Before, I thought it was just odd how there's no "She's cool, let her go pls" persuasion option. Now though, it's goddamn absurd with the addition of Paladins.

For those unaware, when you're playing a Paladin and find Lae'zal stuck in the cage after escaping the Illithid ship, the deception option gets a [Paladin] tag. Given what we know about oathbreaking, and how lying goes against your oath (for Devotion, at least), it seems like the only options to not break your oath are to either abandon Lae there, attack the tieflings, or to tell the tieflings to kill her. Those options seem MUCH LESS paladin-like to me, but maybe I'm crazy.


It's silly how just telling the truth isn't an option given how the truth isn't that ridiculous. The line could be like "You think she's evil because she's skinny and yellow? Have you seen your horns and tails? Run along now and I'll clean up your mess."

You can already tell them something like "I will deal with her" so both of them just leave the area.

I used the Paladin deception option and it didn’t break my oath of devotion. I don’t know if other sorts of deception always do, or if it’s only when there is an (implied) promise that is then broken, if it’s consistent at all.

But I agree that it would seem appropriate to have a non-deception persuasion option to get the tieflings to leave, eg by convincing them Lae’zel wasn’t one of the githyanki who killed their scouts and you’ll make sure she doesn’t harm them.

Yes, that's the deception option.

I used deception option with no repercussion.

Agree ... it feels odd that you are encouraged to lie with your paladin.
Even tho one could argue you didnt exactly "lie" just didnt tell the whole truth ...

But yes, there certainly should be more options.
https://forums.larian.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=835629#Post835629

I wonder what happens if the player is a Drow Paladin? The Drow only get Intimidation or Attack as an option.

Is there no repercussion? I know it doesn't break your oath right away if you choose it, but the Paladin tag makes it seem as if the game is keeping score of how honorable you are, and will cause you to go Oathbreaker if you go below a certain amount.

I don’t think that’s how it works, though it possibly should. Currently, there just seem to be some actions that count as oath breaking, and you’ll get notified as soon as you’ve done one of them.

Unfortunately, even my drow Oath of the Ancients paladin still only gets the intimidate or attack options. It feels as though a paladin might want to try to persuade them to leave instead!

• Successfully intimidating the tieflings does *not* break the oath.
• The intimidate check is only DC 5 but if you fail it then the tieflings attack, and the paladin killing them in this case does *not* break the oath.
• However, choosing to attack the tieflings without trying to intimidate them *does* break the oath (at least if the paladin strikes the killing blow).

Lying does not go against your oath. Seriously, at least in Bg3, it doesn't on principle. I'm not done with my testing yet, but

1. You may kill, deceive, rob, intimidate and ambush.

2. You may not, no matter who it is, /kill/ any NPC that doesn't want to fight you. (Including cowardly goblins in blighted village on the principle of cowardice. Even If they've murdered and will murder again. /Come on, Larian?!/)

Exceptions are made and will be VERY obvious. Non literal examples: Anders --> "You have abandoned my god. Die". Gut --> "Now that you're here alone in this room with me, DIE for asking me to abandon my oath"...

Oath of the ancients can do whatever you want in Zhentariim hideout. Provided, you take the flask & refuse to hand it over. No matter If you fail or succeed your throws, it will end in combat at the moment. (Hey, that's my food for Gale! He needs it more than them 🥺)

In practice, that means your paladin can't kill first and ask questions later. The game is attempting you to -- and at times extremely badly -- "talk things out". If after that talking someone wants to kill you, that's on them! 😇

On second thought, Astarion and the scharlatan Oath of the Ancients Tiefling may have been a terrible influence...

This is more or less in line with my experience as an Oath of Devotion paladin.

Except I also found that he could kill at least some neutrals he'd decided were better off dead (e.g. the duergar slavers) without breaking his oath as long as he did this with his divine smite, a spell or even alchemist's fire. As long as he didn't strike the finishing blow with a weapon, all was hunky dory. That surely is a bug.

Really? Oh, no. I ambushed & killed Ethel that way and had her among my mental list of exceptions. Charred corpse, can't talk with that. Wasn't about to reload over it, though...

Well... all in all, paladin seems more locked to an oath than an allignment. You can chaotic neutral your way around town.

E.g. oath of devotion can use the rod to raise a certain husband as a zombie, oath of the ancients can't.

Oath of the ancients is explained well enough (protect the natural order. Zombie is not natural). Oath of devotion makes it sound like you're forced to play as lawful good. As long as you're not actively and acutely evil, though...

I guess this is what happens when we're not devoted to something solid for roleplay purposes? I really don't know.

I'm hoping it's just what happens when Larian publishes an early proof of concept of a paladin for feedback, without having yet thought through all the details, fixed bugs and added necessary polish .

But I guess we'll see, and in the meantime share our thoughts on what we'd like the paladin class to become in the hope that Larian will either listen or it's what they were intending to do anyway.

Honestly, the way to get around any oath is to just have a companion do the talking.

I tested this in various spots. For example, OoD Pally breaks his oath when you decieve Minthara into thinking you're with the Absolute, but if your lead character is someone else, it doesn't.

Yeah, I understand your point, but it's okay that it doesn't it in this example.

You can also see: paladin killing surrendered goblin = bad. Telling Wyll to do it himself If he wants him dead = alright. Killing an imprisoned goblin = bad. Watching someone else do it (the tiefling) = fine.

In general, you are allowed to straight up kill people who abandoned your god or ask you to break your oath (by swearing loyalty to something opposing it, or If you yourself willingly pretend to follow another code). That's the big "exceptions" apply to you may not kill people (who don't want to fight). It seems pretty evil to me, but that's the "righteous" path.

Oath of devotion forbids to even pretend to follow another god or code, though you may lie about anything else to achieve a "good" enough outcome. Oath of the ancients locks you out of dubious magic and harming animals. As I understand it, an oath of Devotion paladin is enraged when even thinking about submitting to another cause. You do get oathbroken for going too far against what is believeable to have justification for/OOC.

Doesn’t the fact you can simply pay to get your oath back make the whole ‘you’ve broken your oath’ feel a bit ‘who cares’ anyway?

Not for me personally. It still makes a big roleplay difference, and that’s the main reason I make character choices.

True, but when you want to role play to regain your oath, instead of it being in an epic redeeming way, it’s ‘here’s some coin, now gimmie it back’. If that’s the kind of role play people are into though more power to em.

I agree it could be better, but I also don’t necessarily expect Larian to build huge amounts of content specifically for one class, and if I had to choose I’d rather they prioritised better oathbreaking/keeping in the first place than a better redemption mechanism. I am okay to use my imagination on that, and suppose that really, in addition to the handing over the cash there was a long vigil on my knees with deep soul searching.

Though given I didn’t actually have 2000 GP when it happened to me, I did have to do a bit of questing before I could redeem myself. I do think it would make sense to have a higher cost each time - double it say. That would functionally restrict the amount of times it could be done … other than for paladins willing to do long penance creating Elixirs of Silvanus (if that still works as a money-making exploit).