So here's what happened:

So here's what happened:
> enemy sends a troop of children to attack us
> players literally freeze on place
> children start throwing stones and arrows
> I take action and fireball them
> players berate me as a monster
> DM chatises and threaten to drop me to evil
Was it really evil? I think that would fall into the self preservation rule.

No it's not evil. Children are obnoxious fucks and you're not responsible for the continous existence of our species.

Your DM is That DM and deliberately baited you into that action and should step down from his position. Also, pic.

Next question.

The kids violated the NAP, and you were fully justified in killing them.
Or forcing them into indentured servitude in your free trade pleasure corporation.

You did what was necessary. It's not good or nice, but the children were most likely radicalized, enslaved, or drugged to be on the battlefield. However, this user also hit's another good point. You're DM is shit and there's a 90% chance this never fucking happened.

Did they sent some spells upon your group?

Well, no. But the paladin and the warrior (our tanks) were taking sligshot and shortbow damage. I wasn't going to wait before any of them got knocked out.

Ow the edge.

Anyway, yes it was pretty evil, or at least it wasn't good. Dropping alignment over something like that is justified.

That said, the other players should know that they can choose to do nonlethal damage according to the rules of the game.

Your players are unable to tell fantasy from reality. Bail.

It wasn't good. Depends on the circumstances I suppose. Some kids can be so radicalized and fucked in the head that they'd kill if given the chance. I wouldn't take chances.

I'd like to see the sort of children that are able to hurt a presumably armored warrior and paladin with shortbows and slings.

A kid wearing a slingshot is still 1d4 damage. Of course we were stronger than a commoner, but you are still going to die if you take several of them at once.

I can understand the argument that they are weaker, but it wasn't a single kid. Do you think they should jump into a mob and start trying to knock out each one of them?

When an attack pass AC I always considered as it's hitting somewhere unarmored.

>Do you think they should jump into a mob and start trying to knock out each one of them?
They can't exactly keep shooting you if you're right in the middle of them. Not effectively, at least.

>Ow the edge
Lo and behold, the pathetic "white and black" faggot has arrived to call anyone edgy if they don't follow his view.

Whatever floats your boat.

Their attack bonus, damage and range should have been penalized due to the fact that they're children.

If they were a credible threat, they weren't statted and played properly, and it was sensible to take them out as quickly as possible.

If they weren't a credible threat, your reaction was overkill and could be considered evil.

If someone makes a lethal attack against you, and you kill them, you are not at fault. That's how it works.

>Do you think they should jump into a mob and start trying to knock out each one of them?

Why not? It's a bunch of kids. Alternatively, get to cover and come up with a plan. Impulsively taking the easiest course of action without thought for anyone else is pretty much the mark of a true psychopath.

I'm probably more of a moral relativist than you are. There's still something deeply wrong with you if you are willing to cook a bunch of children without pause.

Strange, I thought a moment ago there was no "white and black" in the universe? Interesting how suddenly all nuance disappears when it's convenient for you.

Kids shouldn't be dealing lethal damage to armored warriors.

If they are, the system you're using is wonky. You can't make any sort of reasonable moral point based on a wonky situation.

They why did you said that your group "literally" froze?

>that filename

Why wouldn't a group of children be able to hurt an armoured man? They were shown to use shortbows which require a bit of training. A volly of 20 arrows can cause damage even if 75% of them miss.

Sincerely I don't think that would work. Especially the paladin who I'm not sure would start punching children. But then I don't control their characters so...

>There's still something deeply wrong with you if you are willing to cook a bunch of children without pause.
You're a literal brainlet if you can read the OP and come to such a distorted conclusion.

"freeze"
to become immobilized through fear, shock, etc.:
>When he got in front of the audience he froze.
to stop suddenly and remain motionless; halt:
>I froze in my tracks.

>Doesn't know what psychopathy is

>Moral relativist
>Believes that killing children is inherently evil

Why fireball? Why not sleep? Web? Protection from Missiles? Chromatic spray? Entangle?

>children start throwing stones and arrows
Do thrown stones and arrows by kids even do damage? You could just put your shields up and knock em down, frankly.

Yes, but that would be "figuratively" freeze, when you say "literally" you imply that they did actualy freeze

God I hate it when people do that too. I once edited for a supposedly professional writer who did it all the fucking time.

>hey writer-kun what did you mean by 'literally' here?
>well not literally literally, but -
>no nigga this isn't your blog, this is for a historical publication, you can't say literally if you mean figuratively
>KEEPS FUCKING DOING IT
>mfw

They also require physical strength.

