Why no Sense Good spell?

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by cvannrederode

Companion 2, page 59. In the Evil Cleric template.

Yes.

We couldn't put everything in the core set, and "How often will Sense Good matter?" had an answer that led to us omitting it. That wasn't due to space constraints; "Works as usual, but vs. Good rather than Evil." wouldn't break the bank. It was out of a desire to keep complexity down; the existence of the spell practically demands detail at the level of Evil Clerics (Companion 2, p. 59).

But once you have a clear definition of capital-E Evil and capital-G Good in terms of clerics, (un)holiness, spells, powers, etc., "Works as usual, but vs. Good rather than Evil." no longer feels like a cop-out.

Originally Posted by Spartan506

I don't even thing Sense Good is all that useful for bad guys trying to sense delvers...not all will even be good, and even those that are (Clerics, Holy Warrior), I don't think those radiate as "Truly Good."

Correct.

Sense Evil/Good detects supernatural, essential Evil/Good – demons/angels, unholy/holy artifacts, cursed/blessed altars, etc. – not mere mortal morality, which is a choice that can change with the seasons even in dungeon fantasy. These are niche spells for determining whether foes or objects merit smiting or destruction in the name of the gods . . . or just regular killing and looting. Basically, they sniff out plot tokens.

Originally Posted by Spartan506

I guess Sense Foes is probably best when determining if something you see or hear has hostile intent. For truly Evil folks, that would mean delvers seeking to rid the world of truly Evil folks.

Sense Foes is the more generally useful spell. It detects intent – including the usual mortal kind – rather than morality, essential or adopted. Sense Evil/Good are, as I said, rather specialized plot-advancing spells; they're on a par with Detect Poison, Know Illusion, or Seek Gate in terms of situational utility ("Here's one specific thing we already have cause to look for owing to The Story So Far").

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Most important is to realize that the Dungeon Fantasy Roleplaying Game made a conscious decision not to equate adopted morality to essential morality, and thus to make good and evil near-universal properties of beings – even mundane ones – as in various incarnations of D&D. There's no "alignment" in this game . . . not in the sense that everything that thinks (and many things that don't) have to have a detectable morality. Because of this, Sense Evil/Good are highly specialized spells, not daily-use ones.

D&D basically uses such magic as Detect Team anyway: "Are these guys on our side or the other side?" For that, the DFRPG offers Aura, Compel Truth, Mind-Reading, Sense Foes, Truthsayer, etc.

[Kromm]

Here's a simple test for whether Sense Evil/Good will work:

Did the thing you're looking at or for make a free-willed choice to side with Evil or Good? If the answer is "yes," these spells are useless – try Sense Foes or Mind-Reading! If "no," they'll work.

Thus, non-sentient (IQ 0) altars and temples to Good or Evil – and unthinking artifacts such as (un)holy water and blessed/cursed items – will show up to such spells. These objects' good or evil is essential and cannot change with a choice. It is therefore capital-G Good or capital-E Evil.

Sentient (IQ 1+) entities created solely to serve higher powers – angels, demons, intelligent (un)holy artifacts, etc. – will show up, too. They were literally crafted from or by pure Good or Evil, and had no choice in that. Sapient (IQ 6+) ones might develop a conscience, regrets, second thoughts, etc., but they cannot change the stuff of their creation – no more than a wooden chair can decide to be metal or a steel sword can opt to be wood. You can detect that.

Entities created or animated by the (un)holy magic of mortals will show up for the same reason. This is stuff like zombies raised using Evil clerical spells, golems created by high priests of Good, pure creations of (un)holy magical energy such as animated shadows, and the like. This is for exactly the reasons given above; the only difference is that instead of gods or The Devil bringing the being into existence directly, they loaned out some power to their cult, who did it for them.

Finally, beings and objects possessed by IQ 1+ entities you could detect anyway will show up. This means temples with Good or Evil spirits of place, ordinary objects or people inhabited by angels or demons, and the like. You're not detecting the entity or artifact you see, but the possessing force, which is innately Good or Evil.

Note carefully that this leaves out things some people might consider "evil," like corpses walking around not due to possession by Evil spirits or animation by Evil magic, but just straight-up physical animation by amoral, unaligned magic . . . or even a weird plague or funky poison.