Alignments

[kreider204]

One reason why I love C&C even more than AD&D is that the character creation is so much less restrictive (e.g., with regard to level limits, race-class combinations, etc.). However, the alignment requirements - or lack thereof in many cases - for classes seem a bit too permissive.

As described, rangers sound good to me, especially taking into account bonuses against humanoid monsters, neutralize poison, etc. I can grok the idea of an evil ranger, but I would think the abilities would need to be changed (bonuses against PC races, assassin-like use of natural poisons, etc.).

Barbarians. I'm not really as familiar with the barbarian fiction as most, but I've always thought of them as chaotic, or at least any non-lawful.

Rogues by definition aren't exactly law-abiding types, so I'd think any non-lawful would definitely be required.

Knights, on the other hand, sound necessarily lawful of some sort.

Thoughts? Reactions? Questions? Comments? Bueller?

[redwullf]

I totally agree. I've come to view C&C (for all its wonder) as a framework upon which to build a campaign. Certain alignment restrictions for classes? Write it in!

In the campaign I'm developing (we're currently playing it via Labyrinth Lord, but will switch to C&C soon) I'm imposing moderately strict race/class combinations. I want to ensure our game "fits" my old AD&D perspective, but without the level limits. Along these lines, I like your alignment restrictions and would even consider implementing them myself.

[kreider204]

Well, good - I'm not entirely crazy then.

Ya, I totally appreciate that the PHB is written to be more or less setting neutral, so I certainly wouldn't want them to change it - I'll just include these restrictions in my setting rules (basically just Greyhawk ... ). I'm open to suggestions if I'm being too strict, though, esp. re: the barbarian (were there any lawful barbarian characters in the relevant literature?).

[Dead Horse]

OP,

I agree with your idea of rangers being good... But (you knew there had to be a but right?)
I disagree on every other class you mention.

Barbarians are very honor driven. that and their loyalty make me think of lawful.

Rogues Think mobster, yakuza, and guilds Lawful yes .. good not so much.

Knights the ones out to tear down the kingdom so they can be the new overlord are certainly not acting lawful in my book.

The problem i see with the alinement system is it tries to quantify good by two different measures...

law v chaos is right and wrong for the group.. and it isnt treated as a subjective group. A paladin in a kingdom of evil will not follow laws that are evil in nature...therefore making them chaotic to that society. What is lawful in one society is not for another...etc.

good v evil is a more moraly based right and wrong

Personaly i would have prefered a series of 1 to 10 numbers for alinement guides

How lawful are you 1 low 10 high
How good are you 1 low 10 high
How loyal are you .....
How pious....
How honorable...
etc...

Then you could set restrictions like
Paladin requies 8+ good, 8+ law, 10 pious and a loyalty 8+
Ranger good 7+, loyalty 9+
Knight honor 9+ loyalty 7+
etc...

Then as the game progresses if the character does an action out of his stated range, the CK can just tell the player to adjust they score up or down based on the characters actions.

[Rigon]

I always liked Palladiums alignments.

R-

[Omote]

I always liked Palladiums alignments.

+

~O

[clavis123]

One solution to the Alignment problem is to regard Alignment as a designation of Cosmic allegiance and destiny, rather than a description of consistent moral behavior. A Good character is literally on the side of the Angels. Consciously or unconsciously, he tends towards deeds that advance Heaven's cause. That doesn't mean he won't occasionally cheat, lie or steal (being a limited mortal), but overall his actions will advance order, justice, and benevolence in the world. Likewise, the Lawful Evil character generally brings about tyranny, pain, fear, and bondage, although he is quite capable of being loving, merciful and charitable in specific cases.

Beings without souls (such as Elves) can hold to an Alignment as an intellectual belief, but for beings with souls, Alignment represents their spiritual orientation, which they might even disagree with on an intellectual level. For example, the Cambion who is Evil, but who struggles with his nature. He gives money to charity, and believes himself to be good. Nonetheless, he always hurts anyone close to him, kills without mercy (because they were "bad people" anyway), and compulsively exploits every situation for his own gain. No matter what, he is Evil, though he doesn't want to accept it. Regardless of his beliefs, he is ultimately part of the Devils' plan to imprison and torment the souls of humanity.