Children would either need to use weaker bows, or to use bows they're not strong enough to handle properly. Either way, their damage output should drop to a point where it's no longer a credible threat to an armored warrior.

I actually agree. If they were dealing 1d4 as adults, then that does show I'm right in treating them as adults.

Kids have always been used as soldiers in history, so of course they dealt damage

It's a bunch of armed kids however. Would you try to knock out a thirteen year old with a gun?

My blood boils at it too.

>every caster is a powergaming wizard build with a solution to everything
Allowing such faggots to play ttrpgs was a mistake

But those are literal dictionary definitions of the verb 'to freeze'. There is nothing uncommon or metaphorical about using freeze in this context.

>There's still something deeply wrong with you if you are willing to cook a bunch of children who aren't trying to kill you without pause.
Fixed it for you. If someone, be it adult or child, is trying to kill you and you do nothing to protect yourself, then you deserve to die. Yes, OP using a fireball on a group of children is overkill, but who's saying that there wasn't more enemies coming. Use sleep on the group of kids, they're still getting to die by being trampled underfoot by the enemies horses or soldiers. Children as used as psychological warfare, and the bad guy (most likely) would of kept using kids if OP's party was frozen (because they didn't want to harm a child) and they children are all gun-ho to kill the party for reasons. As I said before, what he did wasn't good or nice, but necessary because the rest of his group didn't do shit out of fear.

I would be more scared of a kid with a gun than I would be of a kid with a bow.

I must point out that there are other anons replying that isn't me.

If it was fatigue damage, it would actually be more sensible. But still, suppose it was... then we would be knocked out and captured by the enemy, which could result in our execution.

They're armed with thin sticks with pointy ends and stones that are being thrown. Not fired, thrown.

You're literally using the word literally incorrectly.

Right examples:
>I literally ended the threat by roasting the children with a fireball
>The party was literally being attacked by sticks and stones and wasn't able to cope

Wrong examples
>I, the OP, literally cannot stop choking on cocks right now
>My party literally was frozen to sub zero temperatures due to kids throwing stones at us

>everyone else pauses to think about what to do
>OP just blasts with fireball

Nope, I just described the situation as OP did.

Psychopathy isn't a real thing, it's a somewhat useful shorthand made up by non-professionals that sort of works to group certain people with antisocial personality disorder into easily understood categories. One of the most prominent signs of antisocial personality disorder is reckless, merit-based decision making without consideration (or ability) for empathy.

I don't believe killing anyone is inherently evil. I don't believe in evil. I know that if your first response to a situation like this is to kill everything with overwhelming force then you're a lazy, impulsive, reckless human being with low capability for empathy. Which in D&D translates into evil.

They were just taking damage without doing anything about it. The warrior just kept blocking while the paladin stopped once to heal.

You don't have to be THAT strong to use a shortbow (ineffectively). If these children were used as soldiers they probably work out.

>Why not? It's a bunch of kids. Alternatively, get to cover and come up with a plan.
This, pretty much. Assuming this situation actually happened (unlikely) your DM is a fag for thinking that kids would have the draw strength to hurt armored men with bows, but you and the other players are (still assuming any of this actually happened) retarded brainlets for treating the game like a JRPG battle screen where you just scream "I ATTACK!" every turn instead of doing something to counter the problem.

Oh, the children are throwing arrows? Yeah that should be 1d2-1 damage.

Hol'up.

Couldn't one still refer to using a sling to launch stones as 'throwing stones'?

>brainlet posting
If he killed them without pause, he wouldn't have waited for them to attack at all, retard.

Since you aren't smart enough to conceptualize an example, I'll do it for you.
>a group of armed human adults approaches with weapons, ready to attack!
>>I cast fireball!
That is killing without pause.

I didn't have those spells on hand, which would be my mistake. I stocked damage spells since they are the mostly effective for wide combat.

Right, so you're all idiots. Take full defense actions and get a +5 to AC if you aren't going to do anything.

Also, a wizard who doesn't even have fucking wind wall prepared? What, you literally have no other spells apart from fireballs in place?

>Yes, OP using a fireball on a group of children is overkill, but who's saying that there wasn't more enemies coming. Use sleep on the group of kids, they're still getting to die by being trampled underfoot by the enemies horses or soldiers. Children as used as psychological warfare, and the bad guy (most likely) would of kept using kids if OP's party was frozen (because they didn't want to harm a child) and they children are all gun-ho to kill the party for reasons. As I said before, what he did wasn't good or nice, but necessary because the rest of his group didn't do shit out of fear.

