>Wait, wait, what? Are you talking about 1st choice of action?
>I think that as a good, you DO have to regard somebody as
>evil, or at least exhaust (all?) other avenues of dealing with
>your target first.

I'm assuming the goodie rager would exhaust other avenues first, because as a good-aligned guy he doesn't want to take innocent life without need. However, given what he (reasonably) believes to be true re: magic, there is "need".

>But... where's the proof? If the mage isn't DOING evil, no
>matter what our goodie villager BELIEVES and KNOWS to be true,
>by killing a mage who is doing no evil, but in fact is doing
>good, he's ignoring what all his experience and senses are
>telling him.

The mage doesn't have to be doing evil. He can ignorantly (yet innocently) be doing something that's dangerous and destructive.

To borrow from the Joe Maran analogy, let's say you're Bob Maran and you know Joe's been deceived, and that he's about to start hacking the heads off a gaggle of elves. Do you take Joe Out in order to save the elves? Sure you do, despite his gold-aura.

>That it is driven by altruism is irrelevant, since if there's no evidence
>of damage, who exactly are you saving?

The question is whether there's evidence of damage. If I worship a Battle deity and he tells me magic is destroying Thera, I'm going to take that as the "word of God" and accept it as truth. I guess it's still up for debate whether that's sufficient "evidence".