Hey everyone, I'm curious about the ethics of trapping a soul. Trying to determine whether or not my RP character will use them. Could use some perspective, either personally or in character, whatever appeals most.

As a definition the oblivion wiki states "Soul Trap locks the soul of a given creature or NPC in an empty soul gem immediately after its death". This soul is then used to enchant a weapon, or, recharge an already enchanted weapon.

My question now is; Is this considered evil, humane, ethical? Your essentially capturing a soul and using it to fuel your own powers. Are you therefore robbing this being of an afterlife, refusing them peace in death? Some points to note include: The extensive use of soul gems by the mage guild, use of black soul gems by necromancers, the fact that animals too are sentient beings (able to perceive pain and feelings).

Please take part in the poll and feel free to quote some lore, I myself can't find any on the issue.

This idea is actually a lot more complicated then I first thought, so feel free to go as deep as you'd like.

I think its pretty evil to trap a soul who wants to go to an afterlife in your weapon and exhausting it in combat

Your controlling your character, do what you want to do to have fun.

I don't care about the ethics. Soul trapping is just for me a way to enchant my weapons/armors. I don't care about the soul of a person, only the power is important for me.

Ethics go out of the window due to the simple fact that... It's a game.

Its okay. I can never remember to cast soul trap anyway.
It doen't matter they're just raandom bits of code.
Give'em some skooma and quickly bump em on the head they won't feel a thing.

Same idea as consuming the heart of a creature to absorb it's power/souls into you. This could easily be done out of a high spiritual respect for what you kill, or out of malice and disrespect.... Intent truly is the separator here.

It's about Role Playing your character.

A character who is purely good might not want to soul trap humanoids based out of morals.

Dragon souls won't be the only souls I'll be using, trapping, manipulating for my own use.

It's good to see an interesting poll once in a while, that is not "what iz yer favorite race / class / what should I take / will you use magic or weaponzzz" etc.

I think we don't know enough of the soul trapping mechanism actually, or even how a "soul" works. Is it only some kind of lifeforce ? Or does that mean the subject is still feeling, and living, and thinking ?

I made my answer based on pure hypothesis, that the soul is still feeling and thinking.

- Based on this, I don't trap humans, even evil ones, because then when they are dead and they caused so much pain and trouble, they should just be gone, not staying in this world inside a weapon or such, which gives them a second chance to wreak havoc. They should just be put at peace "you have done enough already, be gone forever now.".

- Animals, they are only reacting to instinct so I wouldn't trap them either. Even though one might think since they are just animals, they won't really realize their situation anyway, that doesn't absolve you from taking the decision to enslave a soul of an innocent living being, for your own personal gain.

- Spirits/undead : Same thing, they are basically souls already trapped inside a dead thing. Even if the soul is evil then the best thing to do is send them out from this world instead of keeping it in, even in a weapon. That being said, if they are going to be brought back in a lich anyway, I guess they could be trapped in a stone. Once again, it's hard without knowing undead mechanics

- Summoned : A summoned creature, the way I see it, is a creature borrowed/called from another plane of existence, and mind-enslaved for a moment (for most of them, some can't be enslaved). It's already bad enough to uproot a creature from its natural home and throw it into a fight for your own sake because you're too weak to do anything by yourself, if you're going to even trap its soul then it's way too much.

BUT of course, when playing the game, I'll consider that souls are only a lifeforce that is not thinking or feeling, so I will make soulstones out of anything :mohawk: Might roleplay a char that is against soul trapping though... could be interesting. And good old steel/silver plus skill moves means you don't have to rely on borrowed power. That would fit a 'good' char.
The above was only if it was like in real life, and with consideration that a soul exists and feels and such. Being agnostic, this is only pure crap for me IRL :rolleyes: Only needed to give some hope and prevent people with miserable life to get too depressed or rebel against power. But that's another topic

I don't see it as trapping someone's consciousness. That is too tenuous to get a hold of. What I do see it as is grabbing the life force of someone or some animal and putting that in a container.

If your OK with killing the thing or person, then why should harvesting the life force, which would dissipate anyway, be any different? It's not like the body can use it anymore.

So? You don't truly know what happens to that life force when you exhaust it in combat for enchanting. That life force, or spirit may be unique and more humane/holy beyond your wildest dreams, and through it's forced enslavement and use you destroy it/ render it corrupted.

I'd say no to soul trap altogether.

Interesting topic.

For a good character, I doubt I'd do any soul trapping myself. Maybe only for very rare cases, powerful, dangerous, and hostile Daedra perhaps. You get a nice enchantment and that Daedra won't be reborn in Oblivion so it could assault any more mortals. Not summoned Daedra though, only hostile, unleashed Daedra. Soul trapping a Daedra you summoned is too duplicious for a good character and soul trapping a Daedra being forced to fight you wouldn't be right. You might use already filled gems too unless there were some way to release the soul, it'd probably be torturous to be trapped in a dusty gem forever in some shopkeepers inventory.

