The Book of Exalted Deeds, Post Read Wrap-up

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After slogging my way through the Book of Exalted Deeds I have to admit that it is far better than the Book of Vile Darkness. The logic is better but there is still a world created by this book that I just don't see anyone being able to play in.

The Master Planner has argued with me lately saying that I'm looking at this from an overly critical viewpoint; that I'm forgetting that the book is about 'exhalted' deeds and not just 'good' deeds.

I think that he's full of shit.

The book is presenting its case for a how a good character should be and how they should behave. There are places where the book focuses on the above and beyond that would characterize the 'exalted' monicker, but those sections are not where I have taken issue with the book's logic.

Now is the book scarier than the Book of Vile Darkness as the Bus argued?

Yes.

The Book of Exalted Deeds creates a world where every act is a balancing between good and evil. Every time you slip up and damage your 'purity' you place the entire world at risk. If you stray just a little bit from their unreasonably high standards you fall into darkness and evil. And the world they create is one that is just too much to actually play in.

The Book of Exalted Deeds: Part Three, The Final Push

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We're on to chapter two, Variant Rules. The majority of this chapter is crap but there are sections that are way too good to pass up on. Exalted Cohorts (pg 24) presents an interesting idea for new companions for good characters. Exalted Gods (pg 24 - 26) is mostly useless though they do present a deity that will be going into all my future games: Estanna (pg 25). That is a perfect deity that can go into just about any campaign at any point without any work at all. I love her concept and execution.

Exorcism (pg 26), Heroes of the Heavens (pg 26), Heroic Sacrifice and Martyrdom (pg 27), Mercy, Prisoners, and Redemption (pg 28), Sainthood (pg 29), Waging Peace (pg 31), and Words of Creation (pg 31) are a waste of ink in most ways that matter. On the other hand Tithes and Offerings (pg 29) and Voluntary Poverty (pg 29) are fantastic. Voluntary Poverty is especially intriguing and I would welcome the act at any table I'm running.

Chapter Three: Exalted Equipment has sanctified weapons which are cool. The idea that a weapon can be infused with holy energy is one that I find especially appealing for campaigns where devils, deamons, and demons are an active presence in the world. I don't particularly like the game mechanics for creating one but fuck I'm normally the Dungeon Master so I'll ignore them anyway.

Now we come to Ravages and Afflictions (pg 34 - 36). 

Poison and disease are generally the tools of evil monsters and characters, implements of corruption and destruction. If snakes and vermin are associated with evil, as they are in many cultures, it is usually because of their venom that they are viewed in such a negative light despite their neutral alignment. Using poison that deals ability damage is an evil act because it causes undue suffering in the process of incapacitating or killing an opponent . . . Besides the curative abilities of clerics and paladins, the powers of good have their own answer to poison and disease; ravages and afflictions, magical traumas that turn the moral corruption of evil creatures into physical corruption that wracks their bodies. Ravages and afflictions affect only evil creatures, and are particularly debilitating to evil outsiders - despite the immunity to poison that is common among such creatures . . . (pg 34 - 35).

While I understand the thought process behind declaring poisons and diseases evil I don't understand how ravages and afflictions are not. Yes they affect only evil creatures but they still cause ability damage. Logically all four should be evil. Of course this is a needless book where they're trying to justify the page count and price tag so I suppose the pages have to be filled with more than just pretty pictures. 

Speaking of, best picture in the entire book:

I love this picture from pg 35

The concept of Relics (pg 36) is really neat, like the sanctified weapons previously mentioned, but they're not as well done. Most of the items mentioned are either rip offs of existing items (the Shroud of Turin) or they're misappropriated from the Book of Vile Darkness (i.e. the Executioner's Axe from pg 36).

The rest of the chapter is crap. 

Chapter four is filled with either worthless or broken feats. 

Chapter five is mostly a complete waste of ink though there are a few exceptions: Defender of Sealtiel (pg 55), Fist of Raziel (pg 63); Risen Martyr (pg 68); Sentinel of Bharrai (pg 69); and the Wonderworker (pg 82). The other prestige classes are either so nuanced that there are few ways to logically work them into the narrative or are so well designed for non-player characters - I'm looking at you Apostle of Peace (pg 51) - that there is no reason for them to even be in a damnable book for players. 

Chapter six has some really cool spells, though most of them are either re-workings of previously published material or re-wordings of perfectly fine, already existing, spells. Some of my favorite spells are Exalted Fury (pg 99), Glory of the Martyr (pg 99), and Phoenix Fire (pg 103). In fact, just about any spell with Sacrifice description is worth using. 

