If I found a sword that eats souls am I justified in murderhoboing?

In the beginning, sure. Weapons that grow with the shedding of life's blood tend to have some extra effects or caveats that those with less-stringent morals might find objectionable; right now, the odds are 2:1 that it eventually possesses you, 4:1 that the killings weaken the bindings on a demon trapped inside, and 5:1 that you will need to start killing constantly and will grow less picky over who's available. Any takers?

>less-stringent
Just meant "stringent"; don't know how I buggered that one up.

Blackrazor? Our DM used that thing as a major plot point, and it ended up conning one of our PCs into becoming a world-conquering lich (no mind control involved, it just turned out to be impressively persuasive).

I like to imagine had will bending powers to deploy, but was pleasantly surprised at his eagerness.

I'm a warrior of light but maybe you are right. Still well while nothing happens I may as well roll with it, it's much better than my standard blade. Maybe I'm being corrupted in real life too, I just love this thing. Weapons that grow kick ass.

I will keep a closed eye for the first signs of external problem through. I appreciate the concerns.

No, that makes murderhoboing even more evil, as you're destroying the souls of those you kill.

Ding ding ding

It does once it gets to a certain point, by then you're screwed without a decent roll.

>warrior of the light
m8 a paladin probably shouldn't be looking for an excuse to murder everyone he deems "evil". This reeks of a plot point. IC you should probably want to investigate what exactly is giving this weapon its powers and such.

>Claiming mortal souls for selfish reasons
>justified

Are you a god? Because if you aren't then somebody is going to take offense to you pushing in on their territory.

>Warrior of the light
>Using a blade that grows stronger with the life force of others

Enjoy your fall, and if the DM doesn't do this he's a hack who doesn't understand the system he's running.

Well if you're only grabbing souls that would otherwise go on to empower hell, it isn't all that bad.

Another reason: I have the best WILL in my group. Surely I should be the one to have this burden.

Don't worry I will research it more. I just meant that having a weapon that grows is... well, it's utilitarian to use a bit less diplomacy unless needed, since it will help me defeating the BBEG next time he appears.

>4:1 that the killings weaken the bindings on a demon trapped inside

What if the killings strengthen the bonds? How would a good man react to such a sword?

>BBEG
Oh. Your entire campaign is cancer. Carry on. It doesn't matter what you do.

No you are empowering something that is evil, even if it is to "kill evil" it would be the same as torturing an evil person to save more lives. You have still done evil to reach the ends of your goal and therefore are no longer a warrior of light.

You have done evil and are aiding evil, as a "warrior of light" it is something you should have taken straight to a temple to be identified and then destroyed.

>Warrior of the light
>rending the natural order for equipment bonuses

What setting is this?

Well, it's not claim. It's more like consuming. Also they were probably going to the dark anyway so it's something more utilitarian to society.

I was actually worried about falling, but you see, thinking better this isn't different from necromancers or warlocks or those other dark powers. You can use dark powers for good, as long as you careful to don't be consumed by them.

You could become the fantasy equivalent of the Warden of The Blade. That'd be pretty neato.
>getting triggered by BBEG
Newfag please go and stay gone.

Anyone who runs around wielding a soul-stealing sword and trying to justify their actions deserves exactly what they get.

It's a fucking cursed, evil item, and you're either intentionally malicious or overwhelmingly moronic if you think there aren't going to be consequences for using such a thing.

He's not giving it to you because he wants you to kill stuff better, he's giving it to you so he can see how far you'll go with it before you fuck yourself over.

He's basically handed you 50 ft of rope to hang yourself with.

See you should no longer be considered a paladin, no paladin worth anything would even begin to justify using evil to fight evil. You are to be a beacon, just because others stoop to such levels does not mean a paladin should without dire repercussions.

Killing is evil too, but you kill to spare other lives. It depends on context.

Basically my party explored a dungeon and found the sword after surviving a dangerous trap. It started weak but it's getting pretty strong.

It's basically DnD with a bit of homebrew.