[Lord Dynel]

The d20 era removed many restrictions on PCs. 2nd Edition, if I rcall correctly, had already removed gender ability score differences, and 3.x got rid of level limitations and racial class resctriction. One thing it kept, however, was its alignment restrictions. I found that C&C having looser alignment restrictions was bittersweet. One thing that I find, however, is that players kind of fall into "proper" alignments even without the restirctions, which is kind of an interesting case study. I haven't come across any odd alignment/class for the PC characters yet. The barbarian I CK'd was chaotic and the knight was lawful (neutral, if I recall correctly). I think, given most circumstances, players will pick alignments that fit the concept of their class and concept.

As (sort of) an aside, I've seen the other - older - restrictions kind of still in place. In the 11 years I've been running/playing 3.x and its derivatives (Pathfinder, C&C) I really haven't seen many PCs that were also forbidden in older editions. I haven't seen one single dwarven wizard. Likewise, I haven't seen a non-human paladin (DM'd two different paladins, both human). The only class/race combo I've seen that wasn't really allowed before was the half-orc monk. And I've seen it twice. Oddly, it kind of fits.

I know the above is only my personal experience and anecdotal. And half of my players come from older edition experience, too, so maybe there is a subconscious restrictor there, too. But I wonder if it's really that necessary to put that many restrictions on alignments. Are there too many chaotic knights, lawful barbarians and rogues running anound in your games, kreider, that you feel that having these restrictions will really make the game that much more enjoyable? I hope not to sound snarky and derisive, as my question comes from an honest curiosity on the matter.

[tylermo]

Lord Dynel's being snarky and derisive! Moderator? Moderator!!

[tylermo]

I don't believe I'm familiar with Palladium's alignments. I never played Palladium Fantasy, only Rifts. How did Kevin Siembieda and company do it?

[Just Jeff]

Rogues Think mobster, yakuza, and guilds Lawful yes .. good not so much.

Think Leverage.

With a little thought, you can probably develop a character of whatever mix you like. A hate-fueled ranger who's become corrupted by the mission (and all the robed figures intone, "The greater good.") A lawful thief who rules the worlds largest thieves' guild, or even the world's largest city (both in Greyhawk). The invisible knight in Le Morte d'Arthur. Barbarians tend to come from cultures with very strong social bonds, so not much stretch there.

Characters are built one at a time. Rather than impose these kinds of restrictions, I prefer to let a player and CK sort out characters on a case-by-case basis.

[Traveller]

In general I go with Clavis' interpretation of alignment, except for true neutral of course.

[Lurker]

Rigon wrote:

I always liked Palladiums alignments.

+

~O

Me toooooo!

Tyler, it boils down to versions of good selfish and evil. It kind of explains the alignments better than LG CE etc etc.

Personaly i would have prefered a series of 1 to 10 numbers for alinement guides

How lawful are you 1 low 10 high
How good are you 1 low 10 high
How loyal are you .....
How pious....
How honorable...
etc...

Then you could set restrictions like
Paladin requies 8+ good, 8+ law, 10 pious and a loyalty 8+
Ranger good 7+, loyalty 9+
Knight honor 9+ loyalty 7+
etc...

Then as the game progresses if the character does an action out of his stated range, the CK can just tell the player to adjust they score up or down based on the characters actions.

I kind of like that, but wouldn't it kind of muddle the water and not be a C&C kind of "keep it simple" kind of rule?

Clavis, I like your outlook too, but I'm not sure if it fits in the normal high fantasy game. However, in a historic kind of setting (which I prefer) it fits.

[kreider204]

Ooops! I didn't mean to start a general debate about alignments!

I definitely sympathize with a lot of the comments here (and Dead Horse in particular gave a lot of great counter-examples). I'm a philosophy professor who specializes in ethics, so I certainly realize that the traditional AD&D alignment system doesn't exactly correspond to real world ethical frameworks. Having said that, I think it actually works pretty darn well in the context of a fantasy game, and don't really have any plans to remove it entirely.

Still, I wonder if the alignments aren't best left to monsters and NPCs as a rough guideline for the CK, and if it wouldn't be best to dispense with them for PCs. Instead, the player would be required to come up with a brief description of the PC's ethics and personality that is consistent with class, background, etc.

Hmm ...

[PS: Just Jeff, I dig Leverage!]

[Dead Horse]

I think the 1 to 10 system is simple.. simpler then the abiguous alinement system we have now.

Paladium fantasy has the same alinements that rifts doe's.
I personaly dislike the Paladium system.. too many people pick the alinements that let them act like douches.
^ my personal experiance, your millage may vary.

