Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Selectable list of Oaths for paladins at character creation?

I think it would be nice to have a list of Oaths that make sense for each subclass at character creation so we can select from so we can know what we can and cannot do so we don't break our oaths. Similar to how clerics can select their gods. Some of the ways you can break your oaths don't make sense as we can't see what oaths we have available. We should also have a separate screen to see what oaths we have.

The Oaths are the paladin subclasses. And right now there's only 2 to select at character creation: Devotion and Ancients. I've only played Devotion so far but they're both basically "be nice and keep your promises."

+ 100

Not what I meant. I meant something more to a list of tenets they can choose from that would make sense for the subclass like the ones shown in the PHB or something similar to the oath that the green lanterns swear to. A Paladin of devotion to one god would not be the same as a paladin of devotion to another god as they would have different tenets. Currently it seems like the Oath of Devotion and Ancients share the same restrictions when they should not.

You can view the tenets of your oath after you commit to it, but they really should be showing them before that, as part of when you select your oath at lvl 1.

The issue of ancients and devotion paladins being held to the same standards is due to Larian's implementation of the class. Hopefully it will get refined.

I straight up don't want an Oath, I want to be one devoted to a Deity.

You'll most likely get that option in the future, but you'll still be picking from the oaths, which are intended to be somewhat deity-flexible. So your oath of devotion paladin could be a follower of Tyr, or Bahumut, or Moradin, because the tenets of devotion fit with their dogma.

If you don't want oaths of principle and practice to be an integral and core part of your character, then you do not want to play a paladin.
If you want to follow a deity directly, without an oath of practice and principle backing that up, then what you want is a cleric.

Consider this:

Deities in the realms are fickle and changeable in many ways. Both Clerics and Paladins can swear themselves to the service of a deity, and to a set of principles which that deity embodies, but they diverge in an interesting way... Sometimes a deity's nature can change or be changed; they can acquire new folios or lose one that they previously controlled, or they can be affected by cosmic events and inter-deity conflicts or unions that substantially alter their essence and behaviour. Clerics often face being influenced by their deity through their divine connection, and we have many, many tales about gods who changed and in turn caused a change in their clerics as a result - those clerics who once acted in particular way are influenced to adopt the changes in behaviour and ideology of their deity, and are also so changed. Paladins rarely experience this - but rather, paladins tend to find instead that they can no longer follow the deity they originally served when that deity's demeanour and behaviour changes in a way that defies the principles to which the Paladin swore in that's deity's service originally. Those that remain in service to the changed deity, despite its defiance of their original principles, are almost always characterised as Oathbreakers, while those who renounce the changed deity and seek a new divine intermediary to support them - perhaps in their quest to help or redeem the corrupted divine they once served - are not.

So, the question to ask yourself is, if you are playing a character sworn to a deity, and that deity changes their nature, do you continue to follow them, or do you continue to follow the principles for which they originally stood, but now no longer do; if your answer is the first, then you're most likely a cleric, while if your answer is the second, you're most likely a paladin.

If there was a way to upvote a comment yours would get mine.

Ok rephrasing, I want to play a Paladin devoted to a Deity and all that comes with it. Without the Deity, I don't see the point in playing one. As long as that's added, I'll be satisfied.