Nurture verses Nature, The term that tore a party in two.

To our surprise we find Black Dragon eggs! Within a minute of seeing them an argument comes to about what to do with them.


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It started with a group of us running the campaign Hoard of the Dragon Queen at a real life table. The group was a interesting one. I was friends with three  of them while the others were friends of friends kinda thing. In the game we had been tasked with finding the valuables that were stolen from Greenest the starting town.

As such in our party we had; Paladin and druid (both my real life best friends), a human fighter (Best Friend’s friend), monk (DM’s friend), a character unknown class (a friend of myself and my best friends) and my Tiefling warlock . As such during our quest we had many difficult ‘accidents’ happen because of characters but this is about the moment everything came to abrupt halt and showed my character how parties seemily worked.

We came to find the valuables and we had figured out they were probably in the cave guarded by a few DragonGuards. Working our way around and through the cave we come to the final room. To our surprise we find Black Dragon eggs! Within a minute of seeing them an argument comes to about what to do with them. 

Without hestiation the Paladin states “Destroy them!” and readies his weapon. In short amount of time the Warlock was between the Paladin and the eggs. And the argument started. We had just started the session when we had entered the cave, it took the full 4 hours for us to come to an answer.

A huge discussion came to the table about the Nature vs Nurture aspect of creatures to which also is brought up about the Warlock being a tiefling as he descends from evil beings yet is here trying to be good why can not a dragon do the same?

 After a few hours we took a break of the discussion and to cool down. My warlock was not going to just let them destroy the eggs because their blood makes them evil. The paladin would not back down either as he was a follower of Bahamut so he was focused on what his deity would want. Towards the end of the argument, the paladin threaten to kill the warlock (Me) along with the eggs if I did not move out of the way. I continued to stand my ground and would not be threated as such my hands lite into magic to start the fight.

When it was at the apex of tension the druid stood by the warlock as well as the unknown class character, while the Monk, fighter and Paladin stood on the other side. The stand off felt like it took forever the tension was high and the party was split.

The dm having seen all of this and been having a part of the argument finally stepped in with a solution which was simple. The party would vote on it after making the case from each.

My character started with the normal Nurture speech of how the black dragons could be lead in a different direction just as I have forgone my blood.

The paldin went of course to the blood and the fact they were chromatic dragons. nature would overcome any nurture.

After a while the druid sided with the others in destroying the eggs for nature was more important. At which point the unknown class player also sided with them, stated that “I will get dragon parts so that will be a boon over this tragedy” Which took my character by shock, having the rest party against my character (and me). my character had to make a decision. Either my character fights them to protect the eggs, give up on my main mission to find my character’s childhood friend or  continue on main mission.  With a lot of swearing and a few tears my character stood aside. Not wanting to watch or hear it happen, the only words that came from the paladin as he walked by was “It has to be done, I am sorry”.

Out of character I was livid, my voice was cracking and I coved my face. I felt like this was a betrayal to my character and to my own beliefs in Nurture can overcome nature.

From that point on, I told myself to never trust the party fully as this was a defining moment for the setup to my warlock’s trust issues with the party choices and their actions. Which lead to him keeping his own actions quiet and letting the party lead onward. Eventually things would change but this would define my character for the rest of the campaign.


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