[koralas]

Rangers = Good, I completely agree as they are written that way, that said, a wilderness warrior could be of any alignment, the rangers preferred enemy could just as easily be some sort of good aligned creature, then it sways the argument in other directions. Being old school, I like rangers being good, they were most often the "cops" in the games back in the day.

Knights = Lawful, sure I can see that, they have a rigid code of ethics to follow... note that is ethics, not morals, more on that in a moment.

Rogues != Lawful, I disagree with, but it all depends on the reasons for using those skills. To be a thief, or to be a spy? Certainly if acting as a spy, the character could be lawful, even possibly if using those skills to steal for their own profit they could still be Lawful. Take for instance from the 1st Ed. "All thieves are neutral or evil, although they can be neutral good (rarely), and of lawful or chaotic nature. Most thieves tend towards evil." Here the restriction is based more on morality than ethics, rarely are Thieves Good (NG at that), generally they are evil, but can be L, N, or C without restriction.

Barbarian = Chaotic, not so much, most barbaric clans will have a rigid set of rules and definite taboos. They may act seemingly randomly at times, but again, that is a different discussion.

When looking at alignments, my groups and I always used them as a guideline as to the outlook of the character, the core of it's being, rather than a hardline that rules every action. This is a view that I highly recommend, because if AL is a hardline measurement of every action, characters would be forever changing alignments, and a Paladin would be nigh on impossible to play.

We always treat AL along two branches, ethics (L/N/C) and morals (G/N/E). While those terms are closely related, there are distinct differences. Ethics deals with rules governing conduct, where morals describes what behavior is "right" and "wrong" or "just" and "unjust".

Lawful = Strict set of rules/code of conduct
Neutral = Rules can be important, but only when it suits me
Chaotic = Rules are good, so long as they don't restrict a persons liberties or free will

Good = Doing what is right, not just for yourself, but for others in your community, charitable, giving of yourself for others, life is precious
Neutral = Morality is grey, sometimes I do what is right for others, at other times I do only what is right for myself
Evil = Selfish, greedy, doing what is right to bring prestige/power/etc. to myself, aiding others only when it furthers my goals, life is cheap

What is interesting when you look at things this way, you see the correlation to Love/Hate/Indifference. Lawful and Chaotic are not opposites, rather it is the Neutral that is at opposition to both, and the same can be said of Good/Evil/Neutral branch as well. Neutral is really the ambiguous, I don't really care, point of view, where the other alignment arms share emotional or rational responses.

Look at it this way... In the 70's and 80's the USA would be considered C/G in alignment. The individual is valued and their free will is not highly restricted except where there is a danger to themselves or society (don't yell fire in a crowded building, unless there is a fire of course); while the country generally provides for the well being of the whole (welfare, social security, fema). The USSR is L/E in alignment, strict rules and regulations regale most aspects of life, and life is cheap, death for even minor offenses is not unheard of, "my way or the highway" mentality.

So looking at the class restrictions...

Limiting a Knight to Lawful, I probably wouldn't do it, but I can see it, as I said they have a strict code of conduct to follow. Now their morals will lead them to interpret that set of rules as befits them.

A Lawful Rogue, sure, rare to be sure, but even among thieves there is a code of ethics.

A Lawful Barbarian, no doubt, strict tribal rules and taboos keep them in line.

An evil Ranger... ok, sure, but the class will require tweaking to fit this mold. An orcish marauder (ranger) whose combat marauder affects humans and demi-humans (elves, dwarves, gnomes, halflings) and the like...

[Rigon]

Lawful = Strict set of rules/code of conduct
Neutral = Rules can be important, but only when it suits me
Chaotic = Rules are good, so long as they don't restrict a persons liberties or free will

Good = Doing what is right, not just for yourself, but for others in your community, charitable, giving of yourself for others, life is precious
Neutral = Morality is grey, sometimes I do what is right for others, at other times I do only what is right for myself
Evil = Selfish, greedy, doing what is right to bring prestige/power/etc. to myself, aiding others only when it furthers my goals, life is cheap

That's exactly how I look at alignments in my games. Great break down.

