Perhaps try a Nightmare - they're often depicted as flying black horses with flaming hooves and breath. The wings are probably optional, but it's probably close to the feel you're looking for.

I had considered this. I am actually going to be worshipping the God of Fire and Wrath so it would kinda work. I even jokingly suggested it to my GM. I'm not sure she'll go for it. The other issue with this idea is that on the outside he's meant to seem like a pretty normal guy. He's joining a "good" party of adventurers so I don't want something that is going to stand up and say "I'm Evil!"

But thanks for the suggestion. I've always liked the idea of a Nightmare for a mount after I read something about them in a FR novel.

Whenever I think of a black knight, I picture a massive mount, plated with terrifying black armor. An evil pegasus would be cool, and I think the easiest way (and also one that keeps the game balanced) is to simply take pegasus stats and convert them to their evil counterpart (specifically by alignment. i.e. a LE would tend to have high int but low str, while a CE would have a high str but low int). Because I don't have my MM right in front of me, I can only give examples. So, for example (lol), change a cure ability to an inflict, a consecrate ability to a desecrate ability, and aura of courage to an aura of fear, and so on.

Good luck, and send me the character sheet, b/c I need a good evil paladin for my campaign as well :D

Le Phranc

That sounds quite good, I'll take a look at the stats when I get home tonight, then discuss it with my GM, see what she thinks.

This paladin should be quite interesting (I hope). I've got the entire background sorted out, and I know why he'll be adventuring with a "good" party and such like that. It's going to be a hard character to play personality wise, so I'm going to try to stick with a pretty bog-standard paladin stats/skills wise - I normally go for really complicated characters and lose the personality amongst working out which feats and powers and spells to use next.

I'll certainly post the character sheet and background and stuff somewhere when I've finished it. I'm trying to design a website of all my characters (in the current campaign at least) and when I get round to it, he'll be up there too. That said, it could be months/years before this character even gets made.. depending on the life expectancy of my current character. He's already died twice.. the third time will be for good.. but knowing me, now that I have this really cool idea in my head, he won't die ever (not that I actually want him to die of course.. I just wanna play my new character NOW).

I don't know if you thought of it or not but the Nightmare is a fantastic choice for an evil paladins mount. They are horse like and can fly and have other abilities. Depending on the setting and such anything like a fiendish dire wolf would be cool or you could go bananas and choose say a purple worm for fun.

As i'm new at this whole thing, i was wondering if you caould explain to me, how you could be a paladin and evil, as the Paladin's personality type is to be good. Am i wrong?
are there exceptions if so what are they?

According to the PHB, paladins can only be Lawful Good. The DMG does however have the rules for a Blackguard, which is either an ex- or anti-paladin. However these aren't the rules I'll be using. I'll be using a slightly adjusted version of the paladin (instead of turning undead he'll be able to command undead, healing spells will cause damage instead, although lay on hands may be still lay on hands.. I'm not sure how our GM will do it).

The first thing to note is that rules are meant to be broken. We have never really payed much attention to what alignments (and with 2E what races) were allowed to become certain classes. If you can explain it logically, then there is no reason you can't bend the rules.

So how do I explain the existance of an evil paladin? Well, the way I see it, a paladin is a soldier of their god. A zealot almost. (S)he's incredibly dedicated, and as a result is given certain powers. (S)he follows a code of conduct - generally a lawful good one. The code of conduct definitely suggests a paladin should be lawful, and I would never consider running one that isn't. But why shouldn't an "evil" or a "neutral" god have such dedicated worshippers. Who are religious zealots, who fight for their god, who follow a code of conduct. This "code" doesn't have to be "good". The code could say "Thou shalt torture until death all worshippers of insert name of enemy god here".

I don't see any reason why evil paladins can't exist. An example of an evil paladin (well a knighthood actually, but what is a paladin other than a souped up knight?) would be the Knights of Takhisis in Dragonlance. They are incredibly loyal to their godess and believe in honour. And yet they're also incredibly evil.

I was always told that when a paladin turned evil he lost his paladin "powers".

A "good" paladin, if he became evil, would loose his powers. He'd cease to become a paladin. But that's assuming that he gained his powers from a "good" God. If he gained his powers from an "evil" God, thus being an evil paladin, he would loose his powers if he then started being "good".