For a profiteer neutral to an evil character, soul trap anything and everything. My Dunmer Nightblade is gonna be soul trapping all sorts of things.

This made me consider whether it's ethical to be absorbing dragon souls as Dovakhiin. I don't think you get a choice after killing the beast anyways, but I guess it depends on the motivations of the dragons and all the theoretical intricacies of absorbing/storing a soul.

I hope they bring back named soul gems. I want to trap peoples souls(like my enemies)and keep them on display in my home or something.

I tend to think of "soul trap" as a misnomer; rather than trapping souls, you're trapping energy, which I have no problem with. But I voted based on the idea that spell is named literally, so in that case the only option I don't think is totally evil is soul trapping undead.

Great pool Highlander. First one that I wil gladly participate in.

I'm generaly agains trapping good/neutral humans and animals but daedras and undead are fine with me.

About trapping humans :
When playing my good hearthed Khajiit rogue, I will infiltrate Dark Brotherhood and gain access to it's leaders, kill them all, trap their souls and find the deepest place in the Sea of Ghosts and then leave their soulgems there for all eternity . Harsh punishment that is but well deserved.

I consider all the soul trapping business to be wrong...
It wont stop me however, my character will just be a monster.

To an average citizen of Tamriel its ok to soultrap anything not protected by Arkay's Blessing (which protects the souls of Men, Beastmen and Elves) and is why you need black soulgems to soultrap NPCs. Link to http://www.imperial-library.info/content/morrowind-arkay-enemy.

Soul trapping in Morrowind was the only way to rake in huge money I'm all for it.

No's all around. If it were actually me making these decisions I would never do that. As a libertarian I feel much respect for sentient beings. To trap their soul is a grotesque infringement upon their natural rights as intelligent beings. I feel that though animals' minds may not be as intellectually advanced as sentient ones, they still have minds, and respect is necessary for them as well. If encountered, spiritual and conjured beings would have the same principals applied...

Now, with that being said, I do this all the time as a mage. I tend to RP a lot in-game. Soul trapping has always provided an entertaining experience to explore a more sinister dive into magic. Video games such as this allow me to get a taste of the opposite side of ethics that I would never do IRL.

Well, at least i dont see them go "AAARRRRGGHGGH INTO THE STONE I GOOOOO" after they die

Its just some funny sound, and oh i can enchant stuff now

Since I really don't know if what exactly is I'm trapping, it's hard to say. Also, soul gems are used differently in different games. In Morrowind, when you use a soul gem to enchant you permanently attach it to an object, it recharges over time if depleted. Where in Oblivion, you can use soul gems to recharge depleted items. :confused:

Regardless, if the "soul" you trap is an aware and conscious being then I wouldn't do it personally. Otherwise, meh. :whistling:

If I was playing a good character, then no I wouldn't soul trap.

If I am playing a neutral character then I would only soul trap those who attack me first or if I desperately need it. (I'm sure their eternal souls would understand if I needed an enchantment to face Alduin)

If I am playing an evil character then to hell with it, all these people and animals are here for my purpose and my purpose only.

But if I'm just playing the game and not RP I will soul trap whenever I need to.

Really interesting is how speciest Arkay is.
He forbids the trapping of the soul of any of the sentient (playable) races and only Mannimarco eclipsing him during the Shade of the Revenant allows people to do so.

But what about creatures like goblins?
They have a culture, a language. They breed livestock, have a religion, have an economy.
Yet you can trap them in a normal soul gem.

Arkay apparently doesnt care about those kind of humanoids.

In Morrowind the spirits of the ancestors were often utilised to protect the family tomb, or even the family manor.
During the time of the return of the Nerevarine most Dunmer who died their remains were interred into the ghostfence itself to maintain it and the practice of using household spirits waned.

As far as morality goes, the use of enchanting is widespread in Tamriel.
Anyone used to be able to go to the mages guild and in exchange for gold have an enchantment made.
Potema famously was alleged to do this in 'the wolf queen', to create an enchanted item that caused the madness of Pelagius.
In-game at least there seems to be no moral law against the use of normal soul gems at all.

What technically happens to a trapped soul is unknown.
In Daggerfall an enchanted item had a limited lifespan. After it was used up, it would be destroyed, presumably releasing the soul to the Dreamsleave.
Daedra souls recoalesed immediately and a Daedra would spawn before you when such an item broke.
Because of this I think the soul is not destroyed or used up, but that some energy is extracted from it to fuel the magical enchantment.
Possibly a soul gem works like a dynamo, with the soul itself being the motive force.

exactly what i have done since Morrowind, especially high profile or unique creatures and people.