That shit is cool as fuck all.

After the spells only read page 116 (Intelligent Items) through page 119 (stopping at Redeeming Evil Magic Items) and you'll avoid all of the wasted words and bullshit that fill up the majority of this chapter. 

Chapter 7 is better that it's counterpart in the Book of Vile Darkness but I could live without most of this chapter. The exception to that statement comes from pages 138 - 149 where some of the coolest paragons reside. Love these guys and could easily see working them into a campaign without them dominating the story or even taking one iota of momentum away from the players (unlike the majority of the paragons in the chapter).

Chapter 8 is useless for the most part. There are essentially five good monsters in this entire chapter: the Crypt Warden (pg 167), the Guardinals (pg 173 - 175), the Hollyphant (pg 176), and the Rhek (pg 181). Of all these my favorite is the Guardinal, Ursinal (pg 175) which is just cool as all get out and well worth the slog through this chapter.

Seriously, the Ursinal is just too freaking cool.

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The Book of Exalted Deeds: Part Two, In Which We Follow the Straight and Narrow

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Since this series began we've looked at the definitions of good, being good and their implications on Lawful Good, Neutral Good, and Chaotic Good. Today we move on toward the Straight and Narrow Way.

When do good ends justify evil means to achieve them? Is it morally acceptable, for example, to torture an evil captive in order to extract vital information that can prevent the death of thousands of innocents? Any good character shudders at the thought of committing torture, but the goal of preventing thousand of deaths is undeniably a virtuous one, and a neutral character might easily consider the use of torture in such a circumstance. With evil acts on a smaller scale, even the most virtuous characters can find themselves tempted to agree that a very good end justifies a mildly evil means. Is it acceptable to tell a small lie in order to prevent a minor catastrophe? A large catastrophe? A world-shattering catastrophe?

In the D&D universe, the fundamental answer is no, an evil act is an evil act no matter what good result it may achieve . . . (pg 9)

Here is where we run up against some of Monte Cook's work in the Book of Vile Darkness. Monte denoted lying as an always evil act. I would contend that lying is not an evil act in and of itself. Think about the lies you tell every day: you're losing weight; you look good in those jeans dear; I must have shrunk those clothes dear; and so on, and so on.

There are lots of lies that are a natural extension of being alive. Think back on your memories and recall something that matters more to you than anything else. Now write it down and ask some one else who was there to write about the same event and compare. I'll bet that you'll find that you're not as brave or wonderful as you remember. That there were people there you don't remember and that there were entire chains of events that you've forgotten. But in your memory, where you've been lying to yourself, things are as you recall. You were brave and everything was wonderful.

Now why do we tell these lies?

According to many the reason for such lies is a result of our ability to cope with the world. We lie to ourselves about horrible events in our past so that they don't hurt as much. We lie about events where we were scared and powerless making ourselves brave and powerful so that we can live with the little and big tragedies of our lives. These lies help us to survive and are necessary for our psychic well-being.

So do I think that it's okay to tell a lie to avoid a catastrophe? Ab-so-fucking-lutely.

Now in regard to torture I find no fault in their logic. Torture isn't a part of our natural coping mechanisms and is an act that rarely gives accurate information, and that harms both the torturer and tortured. So yeah, torture always bad, lying not so much.

More:

Some good characters might view a situation where an evil act is required to avert a catastrophic evil as a form of martyrdom: "I can save a thousand innocent lives by sacrificing my purity." For some, that is a sacrifice worth making, just as they would not hesitate to sacrifice their lives for the same cause. After all, it would simply be selfish to let innocents die so a character can hang on to her exalted feats.

Unfortunately, this view is ultimately misguided. This line of thinking treats the purity of the good character's soul as a commodity (like her exalted feats) that she can just give up or sacrifice like any other possession.  In fact, when an otherwise good character decides to commit an evil act, the effects are larger than the individual character. What the character sees as a personal sacrifice is actually a shift in the universal balance of power between good and evil, in evil's favor. The consequences of that single evil act, no matter how small, extend far beyond the single act and involve a loss to more than just the character doing the deed. Thus it is not a personal sacrifice, but a concession to evil, and thus unconscionable . . . (pg 9)

Wow, what a mess of pressure on your every decision. Remember we're still working under the lines of Monte Cook's Evil Acts which defines everything from mundane every day lies to simple greed as objectively evil. So every day you, by just being a human being, are titling the scales of good and evil solidly to the side of evil.

Fuck no.