>there might be more enemies coming so instead of using sleep, a first level spell that MIGHT kill the enemy combatants IF someone came along and trampled them, I will use a 4th level spell that's ridiculously overkill AND waste resources on enemies that are doing scratch damage at best, leaving me vulnerable since I don't have as much resources to deal with other enemies later on

No, that reasoning's bullshit. Complete bullshit. Even being full psycho, you're wasting resources on something that's barely a threat when you worry other threats are approaching.

Yes, true, but bows were the weapon of the past. And that doesn't change that an arrow thrown by a child can penetrate.

>I stocked damage spells since they are the mostly effective for wide combat.
They genuinely aren't..

I was tempted to use 'literally'.

In a round about way yes. Hell, in this thread we've got people thinking the kids threw arrows instead of using a bow, because of how it's spelt.

I meant they were throwing the stones, the arrows were of course being shoot. No one would throw an arrow.

>If these children were used as soldiers they probably work out.
Wouldn't they need to have gone through puberty for working out to have any sort of practical result? Especially when it comes to the sort of upper body strength required to deal damage with a bow?

Ah, superfluous semantics. The sign of a man with no argument.

You know what was meant. The PC responded to an attack with overwhelming force despite the source of the attack being pitifully weak and probably more a victim than them. Rather than thinking of something else to do, like the rest of the party, he instantly resorted to the easiest possible option. This is either bad roleplaying or playing an amoral character.

That's just because you would call them a dart in that context.

Why are you assuming they are prepubescent child soldiers?
OP has never specified age.

Well, that is something they should have thought and not me. I'm just saying how it happened.

I had at the moment fireball (for groups) and magic missile (for singles). I actually had a charge of web, but I had used it with continuous flame to light a group of soldiers.

Because he called them children.

I wouldn't consider a shredded, combat-trained 15-year-old that blossomed early a child, especially in premodern fantasy land.

You are bad at wizarding.

Well I'm open to suggestions. But in battle I usually prefer to deal damage than support.

Literally?

>Ah, superfluous semantics. The sign of a man with no argument.
No it fucking isn't you fucking brainlet.
You are posting completely misleading and utterly wrong shit, to tint the discussion in a way to make it look more favorable to you.
There's a huge fucking difference between killing children without pause, and killing children after they are actively attacking and wounding your friends.

>You know what was meant.
I know the bullshit you were trying to pull.

>The PC responded to an attack with overwhelming force despite the source of the attack being pitifully weak and probably more a victim than them.
They were dealing lethal damage, and you don't know ANY of that shit.
For all you know, these "children" were 16 year old gang members.

>Rather than thinking of something else to do, like the rest of the party, he instantly resorted to the easiest possible option. This is either bad roleplaying or playing an amoral character.
Let me send some armed "children" after you and see how you feel when being violently attacked.

Ah. But still, I would have said dart if they were. Frankly didn't see a single dart enemy on the game, the closest would be javelins.

>I wouldn't consider a shredded, combat-trained 15-year-old that blossomed early a child, especially in premodern fantasy land.
Are you OP?
No?
Then what you think is irrelevant.

Ok, that's it. Tells us what this part of the campaign is. It sounds like you and your group are in a warzone and you didn't pick non lethal spells, since you're in the middle of a war, correct? If we, the anons, know the whole story, then maybe we can actually come done to a decision.

A wizard shouldn't deal damage.

A wizard should stock up on save-or-die or save-or-suck spells. Encounter enders. Considering this 'playing support' is toxic vidya thinking.

Don't mind me, I'm just going to ignore all the irrelevant shit you say from now on, since you're not the OP.

You don't really have a choice. If children are actively trying to kill you, they're combatants. It's an awful thing, but your enemy is awful for doing it.

Remember, if they get away with using children as soldiers, EVERYONE WILL DO IT.

I like how the thread started about a wizard throwing a fireball into a group of enemy children soldiers and the moral quandary there, and now it's about how the wizard wasn't efficient enough in his AoE spell selection to use on the group of children.

Create Pit and Glitterdust are the best AoEs though, let's be fair.

>everyone should play the most cancerous wizard build possible, and if you disagree, you're toxic
literally stop posting and fucking kys

>internet toughguy: the post

You calling anyone a brainlet is irony of the highest order.