R-

[Arakor]

Lawful = Strict set of rules/code of conduct
Neutral = Rules can be important, but only when it suits me
Chaotic = Rules are good, so long as they don't restrict a persons liberties or free will

Good = Doing what is right, not just for yourself, but for others in your community, charitable, giving of yourself for others, life is precious
Neutral = Morality is grey, sometimes I do what is right for others, at other times I do only what is right for myself
Evil = Selfish, greedy, doing what is right to bring prestige/power/etc. to myself, aiding others only when it furthers my goals, life is cheap

I do like this interpretation but I would argue that Neutral and Chaotic are round the wrong way. I reckon that it should be (emphasis mine):

Lawful = Strict set of rules/code of conduct
Neutral = Rules are good, so long as they don't restrict a persons liberties or free will
Chaotic = Rules can be important, but only when it suits me

[koralas]

Lawful = Strict set of rules/code of conduct
Neutral = Rules are good, so long as they don't restrict a persons liberties or free will
Chaotic = Rules can be important, but only when it suits me

I can understand this perception; however, the "middle path" is one of ambiguity, neither leaning towards one way or the other. Basically along the ethics line, this states, it doesn't matter how I get it done, so long as it fits the outlook I have. So if N/G, I'll follow or break the rules to insure the greater good regardless of the consequences. C/G says that the rules are needed, but they should not impede my or others ability to do what is right; further, they should provide the basis for justice and the freedoms and liberty of the people. A very subtle difference, and perhaps I am not stating quite right, but once grasped the difference is immense.

Nuetral = ambiguous along both lines, nothing is right, nothing is wrong, rules are there but made to be broken. The analogy with Love/Hate/Indifference is, IMO, the key to understanding this. Love and hate (Law/Chaos, Good/Evil) are but different sides of the same coin, not truly opposites as both are a strong emotional response. Indifference is not caring at all. So truly Indifference is the opposite of both Love and Hate, while Love and Hate are merely differences of opinion. This can be taken with almost any "tri-polar" system such as electricity; positive, negative, neutral - positive and negative are a charge, but neutral is the lack thereof.

I think the C&C PHB has the closest writeup of alignments to the way my groups and I have always played them

NEUTRAL GOOD: Characters of this alignment have a healthy respect for
both law and freedom, typically choosing a road betwixt the two in order to
achieve benefits and mercy for all.

CHAOTIC GOOD: Characters of this alignment view the greatest good
as being attainable through freedom and individual liberty. Thus they
place primary importance on individuality and liberty of action over
that of any law or societal structure.

[Lurker]

Lawful = Strict set of rules/code of conduct
Neutral = Rules can be important, but only when it suits me
Chaotic = Rules are good, so long as they don't restrict a persons liberties or free will

Good = Doing what is right, not just for yourself, but for others in your community, charitable, giving of yourself for others, life is precious
Neutral = Morality is grey, sometimes I do what is right for others, at other times I do only what is right for myself
Evil = Selfish, greedy, doing what is right to bring prestige/power/etc. to myself, aiding others only when it furthers my goals, life is cheap

That's exactly how I look at alignments in my games. Great break down.

R-

Rgr on that good break down & I'll copy paste it for my home brew - Thanks

I'm a philosophy professor who specializes in ethics,

Kreider, wish I could have taken a course form you. I ended up having to CLEP my ethics -time and money limit from the military - but always enjoyed helping my teammates who were in ethics classes.

[Traveller]

Koralas' breakdown is quite good too. But to me (and only me) the Neutral breakdowns only work in conjunction with a non-neutral alignment. No intelligent creature can be true neutral since the act of making a decision at all renders the being no longer neutral. Unintelligent creatures function on instinct and don't care how society sees them, thus unintelligent creatures can be neutral.

FYI, evil nymphs do exist in my world, along with good doppelgangers.

[Dead Horse]

Koralas succintly stated my point of law v chaos and good v evil.
They should be two separate measures.

If you quantify good/evil as a scale with neutral being the center.
And do the same with law/chaos

Over the course of play. When a character preforms an action you (as GM) consider as demonstrating tendancy to good/evil/law/chaos.
You inform the player the charcater recieved an alinement point twoard that end good/evil/law/chaos.

Since each Alinement will be expressed as a number you can say
Good is 1,2,3,4 neutral is 5,6 evil is 7,8,9,10 at a glance you can see if a character expressed as good is sliding to evil over time based on the number as it changes in play.

[kreider204]

Kreider, wish I could have taken a course form you. I ended up having to CLEP my ethics -time and money limit from the military - but always enjoyed helping my teammates who were in ethics classes.