Thanks.

I must clarify: the new bad guy DM is using didn't gave me this weapon. It's a trophy from a dungeon me and my party beat together.

Maybe there will be consequences, true I'm not stupid, but while it's acting like a normal weapon I don't see a problem in using it.

No, you are not.

You ARE justified in becoming a Sword Trainer, and forcing it to go on a diet. No more eating souls! Get it plenty of exercise, oil, polish, and a good healthy diet of parries and yields, and it'll be a proper blade in no time.

This is actually a great idea for a character. A neutral good character who buys/trades/'obtains' evil swords and trains them to be less evil.

It takes a very particular mind set, since you'd have to limit things that most evil swords would grab onto (lust for power, revenge, darkness within the souls of man). Just a generally upstanding, humble fellow who wants to give intelligent weapons a second change.

Claim meaning you passed final judgement, and took it for your own needs. More specifically the sword's needs, since you've become a tool for it's betterment which is entirely backwards.

Any goon with a sword can execute a man, the judgement of that soul is the purview of the gods. You're cutting into a game you can't compete in without depending on the sword, which is exactly how it will lead you to a fall.

Wait a second. If you channel holy energy via smiting through a demonic blade wouldn't it take damage?

Well, now I'm feeling a bit bad. I don't really want to make a bad example. That's actually a better argument than 'it's evil, drop it!'

Maybe, I dunno, I can purify it or find a way so it only eats life energy. That would make it nicer.

>the guy who thinks of himself as a warrior of light is doing evil things

It's a realistic fantasy setting

Until now nothing happened, so far so good. Maybe I should ask the next church if my goddess is okay with this through.

Just give him a power where, as long as he intends to train the sword, he can grab ANY blade safely, since he won't be using their dark power anyways.

Gruunsh, Slaked With Blood may be used to immediately domineering any warrior what grips his bone-hewn hilt to a doom of death and slaughter, but he'll just have to learn consent when he gets yanked up and twirled around like a cheap baton.

Ohhhh you're lawful stupid gotcha, a paladin is justified in his duty to kill evil but he is tasked with being smart enough to know when it is justified. Your duty is to dispense justice and know where the line is, if someone begs mercy and is willing to change, justice demands they get that chance but still pay for their crimes. Killing is only justified when it is the only course of action to stop evil.

However attempting to argue that using a tool that is inherently evil to do good is fine means your fall was only a question of when.

You might create an anathema of some sort. Probably deal insane damage at high risk of essentially forcing a divine antimatter reaction.

This is a comy idea and I'm just lifting it from you.

Not if his character knows that the sword gets more powerful and has any desire for it to do so (and why wouldn't they?)

Nah, I use holy magic when I'm not wearing it.

I really don't need to, it's damage is pretty high.

But if the punishment is death anyway is there much of a difference? It's only a different guy swinging the balde.

Also wouldn't a paladin have permission to apply law judgement? I can see a problem if it was a foreign country through.

>realistic
Shit taste

Because you are bound by your oaths, if an enemy asks for mercy it is to be granted and the community he has wronged is to decide his fate, that is what is just. To simply assume that is the fate is what leads to evil slowly and subtly.

You answer, or atleast should, to a higher calling and the laws of man only matter if they are just and good. Laws that are unjust or simply cruel for the sake of being cruel are to be ignored and changed.

Being a paladin is never easy and shouldn't be, you should strive to be an example of justice, mercy and all that is good in the world. It is easy to kill a man, simply assume his guilt and tell yourself "it's for the better" but by doing so you have cut a chance to weaken evil in the world by reforming that man.

If the community decides that to see justice done is death then so be it, make an offering or argument of trying to reform him. Ultimately though you must do everything to ensure that good is done even if it is harder.

FF1.

I'm not the DM so I'm not qualified to say, but I doubt the gods deal much in single souls. Eventually, the Dark Forces you think you're depriving of resources will take notice and start acting against you, very directly if you're lucky, but eventually in subversive ways to induce a fall and retribution from The Light to attempt to secure the sword for their purposes.