>brainlet doesn't even understand what I said
I'm actually so glad to not have a sub-80 IQ

>gets caught and posts smug reaction images to make himself feel better
Wow, you really got me there user, never seen such advanced tactics before in my life.
Guess you win then, huh?
What do you want engraved on your trophy?

I disagree, because I deal the most damage in the party. You are probably thinking I should do support, but we already other two pcs to do so.

Because he didn't call them 'youths'. He called them children.

Subpar wizard, subpar party, subpar DM.

To add to what other anons said, you are wizarding wrong.
The Wizards strength is (not only) in dealing damage, but in its versatility of support.
There are a shit ton of great spells to help against groups of archers. At a level where you can cast fireball you have literally no excuse to not have at least one or two prepared.

And, btw, could you specify the age of the children? Are we talking 10 yo child soldiers or 16 yo hardened gang members?

Pretty much.

We are advancing into the enemy country and have been constantly fighting against group of enemy soldiers and other creatures. It's like WW2 but with magic against Not Hitler.

The enemy knew that our party was naturally good, so he sent an army of children to probably delay our invasion of his territory. So you could say that we are practically mobilized for war since every last encounter we have been solving with violence.

I think a 8 year old could use a short bow, at minimal efficiency.

Well thank god you magically know that OP follows your specific subjective definition of what a child is.

>A wizard shouldn't deal damage.
So why do I have those high damage spells?

But the fireball ended the encounter.

Not with fireball. Hell even in wonkier editions doing non lethal damage with a spell required some metamagic fuckery

Not that guy, but why would you ever think anyone would respond in detail to a post that includes such cringeworthy lines as

>Let me send some armed "children" after you and see how you feel when being violently attacked.

and makes just as many assumptions as you accuse the other guy of? You're not acting in a way that people take seriously.

Trap options.

I didn't equip support through because I'm an offensive wizard. As I said before we already have two other support members. Blame them and not me.

I'm not sure of their exactly age. The DM said they were children, the big with bows and the smaller with slingshots. I could ask him the age, but by now I'm not sure that would help.

>There are a shit ton of great spells to help against groups of archers. At a level where you can cast fireball you have literally no excuse to not have at least one or two prepared.

All OP knows about D&D is that wizards cast fireball.

Explain your argument.

>hurr durr calling people between adolescence and maturity 'youths' is subjective
Now I get it. You just suck at the English language.

No dipshit, a child is anyone who isn't fully grown.
That includes jacked 15 year olds

Are you also made of pudding? What kind of children can do any fucking damage without firearms?

You're either a retard or your gm is a retard. You, in rl, could have survived children throwing rocks and firing arrows if you had any metal armor. Just a fucking cloak draped in front of you would be a good enough shield against children.

You're not evil, you're a pussy.

They were dealing lethal damage, and you have no idea how old these "children" were.
Don't try to bring IRL shit into this, when in the game, they were objectively a lethal threat.

It's like a fake ID badge so the developers don't think you're broken.
>"s-see, officer? 10d6 fireball, that's 35 average! That's about as much as the fighter, a-and it balances out that it hits multiple people b-because I can only do it a couple times a day..."
>"...mm...alright, seems to be balanced. Keep your nose clean, Wizard."
>"r-right! Of course, see you next edition!"
>"righto. I hear those damn MONKS are getting uppity again...getting cocky with their armorless defenses and full attacks...someone needs to take them down a peg or two again..."

And then you pull out the stupid shit like wall of stone, polymorphs, webs, illusions, whatever the creators can't quantifiably balance since there's no direct number stapled to them.

Seems pretty evil to me

Children soldiers are a hard thing to counter. They exist and if they threaten you, you should drop them. This doesn't mean what you did was good and you should feel bad for doing so, but you had to do something. Evil, maybe depends on why you did it in all reality; necessary, more than likely.

>I didn't equip support through because I'm an offensive wizard.
Honest question then: Why are you even playing a Wizard if you play with zero versatility? Why not go for a straight up Barbarian or something like that?

I mean, a simple level one spell like 'Obscuring Mist' would have given your group time to asses and to come up with a better plan then 'lets burn these kids to death' and a level three spell like 'Deep Slumber' would have solved the encounter altogether without literally burning children to death.

>All campaigns are the same and there's an universal truth to how the game should be player
You right now and also being wrong. If the campaign actually contains hordes of mooks that die to a fireball, it makes fireball a good choice. Especially since the AOE is often larger than most good control spells