mientras él hablaba con ellos, he aquí que aquel paladín que se ponía en medio de los dos campamentos, que se llamaba Goliat, el filisteo de Gat, salió de entre las filas de los filisteos y habló las mismas palabras, y las oyó David."

 

The giant philistine warrior named Goliath, is described as a "Paladin". Goliath, the Paladin of the Philistines, comes out between the lines and challenges the Israelites to send out a

Paladin of their own to decide the outcome of the battle. Since David won, and Israel was considered one of the weakest armies of the Old World, David becomes the one and only "Paladin of the Weak".

 

Goliath was a Paladin of Baal, Astarte, and Dagon, while David was a Paladin of God.

No one is directly calling David a "paladin of the weak" in the quote. And Goliath is called a champion.

 

EDIT: Ninja'd

Edited November 23, 2012 by kenup

[Felithvian]

Well, surely, the Spanish translation is not older than the earliest occurence of the word. If anything, it's shift in meaning of the word in Spanish.

English translation of the same part says:

 

"As he was talking with them, Goliath, the Philistine champion from Gath, stepped out from his lines and shouted his usual defiance, and David heard it. ²⁴ Whenever the Israelites saw the man, they all fled from him in great fear."

 

So, Goliath was a champion of the Philistines. There is no religious connotation.

 

We all know that the Philistines were extremly religious, along with the Israelites. A simple "champion" doesn't meet the requirements for a religious (Yet brutal) fighter belonging to the Philistine army. Simply put, the English translation is completely wrong.

 

Do we have any Hebrew speaking/reading Bible experts to read the original for us? Look, I would be my last pair of shoes that the Spanish translation and misuse of the word "paladin" in this context is later than the knightly context which you seem to dislike so much.

 

Yep, a quick search confirms that the first translation of the Bible into Spanish happened in the late 13th century. Which is about 100 years later than the earliest known version of Song of Roland. Which uses the term paladin in knightly context, speaking about a dude who lived in the 8th century.

 

So no, you're wrong.

 

St.Jerome's latin translation belongs to the 4th century. Castilian, Valencian, Catalonian & Gallaecian are all dialects from the Latin form. Most, if not all translations hold very little difference from Latin. If you lived in Spain, you would clearly know what I'm talking about. You searched wrong.

Edited November 23, 2012 by Felithvian

[Felithvian]

No one is directly calling David a "paladin of the weak" in the quote. And Goliath is called a champion.

 

You're joking right?