Which would be cool, but it probably steps on the toes of your unrelated BBEG meaning the DM cuts out the cool shit and gets to the consequences for you fooling around with heresy much more abruptly.

Don't feed it crap souls with no meat on em, feed it bold souls that make god think twice about the whole free will thing.

Just because you can doesn't mean you should.

>Warrior Souls = Powerful Sword
>Evil Souls = Evil Sword

....Maybe you should find a bunch of Paladins to chop up OP. Y'know, for the greater good or something.

You could make it into an interesting character arch of you fall start all like "I'm just consuming souls of bad guys" to "Look he wasn't exactly a bad guy but he was kinda a dick" to "Well how else am I supposed to get souls." Probably discuss with your GM in private first if he's ok with it. If your GM wanted it could lead to an interesting scenario where you play a villain against the party, although you might want to roll up a new character so you could do stuff with the party while the villain is not around.

RIP Soul Series. Murdered by a rushed release, fanfiction tier additions to the roster and ESPECIALLY tourneyfags.

>Murdered by a rushed release, fanfiction tier additions to the roster
Don't forget the story itself...

> and ESPECIALLY tourneyfags.
Fuck you, we are doing our best keeping it alive even after 3 shitty games! What have YOU done for SoulCalibur lately?

see me in SC2 on Dolphin

I don't know who the dude in camo is, but I think he's my spirit animal.

I'll lay down 10 quid on it binding a demon.

>Don't forget the story itself...
I didn't unfortunately

>Fuck you, we are doing our best keeping it alive even after 3 shitty games! What have YOU done for SoulCalibur lately?
Eat shit my man. Trying to rush it to the next big tourney is the reason that shitfest was not only crap, but even unfinished crap. The series was doing well on its own, THANK YOU VERY MUCH!

Tourneys itself are fun, but in vidya it usually attracts the autists of the "NO ITEMS, etc." sorts, unfortunately. No offense man.

You didn't see anything.

>Trying to rush it to the next big tourney is the reason that shitfest was not only crap, but even unfinished crap.

Bullshit, half a year would have at best net you like 2 more characters (and 20 million more fucking retarded cosmetic items like T7 is doing it now), that would not have saved that shitshow from ZWEI and GI'S THA COST SUPER METER ASDFASDFASDFASDFA.

If no items is more fair for competition,
it's more fun for competition. True that some people want to look so pro are scrubby about not being scrubs, which is fucking stupid, but that's testosterone fueled competition for you.

Seriously though, everybody grab dolphin and SC2,
it's ridiculously fun.

Is OP actually being corrupted in real life?

That'd be actually pretty cool if pulled of well.
>"I spare the children."
>"You don't. You murder them all in cold blood, as your blade feasts on their souls."
>"What, not even a will save?"
>"We have passed will saves about a hundred souls ago. Your character had been controlled by the blade since he picked it up, it's just that you have been as ruthless and bloodthirsty as it is, so I didn't even need to tell you. You have been playing a bloodthirsty but cunning demon trapped in a sword for weeks now. Your ascension is near..."

I think that's Firefly.

He's a professional terrorist.

if it is sword related than you dont need to justify anything, it forces you to be a murder hobo.

Who was looking for a justification?

COMMENCE EXTERMINATUS

Your soul is now mine.
The Sword

I think I'm okay. But it's a bit hard to control when each kill increase my power. I'm not sure if DM was being nice or it's part of one of his plans. This thread did offer other perspectives.

It doesn't actually force me, but it does give me a reason to use lethal force more... regularly.

Me. Because before I found it I was kinda underpowered when compared with the rest of the party. But I did get a bit more radical in my roleplaying, so I wanted to get some perspectives: if I am doing it right or wrong. This thread has actually helping me ponder a bit more about it.

I even picked SoulEdge because it doesn't seem like a good thing. But I am fighting more efficently and helping save people which is an objective good thing.