That's too bad - the best part of the actual class is the discussions, applying the theories to real life situations and so forth. Good stuff!

One of these days, I might try to develop an alignment system based on the major philosophical theories of ethics, but in the meantime, I think the D&D system works well enough for my gaming purposes.

[Andred of Albans]

Law/Chaos Good/Evil Alignment never really worked for me. It's fine for monsters where we need a handy label - the elf princess is good and the goblins are evil. However, if falls short for player characters.

No sane person seriously thinks of themselves as "evil". Even the greatest villains in history saw themselves as pursuing a higher good. Hitler believed he was saving the human race from genetic and moral disaster, Vlad Tepes (Dracula) saw himself as the protector of Walachia against the Turks (and many Vracks and Romanians still agree - he was canonized by the Orthodox Church!), Stalin saw himself as building a new utopia for the working class, Mao saw himself as the father of a new cultural paradigm... Of course, the millions they murdered might disagree!

Chivalry and Sorcery had a stat called Piety (Alignment in 1st edition C&S) that was a numerical score. 20 was saintly while 0 was diabolic. The figure represented a character's faith in and relationship to the godhead. The higher one's piety, the more one had to act in accordance with one's professed religious beliefs. Obviously, the presumption here is a cosmology consistent with Jewish and/or Christian beliefs.

Another excellent approach to "alignment" is the moral passions system used in Pendragon. A series of paired virtues (e.g. Chaste/Lustful, Honest/Deceitful, Brave/Cowardly, etc.) exist for each character. Each passion has a value of 1-19 and the total of each pair must equal 20. Each religion has favored passions, a character who has 16+ in all the favored passions gets some benefit from G-d (faster healing for Christians, extra hit points for Pagans, extra armor points for Jews, etc.)

In a C&C (or D&D) game, Piety would replace Wisdom to determine bonus spells for priests. Wisdom would still be used to determine magical save bonuses. Here piety or alignment represents the degree of faith a character has in his/her professed religion. High piety scores may be required to be a Paladin while minimal piety (9?) would be required to be a cleric.

If you opt for a Pendragon style religious system, the average of the favored passions would be used to determine bonus spells rather than wisdom. Only a character with 16+ in all the passions favored by his religion could be a Paladin while a 11+ in each would be required for the priesthood (lip-service at least!)

Personally, I love the elegance of the Pendragon system and the real guidance it gives to role-play (a player who wants his character to act against his passions has to roll a d20 check against the value of the passion - if it is lower than the passion number, the player must abide by the passion. E.g. an honest character will tell the truth or lie so poorly the truth will be known even if the player wishes to lie - if he rolls higher than the passion, he can lie but his honesty passion drops one and his deceitful passion increases by one).

If you like easier book keeping the C&S system is pretty neat too. Creates a direct correlation between depth of faith and divine favor (clerical spells).

[ArgoForg]

I've never seen the problem with the basic nine alignment system, and I think it covers the vast majority of the personality and moral scales well. Then, too, I've always treated them as general moral guidelines, as well as with a degree of absolutism-- in that when the characters start gaining notoriety, the majority of the people of the world that know of them base some of their opinions on the PC's alignment. A Chaotic Evil character can do acts of good; a Lawful Good paladin can be so filled with the righteousness of his cause that he commits an unspeakable act. But by and large, those acts do not define the character-- the CE character will usually do far worse things that offset those good acts, and the LG paladin (if he wishes to remain such) will ask absolution and do penance to make up for any such unspeakable acts he's done.

But to be fair, I have never seen alignment as though it was meant to be a straightjacket. It was meant (rightly or wrongly for me to think so) to provide an easy way to suggest how a PC, NPC or creature would react to a fair amount of its normal situations. There are a couple people in my group who harp on running an alignment-less game, and my response has always been, "Why? At what point has your alignment been a stricture to how you ran the character?"

If you don't like alignment simply because the idea of 'good' and 'evil' in the spell descriptions is too black and white for your tastes, then another descriptor can be easily substituted. "Undead", "Humanoids", "Outsiders", "Clerics of Thoth", "Men With Blue Breastplates". But IMHO all you're doing is winnowing the spell down from something genuinely useful to the players to something far more situational.