Try to think outside the set rules. Try to think of a paladin as following a code (whether it is good or evil). If he breaks that code, he ceases to be a paladin, and looses his god-given powers. The rules say that this involves a "good" paladin becoming evil (or not necessarily becoming evil, he could become neutral for example and still loose his powers). But it could also be the other way round, an "evil" paladin becoming "good".

waitaminute....

*takes out player handbook*

"Alignment: Paladins must be lawful good, and they lose their divine powers if they deviate from that alignment. Additionally, paladins swear to follow a code of conduct that is in line with lawfulness and goodness."

Unless you are going around the rules of the book (it's not a big deal, but it would explain what you're saying here), your paladin HAS to be good. Because the way I'm reading this, you're making a Cleric, not a Paladin.

If you read the first comment you responded to.. that's *exactly* what I'm doing. I see know reason that evil paladins can't exist, as already explained. They just follow a slightly different code. Both times I've explained that I'm bending the rules because I don't believe they make sense. It's not fair that a good god can have paladins and an evil one cannot. They're just lawful evil, not lawful good.

gah, no need to get pissed off about it.

I'm not pissed off at all. Sorry if you took it that way.

I was just trying to explain how evil paladins can exist. Hopefully it's clear now. Although if there are any reasons why they shouldn't exist, I'd be interested to hear them.

One of the key things you'll find when I post here, is that I fully believe in breaking the rules, assuming there is logic behind it that is. :)

In the end I just think an evil Paladin is basically a cleric (since clerics can have all alignments). I'm not exactly sure why you just don't make things easier by making a cleric, and bending the rules magic-wise if the restraints on magic is what is bothering you about it. (although I'm wondering if Paladins have to "wear" their god's symbol; which would be a giveaway with a cleric since you intend to make him seem good.)

Not exactly. A cleric has more spells, isn't as hard a fighter, can't smite evil/good, can't lay on hands, can't have a mount. He's more a knight than a cleric. But a knight of a religion. If an evil paladin is a cleric, then surely a good paladin is a cleric too. The only difference between an evil paladin and a good paladin is that instead of smiting evil, or laying on hands, they will smite good and lay on wounds, and the such. It's nothing about restraints on magic. It's about the style of the character. And the character is a knight. Anyway, the DMG has the "blackguard" which is an basically an evil paladin. Is the blackguard a cleric?

As for the whole holy symbol thing, not at all. On our world, gods are neither "evil" or "good". The whole evil and good thing is not as clear cut in our world as in other worlds. A God may tend towards evil or good, due to their realms, but what might classically be an evil god may have good followers or vice versa. Even with the gods in the rulebooks, you don't have to be exactly their alignment. You can be one out one way or another. So if his God were neutral, he could still be either evil or good. The background behind this whole character is too complicated to explain, since it would involve five years of roleplaying, and a whole rich history of the world. But basically, being an evil paladin is the only way to make the character plan work as planned. The whole concept of the character needs an evil paladin.

Ah, there we go: your world has its own rules. I completely forgot about that possibility (granted I have only one (bad) dnd campaign in my history...so yeah...)

I also have the best GM in the world *grin*.

Yeah, our world is at once very similar to FR or Greyhawk, and yet at the same very difference. I mean, we've encounted Eldar from Warhammer 40k for a start. It's a very interesting setting that has been evolving for the past five years, and has at least a few years of planned plot ahead of us. It's very cool, even if I do keep having to retire characters, or finding they die on me. I must have the highest character turn over in history. ;)

Yeah, in my case, not only was our DM always hitting on my characters (literally ;o)), the whole thing was a big power trip where the goal was to have this super-strong evil wizard to show he could have one and kick our ass with it. He didn't take into account that 3 of us were playing our first campaign, thus knew almost nothing to the magic of a wizard, and the 2 others hate magic, so knew nothign either. He defended himself by saying it was all legit, but it,s pretty much killed our desire to play anymore!

Three words: Dire Winged Monkey.

In all seriousness, the black pegasi is nifty; a young black dragon would be cool too, but I can't remember the levels and such that you're creating this for, so. ..Black dragon would be rather easily noticed as an evil creature too.

It's gonna be somewhere between level 12 and level 15. Yes, a black dragon would be a little too obvious.. especially since we have a few bronze dragons that are friends of the party. Plus, cause he worships the God of Fire [and Wrath] a red would be better.. and waaaay too obvious.

What I need is a black pegasi that can *also* breath fire.

the hornsaw unicorn from the sword & sorcery creature collection