>I will keep a closed eye for the first signs of external problem through
>closed eye

it's already affecting you seems like

I have this issue

Does it get weaker if it goes without souls? Does it demand souls every time it is drawn (Murasame)?
If it's just powerleveling your sword then I don't think you should immediately give in to making your sword the best sword on earth by killing everyone who dares to cross your field of view.

(me)
Shit, I meant Muramasa, the bloodthirsty sword thing.

Ops, meant open.

>Does it get weaker if it goes without souls?
Doesn't seem so.

>Does it demand souls every time it is drawn (Murasame)?
Also doesn't. It just has a soul counter: if I fill it damage increases.

It's mostly powerleveling. Each time I kill someone a little orb fills a little, fill it up and a line appears on the blade and it gets permanent damage (the level increases).

>
I even picked SoulEdge because it doesn't seem like a good thing. But I am fighting more efficently and helping save people which is an objective good thing.

Paladin back again, I will agree you are objectively doing good by making people's lives better through removing threats. However in the objective eye you have caused evil to grow stronger in two regards, one you are using an evil item and powering it to who knows what end and two the corruption of a good soul, such as a paladin's, is one of the greatest victories evil can achieve. Forcing a paladin to do something grants evil nothing because it is not the paladin's will causing the evil, but willing doing it is what they crave and from what you've stated have achieved.

Attempting to justify it shows you know what you are doing is wrong but are taking the easy road to gain power and trying to explain it away as not evil.

>justified
Not really no. If you actually want to do this while roleplaying an interesting character, do it à la Knightmare
>Noble, German Knight finds Soul Edge
>It utterly consumes him and sends him on a rampage for blood
>Eventually he overcomes Soul Edge and destroys it (that's the Knightmare ending of SC2 if I'm not mistaken, but I'm almost certain it's not canon, in as far as Soul Calibur canon even exists.

Destroying souls is evil.

You aren't a divine judge, you're a man who is deciding the fate of their soul.

Are those three gold bracelets related to High Lord Wolnir?

I almost tried this in Dark Heresy after rolling so well against a daemon weapon it got scared of me

Well... maybe it isn't as bad as we thought. Maybe it eats lifeforce instead of souls. I will talk with someone about it. Maybe there is also a way to use it's power without those consequences.

Yeah, I know it's justifying it, but even if it's evil that doesn't mean it's impossible to be used in a way that doesn't benefit evil.

I think I can do this if it comes to that however. As I said I have a good WILL.

Maybe it's only absorbing them?

M'boy, if you're thinking like that then you've been fucked from the beggining. Just dump the bloody thing into the holy equivalent of a volcano and hope you can still atone for using that before you fall.

THOUGH MY SOUL WAS ONE OF THE FIRST TO BE DEVOURED BY YOUR EVIL, THERE ARE THOUSANDS MORE BOUND WITHIN THIS BLADE, AND THEY CRY OUT FOR RELEASE

I can get rid of it easily, but I would rather not do so unless it's absolutely needed.

And I don't mean it like 'Surrendering? HA! Taste steel!' type, more in like 'You know, we really don't have to give them so many chances to surrender.' Be a bit more decisive if you will.

>Well... maybe it isn't as bad as we thought. Maybe it eats lifeforce instead of souls. I will talk with someone about it. Maybe there is also a way to use it's power without those consequences.

It is too late for that, as a paladin you should reach for a higher ideal and using something that feeds off the souls of others in any form is evil. It should be repugnant to you and your first thought should have been to destroy it or contain such a tainted weapon.

>Yeah, I know it's justifying it, but even if it's evil that doesn't mean it's impossible to be used in a way that doesn't benefit evil.

If you know it's justifying yet continue then you are already lost and falling. You have already benefited evil more than any good you can do so long as you keep using evil to achieve it.

Every act of good you do will be tainted by evil because of your folly in using an evil item. In the grand scheme you are only serving evil more and more with each soul it grabs.