Another excellent approach to "alignment" is the moral passions system used in Pendragon. A series of paired virtues (e.g. Chaste/Lustful, Honest/Deceitful, Brave/Cowardly, etc.) exist for each character. Each passion has a value of 1-19 and the total of each pair must equal 20. Each religion has favored passions, a character who has 16+ in all the favored passions gets some benefit from G-d (faster healing for Christians, extra hit points for Pagans, extra armor points for Jews, etc.)

I will say that I did-- and do-- love Pendragons passions system. I doubt seriously I would use it in place of the standard alignment system, as it's a little more bookkeeping, but I could easily see adapting it to a game, especially when it comes to priests and their gods' domains.

[Just Jeff]

Personally, I love the elegance of the Pendragon system and the real guidance it gives to role-play (a player who wants his character to act against his passions has to roll a d20 check against the value of the passion - if it is lower than the passion number, the player must abide by the passion.

I'm fine with the alignment system because it's a big gloppy generalization that is handy for spells and the like, but that's about it. I loathe mechanics that interfere with personality or the decision-making I want to come through roleplaying.

[clavis123]

Personally, I love the elegance of the Pendragon system and the real guidance it gives to role-play (a player who wants his character to act against his passions has to roll a d20 check against the value of the passion - if it is lower than the passion number, the player must abide by the passion.

I'm fine with the alignment system because it's a big gloppy generalization that is handy for spells and the like, but that's about it. I loathe mechanics that interfere with personality or the decision-making I want to come through roleplaying.

Which is why I prefer the idea of Alignment as cosmic orientation, rather than a description of personality. As I present them, certain of the Demons and Devils (particularly the Luminous Devils) can be very enjoyable company. They will, of course, always eventually cause suffering and torment in the world. Nonetheless, they can personally be be charming, elegant, honorable, and polite. Likewise, the powers of Good can be rude and seemingly heartless, but they always wind up doing the right thing in the end.

An Evil PC can be quite sociable, and potentially better company than a Good character. The difference is that the Evil PC will tend to be selfish when it counts, and the Good one will tend to do what is best for everyone. Except in extreme situations, however, you might never know the difference.

[maximus]

Was not sure where to go with this one, but alignments looked best. I have a mostly good (LG, NG,) party with a neutral rogue. They were in the midst of exploring the Evil Shrine area in the Caves of Chaos when they encountered the 4 under priests. The priests tried to sucker the party in, claimng to be there under duress, but failed. The party's ranger thought it a good idea to try subduing the lead guy. After suceeding in an attempt (at -8!) to knock him out, he also managed to knock out 2 more and the fourth was killed. They wanted to keep one for questioning but couldn't figure out what to do with the others. He got the bright idea to put the Helm of Opposite Alignment on the priest, which they had identified earlier, but they were still stuck with how to deal with the other 2 subdued guys. The NG cleric and LG cleric both felt it was an evil act to kill them but there was no realistic way to transport them back to the Keep without exposing the party to attack. The rogue finally solved it by slitting their throughts. Evil act? I'm interested to see how other CKs have handled similar situations.

[Captain_K]

When it comes to PC actions, its hard to nail all things down AND all alignment actions need to be tempered with the situation. If killing for money is evil (aka the assassin) then Paladin's must never seek rewards for slaying an evil monster.. wait,,, that will never work, that's not evil, that's good killing evil... evil kills evil, good kills evil, neutral does not care... can good kill good, like the Vikings vs the Irish, or the French vs the English... seems to me to be very situational or from the point of view of the one with the sword pointed at them.

I would think strict alignment requirements only apply to the cosmic or magic strictures of the game not life.. write down your alignment on your sheet that's basically how you intend to play then when spells and magic items come along that's your alignment.. but other than that how you act on average must be more or less along those lines or you and your CK should discuss a shift in alignment... which most of the time should have little impact (unless you magic sword or your Paladin's patron has something to say about your alignment drift).

[Arduin]

... They were in the midst of exploring the Evil Shrine area in the Caves of Chaos when they encountered the 4 under priests. ... The NG cleric and LG cleric both felt it was an evil act to kill them but there was no realistic way to transport them back to the Keep without exposing the party to attack. The rogue finally solved it by slitting their throughts. Evil act? I'm interested to see how other CKs have handled similar situations.

Those priests, by the fact of who they were, are admitted evil killers. Perfectly okay to execute such. It's called the Death Penalty. LG & NG people are in no trouble for upholding and executing those types of laws.