I'm with them when it comes to the though process that you can not trade your moral 'purity' for the lives of innocents as your 'purity' is not a quantity that can be traded like cows and gold. But the idea that every act is important in this war between good and evil creates a situation where a conscientious character can not act at all, and that just sucks.

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The Book of Exalted Deeds: Part One, Where Our Moral Code is Lost in the Weeds.

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Unlike the Book of Vile Darkness the Book of Exalted Deeds is designed for the players. It's supposed to provide a narrative goal for players the world over in how to strive towards being good. It provides feats, prestige classes, weapons, artifacts, monsters and a grouping of variant rules.

In many regards it ultimately fails because of the underpinning of logic that is used in defining what is good, and what it meas to be good. 

Being good requires a certain quality of temperament, the presence of virtues that spur a character, not just to avoid evil or its appearance, but to actively promote good . . . Good implies altruism, respect for life, and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings. Good characters make personal sacrifices to help others . . . Good is not nice, polite, well mannered, prudish, self-righteous, or naive, though good-aligned characters might be some of those things. Good is the awesome holy energy that radiates from the celestial planes and crushes evil. Good is selfless, just, hopeful, benevolent, and righteous . . . (pg 5)

To put these definitions in a simpler manner to be good it's not enough to act in a manner that does not negatively impact the rest of the world you have to actively engage the world and attempt combat the forces of evil. Good itself is described through implications that collectively are righteous but they create a very narrow definition. If a person is good they are charitable, they hold a respect for all life - which means that they don't actively attempt to take the life of even evil creatures, and they only observe any sense of righteousness for sentient beings (a tricky word in and of itself). 

Now this definition of good, which is incredibly restrictive, is supposed to be observed by anyone who puts good in their alignment choice; and that's a problem. If you hold that definition of good then you have three alignments (Lawful Good, Neutral Good, and Chaotic Good) that most players can not use. 

The book attempts to mollify the situation by stating that ". . .  the standards expected of good characters in D&D, especially those who lay claim to exalted status, bear much more similarity to modern sensibilities about justice, equality, and respect for life than to the actual medieval world that D&D is loosely based on, and that is quite intentional . . ." (pg 11). 

This is a huge step away from those initial definitions of good and of being good - which is very nice. But in doing so it begs the question what happened to those alignments

Lawful Good characters possess a sense of discipline, honor, and community that other good characters do not necessarily share. Lawful good characters are members of monastic or knightly orders, church hierarchies, or organizations devoted to righteous causes. They believe that morality can be legislated, and promote the establishment of just societies whose laws and customs inculcate (instill) good behavior in their citizens. Lawful good adventures fight evil knowing that they have the support of legal systems behind them: they are bringing criminals to justice as well as opposing evil.

In an evil culture or one that tolerates evil, lawful good characters are in a difficult situation. On the one hand, they abhor evil and cannot stand to see it institutionalized. On the other hand, they believe in legitimate authority and will not overthrow a kingdom because of evil practices within it. Lawful good characters usually try to work to change flawed social structures from within, using whatever political power is available to them rather than toppling those structures by force (pg 12).

So lawful good is the same as those assholes who try to legislate away a woman's right to choose and the right of a gay man and woman to be counted as human beings because their religious texts tell them those things are bad?

I think not.  

And at some point along the way I am sure that I am going to find a series of books on what it means to be lawful and chaotic; and when that day comes I'll finally understand why the fuck it is that lawful characters are just supposed to lay down to any old law they come across. Until that day I'm going to follow the teachings of John Rawls the dominant voice in modern theories of politics and justice. According to Rawls an unjust law is one that must be counteracted through the courts, through civil disobedience, and through the legislature. To follow the unjust law is to, in effect, legitimize it. With that as my understanding of the modern sensibility when it comes to laws it makes no sense what so ever to expect a lawful good character to roll over to an unjust law.

Just one more bone: why the fuck does every lawful good character have to belong to some organization.

Chaotic Good characters are strong-willed individualists who tolerate no oppression, even in the name of the common good. They usually work alone or in loose bands, rather than as part of some organization or hierarchy. They have no confidence in the ability of laws and social mores to train people in good behavior. Indeed, they have seen all too often how people hide behind rules and laws as an excuse for evil or at lest irresponsible acts. While promoting a legal system that places few restrictions on individual freedom, chaotic good individuals look to other forces - religion, philosophy, or community, for example - to encourage good behavior and punish evil. Chaotic good adventurers fight evil because it's evil, not because it's illegal. 

