1) Alignment. My warmage will be true neutral or neutral evil. He wont be the baby killing demon loving kind of evil, but he will be vain, selfish, rather uncaring and quick to anger towards all but his closest friends. However, the DL world seems very square when it comes to alignment, and I wonder if it is even possible for an elf of any kind to have a NE alignment without being branded a dark elf and hunted by his own kind? I guess that most other elves would think of him as a jerk for his way of behaving, but as he is very moderate in his way of being evil the other elves wont know for sure unless they actually cast detect alignment on him... what would you(r DM) rule in this situation?
2) The warmage class seems. How on earth would the Wizards of high Sorcery deal with this class? Usually, if a wizard is a specialized evoker before taking the test, and the wizard is enrolled in the order of the red robes ect, he would normally have to use the retraining rules to change his specialization to either transmutation or illusion, but Ive never quite understood how things worked with spontaneous casters such as bards, sorcerors and warmages? Will I be branded a renegade right away?
Thats all for now, but Im sure that even more trouble will turn up eventually.
Having an evil alignment can be a problem for an elf, but it's not as bad as it is for an elven wizard. As long as he did his evil deeds in secret, managed to shift the blame, etc., it's unlikely he would be discovered.
I dont remember what the era of play in this campaign is called, but the gods have left Krynn alone for quite a while, and has just returned in a poof of logic. For this reason, there is chaos all over the world. Also, both Silvanesti, Qualinesti and Kagonesti elves has lost their lands to a massive ork/goblin/minotaur invastion, and 99.999% of all elves are presumed dead in the following genocide.
I have not yet had a chance to read the novels, but my DM told me that I should look the age of play is simultaneous with the chronicles of Huma Dragonbane.
Edit: The elves aren't completely down for the count. A large number of refugees are looking for a place to settle in the east, northwest of Khur, and bands of freedom fighters are joining together in Qualinesti under the leadership of a famous elf from the past...
One might say that the warmage has committed to memory all of his spells in the same manner that all Wizards have Read Magic commited (the one spell they do not need to have a spellbook to prepare) to memory, or possibly like the Archmage ability: Spell-like ability, or most simply of all the spell-mastery feat.
Spell Mastery feat allows the wizard to choose a number of spells equal to their Int mod that they already know, and from now on they do not need a spellbook to prepare them.
Wizards also have the ability to leave their spell slots open and to prepare spells later (granted it takes a minimum of 15 minutes to put a spell in the slot left open), the Warmage has simply condensed and become an expert in this type of preparation in that he has reduced this time needed to no time needed and simply chooses which spell to cast.
So a warmage (IMO) is simply a very specialized wizard who is simply a very, very, very fast spell-caster and there is nothing chaotics or ambient about it.
Now an elf who chooses this type of spellcasting would traditionally be against the elven way of thinking because the Warmage is not a defensive caster he is an aggresive and attacking type of character. Where as the elven mentality has always been "if you leave me alone, then I will leave you alone," and the elves had no reason to leave their homes and go looking for a fight (except possibly during the dragon wars - which take years and might possibly offer the elves a reason to train someone like a warmage). A warmage without a war, or conflict, to fight, has no purpose.
As far as the evil part of his alignment (should you choose this) will always make him an elven outcast almost as soon as they dicover what he is doing. Of course to be evil he must choose to be evil, simply being uncaring about others, selfish, vain, and quick to anger is not evil in and of itself. If he is killing people because they have what he wants then that is evil (of course this is being greedy not selfish). If a millionaire does not donate to a charity, is he being evil? Selfish, yes, evil, no. Not caring about people and others is only evil if he has put them in a position in which they are in danger or their rights have been compromised.
Remember being evil is the choice to be evil and to actually commit evil when given a choice to be either good or evil. For instance, you are standing on a bridge and are watching a person hanging on to the bridge, there are three choices
1: Good - Give the person help onto the bridge.
2: Evil - Cause the person to lose his grip and fall.
3: Neutral - Do nothing.
Now which choice is the uncaring choice?
I say number 2. In 1 you want the person to live and therefore you care about he well-being. In 3 you obviously want the person to die and therefore you care about his well-being. In 2 you do nothing as whether or not he lives or dies does not concern you. You could even possibly take something from him as he is hanging there about to die and this would still be un-caring (at least in reference to his well-being), some would say that taking the item would be evil, but again it would depend on why you took the item. If you took it to return it to its rightful owner then this would be good, if you took it for yourself then this is evil (unless it was yours to begin with), if you took to prevent its loss to the world (like an artifact) then this is neutral.
Simply breaking a law is not evil, it is illegal, but not necesarily evil (look at robin hood). A vain character is not evil, look at some models, if their degrate others because they are not as beutiful as the character then this is evil. It is not evil if he decides not to save the damsel in distress from slavers, but if he tries to make money off the situation then it is. Being angry is a part of being human, everyone eventually gets angry, acting in anger can be evil depending on the action you take. If you get angry and use this anger to increase your strength by working out it is not evil, using the anger to motivate you to complete repairs on a building is not evil. If you use this anger to go out and slaughter the person who angered you then this is evil.
So like I said, simply being vain, uncaring, selfish, and quick to anger is not evil. How these traits play out in regard to others however can make them good or evil.
My character would possibly help the person hanging from the bridge, but it would ultimately depend on who that person were. If it was a useless bum or a kender (my character find kenders extremely annoying) he would be left hanging there, but if the person looked 'decent' he could expect help. My character is not completely heartless because of his evil tendencies.
I also guess that my character could kill in anger. If he caught a thief taking his stuff, he would immediately pummel him to death or near death (using Fist of Stone), without caring wether the thief just did what he did to feed his starving family.
Gotta go to work, I´ll come back later.
If he gives something than I let him go, if he doesn't give anything than I would use my magic (I am a red robe wizard) to put him back in his troublesome situation. In this case he would be hanging back on the brigde.
Is my character evil, neutal, good or something between?
I tried to simplify the situation. Unfortunately it is possible to interpret the situation in many different ways depending on what what happens after, or the reasons why you did it. For instance in the Knight of the Old Republic II, you have a chance to give money to a refugee for no reason other than charity, but in turn this only made him a target for other refugees who were jealous. So was the act of charity good or not?
There should be consequences if a character does not play the character. Using the bridge scenario, if a white robe or a good cleric or a Knight of Solamnia does not do anything to help the person on the bridge and the person falls there should be an alignment penalty or somekind of negative consequence. On the adverse side though should there be a reward for a good character doing a good thing? Not always. They are good, doing the deed is reward enough.
On the adverse side though should there be a reward for a good character doing a good thing? Not always. They are good, doing the deed is reward enough.
Good roleplaying is its own reward.
