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Old 12-14-2018, 10:26 AM   #21
David Johnston2
 
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Honesty

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Originally Posted by Icelander View Post
That various actions were retroactively judged illegal doesn't change the fact the were the law for the purposes of Honesty in Germany and occupied Europe. It's not like Honesty includes precognition for future changes of laws.
No it doesn't. Nor however does it obligate people to do more than the absolute minimum to comply with the law when they have a problem with it or to necessarily to accept that surrender means accepting the new regime's laws as being more legitimate than the previous ones. An Honest person living in occupied France must decide for itself whether the Vichy regime is a legitimate authority or the France they were born in is an over-riding authority and Vichy is a temporary aberration just as when an Honest person travels in a foreign land they must balance their laws against the local laws and decide which takes precedence.
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Old 12-14-2018, 11:43 AM   #22
johndallman
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Honesty

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Originally Posted by David Johnston2 View Post
No it doesn't. Nor however does it obligate people to do more than the absolute minimum to comply with the law when they have a problem with it or to necessarily to accept that surrender means accepting the new regime's laws as being more legitimate than the previous ones.
And this is why Honesty has a self-control roll.

In a different game, I've seen a character played who had the equivalent of Honesty with no self-control, always fanatically obeying the law. Preventing him from ruining heroic and socially useful schemes became part of the game. His player was fine with this, since he was an anarchist, and had created the character as a parody of "lawful" behaviour.
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Old 12-14-2018, 11:51 AM   #23
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Honesty

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Originally Posted by David Johnston2 View Post
No it doesn't. Nor however does it obligate people to do more than the absolute minimum to comply with the law when they have a problem with it or to necessarily to accept that surrender means accepting the new regime's laws as being more legitimate than the previous ones. An Honest person living in occupied France must decide for itself whether the Vichy regime is a legitimate authority or the France they were born in is an over-riding authority and Vichy is a temporary aberration just as when an Honest person travels in a foreign land they must balance their laws against the local laws and decide which takes precedence.
The way I read it, there's no decision involved unless the character successfully rolls against Self-Control. People without Mental Disadvantages that apply can rationally weigh morality against legality, but Honesty, at its core, is the inability to distinguish between the two.

Also, Honesty specifically says something like that the character must do their best to ensure that other people follow the law. That means far more than the Feature, Quirk at most, of doing the absolute minimum to comply with current laws. It means taking action to prevent others from breaking the law, regardless of how immoral that law may seem to an outside observer.

To me, Honest people continue to follow the law regardless of regime change or repressive legislation. If they stop viewing the source of law in their home society as legitimate, they've bought off Honesty. They might replace it with a Code of Honour, Sense of Duty or similar, but they are no longer Honest.
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Old 12-14-2018, 12:05 PM   #24
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Honesty

As it happens, I tend to view Honesty as incompatible with being a PC in most campaign styles. That is because nearly every story casts the PCs as independent actors making choices and potentially acting against the status quo.

Honesty, however, represents the position that the current holders of authority are legitimate, right and that obeying their will is a moral duty. It's the ultimate alignment with the status quo and thus characters with ittend to be strictly constrained from taking actions characteristic of heroes, protagonists or adventurers.

That's not a moral judgment, merely an observation that characters who want to change the status quo are more usually the focus of story than characters who wish to preserve it. All the more so in any kind of society where the state has a monopoly on violence and imposes strict consfraints on how to resolve conflict within the law.

Simply put, most Honest protagonists will resolve the Call to Adventure by calli g the autborities.
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Old 12-14-2018, 12:17 PM   #25
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Honesty

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That means far more than the Feature, Quirk at most, of doing the absolute minimum to comply with current laws.
I don't see that being just a quirk (much less a feature!).

Just being unable to do what is generally considered serious crimes can be rather limiting for an adventurer and there is an enormous number of other laws that you would have to follow as well. The vast majority of people probably break some laws occasionally.
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Old 12-14-2018, 12:28 PM   #26
Fred Brackin
 
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Honesty

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I don't see that being just a quirk (much less a feature!).
"Always does X (except when there's a reasonable excuse)" isn't even much of a Quirk. It's the point of Honesty that you will obey the LAW even when it
is not reasonable to do so. The same for most other Mental disads too of course.
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Old 12-14-2018, 12:32 PM   #27
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Honesty

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"Always does X (except when there's a reasonable excuse)" isn't even much of a Quirk. It's the point of Honesty that you will obey the LAW even when it
is not reasonable to do so. The same for most other Mental disads too of course.
There was no "except when there's a reasonable excuse" condition there. If that was the case, then it would indeed at most have been a quirk.
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Old 12-14-2018, 12:44 PM   #28
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Honesty

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Honesty isn't about obeying authority. If an authority gives an illegal order, an Honest person is obligated to disobey.
Fair point, which is why I added "or something".
But that brings up another problem -- is it reasonable to expect all characters with Honesty to necessarily even know the law?


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Originally Posted by Icelander View Post
As it happens, I tend to view Honesty as incompatible with being a PC in most campaign styles.
Me too. It is way more of a PINTA factor for a player than the [-10] is worth, and it almost guarantees that eventually there will be conflict about it between the PCs.

Last edited by Donny Brook; 12-14-2018 at 12:55 PM.
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Old 12-14-2018, 12:49 PM   #29
Andreas
 
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Honesty

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Fair point, which is why I added "or something".
But that brings up another problem -- is it reasonable to expect all characters with Honesty to necessarily even know the law?
The generalities of well known laws, yes. Anything less than that and you should probably have to take a mitigator for Honesty (unless your misstaken assumptions about what the law says is equally limiting).

Knowing all laws however isn't really reasonable to expect even from people who's job it is to know the law.
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Old 12-14-2018, 01:03 PM   #30
David Johnston2
 
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Default Re: [Basic] Disadvantage of the Week: Honesty

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The way I read it, there's no decision involved unless the character successfully rolls against Self-Control. People without Mental Disadvantages that apply can rationally weigh morality against legality, but Honesty, at its core, is the inability to distinguish between the two.
I said nothing about morality. The issue here is making the decision about which law or set of laws has the greater legitimacy. An Honest Frenchman can decide that the new regime is illegitimate and stick with with their pre-existing loyalty, or adapt to the new circumstance.
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