In societies where evil practices are tolerated, chaotic good characters are the most likely rebels, and they have few hesitations about overthrowing the existing order if it means eliminating those evils (pg 12).

So chaotic good characters are Che Guevara and Abbie Hoffman? Great. Now I have to deal with a bunch of beret wearing hippies at my gaming table.

At least this is closer to something that I can tolerate.

Neutral Good characters occupy an indistinct middle ground. they espouse the ideals of good and none other. As a rule, they don't care whether good is imposed through laws and customs or encouraged by temples and philosophers; they simply want goodness to flourish. Legislating morality sometimes works, and is good as far as it goes. When lawful good societies begin legislating every detail of their citizens' lives, however, passing laws on subject that have no bearing on good and evil, the neutral good citizen become impatient. They support law when it promotes good, but not law for its own sake. Similarly, they like the idea of personal freedom, but they're not sure everyone should have it: too much freedom gives evildoers too much room to prosper. Like chaotic good adventurers, neutral good ones fight evil because it's evil, but it certainly doesn't hurt to have the backing of legal authority whenever possible. 

Neutral good characters in societies that tolerate evil resist evil to the extent they can, without actively working to overthrow the government. They protest injustice, sometimes engaging in civil disobedience since unjust laws are useless and not binding in their view (pg 12).

I hate this definition in so many ways. It would be so much better if it were to read as follows: A neutral good character is your average person who attempts to do the best they can in the world. Sometimes they're selfish, but more often than not they try to do the best they can for those around them and their community. 

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An Introduction to the Book of Exalted Deeds

All of them, Bus, Neverwas, Poot, Thief 1 and 2, Laughing Boy, Kid Icarus, Genius, Mamma's Boy and Baby Momma, had been waiting on the BIG adventure to start. The Opportunist was getting ready to run the World's Largest Dungeon. He had picked this group deliberately avoiding the most dangerous coalition of our gaming community.

That isn't to say that the other players weren't good players. In truth Thief 1 and 2 were, on occasion, very good players but they were easily frustrated and rarely played well with anyone else. The Genius was a quick study but he had to learn the hard way before he got the story right. Laughing Boy and Momma's Boy were too concerned with proving how unique and wonderful they were to remember to take care of the group. The Bus was a good player; however, at the time he was into a really idiosyncratic wizard that he took from campaign to campaign and remade time and again no matter how often the silly thing died. The Neverwas could talk a good game, and dominate a game when there were subordinate personalities, but to follow anything he said was sure to result in your having to roll up a new character. Baby Mamma had just learned to play; she would later become quite good but at that time not so much. That left Poot and Kid Icarus as the only viable faction in the group.

They were a part of our group. Poot was a hell of a warrior, a damned fine wizard, and in a pinch could be a fashionable rogue. Kid Icarus favored druids and inventive solutions to everyday problems. He was our outside man and thought of the solution to problems that the rest of us had not time or inclination to find: in a word he was indispensable to any overwhelming situation. The Master Planner ran a ranger and could hit any target from three different directions before they knew what was happening. Step-up was the rogue - not a rogue, the rogue. He ran his rogues with an almost preternatural ability to find every trap and every hidden enemy, and on more than one occasion he had saved our entire group. Biggboy was either a barbarian who enjoyed standing at the front, or the best healing cleric I've ever had the pleasure of grouping with. Then there was me, I played either the fighter who held the line or a cleric that protected the flank. When we were together there were few situations that could slow our group and we had worked together for long enough that we never had those awkward inter-party breakups that plague newer groupings.

The Master Planner, Step-up, Biggboy, and I were left off the invite list. This was done, as the Opportunist would later tell me, "Because I really wanted to explore the dynamics within a dysfunctional group when confronted with a killer dungeon."

"I'm assuming since they each went through five characters the first night that you found your answer."

"Not really."

"And the reason we can't play?"

"Well, I'd invite you guys but it would really throw off the dynamic I'm looking for. And the group is really starting to develop this synergy that only comes about through these sort of intense emotional situations."

"Bullshit."

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Like my time trying to join in with the World's Largest Dungeon reading the Book of Exalted Deeds has been a bit like tilting at windmills. I could never get into the game and the Book of Exalted Deeds just frustrated the hell out of me.

I grew frustrated with the first five pages and would throw the damnable thing across the room unwilling to waste my time with the fucked logic and untenable moral positions that it would have me and my players put ourselves in. Yet seeing as how I've actually spent the time reading the Book of Vile Darkness I might as well read this companion volume.

Maybe it'll be better than its brother, but fuck if I can see how. 

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