Your best course of action is to find a temple to have the item removed from your person, forcefully if need be, then seek atonement. Otherwise you are but a parody of what a paladin should stand for and serve evil in the end

user trust me, there's nothing more dangerous than getting confident around an evil artifact, just dump the godforsaken thing before it goes full One Ring on your ass. There's no safe way around a cursed artifact, much less one that eats souls.

This paladin has it right. Don't do evil swords kids, not even once.
>mfw my paladins all have a sword similar to this, the point being to learn restraint to keep the demon inside bound

If you're a paladin, yes, its evil.

If you're really serious about making that sword stronger, consider roleplaying a paladin that gets addicted to killing after finding that sword and falls from grace, slowly becoming becoming a chaotic evil anti-paladin.

If not, would your god condone it if you are killing only evil aligned people with it?

Of course that out of character you are inclined to kill that evil guy because you want your sword to get stronger, but you can always roleplay some other intention.

I would go for the anti-paladin route, though.

You are even less justified in this, for you are now consuming their souls, dooming them to purgatory. You are now the enemy of every fucking paladin out there. Great job dumb ass.

That's what's so fun about playing a paladin, always having to be on your toes for and think of solutions that are better than the two simply handed to you.

Unfortunately it takes both the player and DM to work together when facing problems.

My son, why?

You guys are really making me feel bad about this. Okay, I'm going to drop it at a temple as soon as I can. Just one last act before it, helping the party finish the BBEG because maybe he could steal it, which would be very bad for us. Thanks.

No, my son! You think you'll only use it that final time, but that is when it will truly seduce you!

If you fear it being stolen keep it on you till then but do not wield it. Though it would be best to be rid of it completely guarding an evil item from the hands of others is not wrong or outside a paladin's duties.

Good luck in your fight, seek atonement for the misstep on your journey, grow from it and remember evil can never be used to fight evil, it simply reduces the user to the same level as what he fights against.

While I more agree with this it is now his choice, wether he rises above this dark time or succumbs to it will truly tell if he is worthy of being a paladin.

It currently has extra damage, bonus to attack rolls, better crits and lifestealing, but mostly important it does soul damage, ie it can kill even immortal beings.

If BBEG isn't one of those then I probably won't need it.

But you are correct, that's actually better than the temple. I can keep it with me and just not wield it, this way keeping it safe. Besides, even after BBEG is dead another one can rise. Or a corrupt church militant. It needs to stay protected and I could make it a quest to destroy it with my own hands when I have the free time.

No.
If anything it makes murderhobo-ing WORSE because you're fucking up the ineffable parts of people and things, as well as the physical.

Nothing good can come of that sword.
Willing to bet your GM is gonna pull a tolkien and have it turn out to be the big bag's phylactery or something.

Even should he be such, using such an item is still evil, better to die staying untainted than to sink to his level to beat him. Such is the lot of a paladin, to lay down their lives even if using evil would save them. Ask yourself this one question "if I refuse to use this but keep it with me and die who will pick it up?" The best course is being rid of it but I nor any other can force your hand on this.

I will impart one last word of caution, be sure you have the will to resist using it ever again, including this coming fight. If you do not it will be you who is hunted by paladins and possibly even your friends.

Story?

I'm tired of these fucking newfags ruining my board

Exactly this. Anyone can cut down a bandit. Hell, even a child could do that with a bit of good planning. Its a paladin's job to bring them to justice and show the locals what law and goodness means and looks like. Otherwise people forget over time why they have laws and why the social contract matters. They'll get one tiny step closer to barbaric, bloody anarchy which almost always then turns into an ironfisted tyranny.

Killing a thief in cold blood just shows that violence is the easiest way to solve problems. Apprehending a thief, bringing him in to the local constable, having him tried and hanged shows the people that the law still exists here and you can't just murder your problems away.

it's a trap and you're a fool if you take it.

however my inner DM says "do what every your character would do regardless"
for example: my warlock would try to take it apart and gain it's powers, but my paladin would try to destroy it.