Hello! First off, I don't know if this belongs into the general discussion or Story/Lore, so, apologies in advance.

So, let me explain: My character has always been a very optimistic, honorable person, who thanks to her upbringing (she kinda got teached by honorable people) always viewed duels, fighting and adventuring in a rather ... 'romantic' sense, so to speak. So far our campaign has always been very light-hearted.

However since a few sessions we're exploring an orc hideout, and these orcs took human prisoners. The party and my character had to witness the whole scale of monstrosity - orcs killing and torturing villagers for fun, forcing them to fight each other to death and other things which I don't even want to mention here. (I kinda blame the DM for this - as I said, our campaign never was this dark, and I never expected such a change in tone.)

But my character can't cope with that. She never had seen such atrocities, and I think it shattered her. Honestly, so far I see only three possible development paths (I admit, I'm probably narrow-minded here):

- Either she goes down a dark Anakin/Arthas path and will just start to murder any perceived evildoer and probably never show mercy to any 'villains' again - "They're just going to resume their evil deeds anyway, so just let end them." (That being said - my character so far had reservations in regards of killing and only did so if she really had no choice.)

- Frustrated with all this she starts to blame herself and takes increasingly high risks to punish herself for her failure to protect these villagers. Of course these abductions happened before the party even was in the area, but she still feels incredibly guilty.

- The other option would end her career as adventurer; feeling frustrated and helpless she'd probably retire and somehow go back to a normal life, far away from all kinds of cruelties.

Of course the other group members don't want her to leave, after all they're adventuring together now for 1,5 years. Don't get me wrong, I like my character and I like the group, and the DM told me that it's fine for me to create another character if I really don't see another choice. I just don't think my character could shrug these horrors she has seen off ...

Any ideas how she could cope without becoming unplayable? Or am I just overreacting here?

Thanks in advance,
Miri

D&D always more than 3 choices. 

What you really have to ask is do YOU want to keep playing. And if so, do you like this character? You don't have to think too much about what your character thinks or feels or how they would be scarred by real or emotional wounds. If you want to play, play. 

What are the value of principles that when opposed, collapse?

Surely, this character can point to such things and say "this is why everything I believe is so important" using this moment to strengthen their ideals. Barbarism is not a counter argument to civilisation, only its antithesis. Surely evil needs to be defeated so fragile good has a chance to flourish.

You always have a choice on where your character goes.  Just as in real life, sometimes people who see the horrible of the world still can continue to see life as a place of opportunity and beauty. I think it is actually those people who are the strongest who are able to see the bad and move on through that and seek to be the light for everyone else.

You have a choice. Be the sadness or be the light.  Whichever wolf you feed will grow stronger.

Quote from Lyxen >>

The first thing to do would be to discuss with the DM about the overall tone of the campaign and what is intended for the future. It's not a question of blaming anyone, but ust understanding. Maybe some other players also wanted the campaign to take a darker turn, who knows.

But the this would allow you, as a player to determine whether you still want to play in the campaign or not, because I understand that it's not only the character who has been shocked.

After you make this choice, then if you decide to continue playing, you can then decide with which character you would enjoy it best, whether it would be the original character with or without some of the changes above, of whether it would be better to retire her and choose another, tougher character.

But the most important thing is that you should not feel constrained by the character, it does not exist, it's just a figment of your imagination and you can steer it whatever way you like. You certainly have all the reins here including the imagination to find the right path for your character, that "right path" being the one that you will enjoy playing.

I really, really, really like the totality of this post.  All of it.  

So from a RP standpoint, remember that while you are trying to roleplay your character you are in charge of its destiny.  If you don’t want to play it a certain way, you don’t have to.  Alignment in 5th doesn’t exist as a hard construct like it did in other editions and at the end, people evolve and change.  Just like you are mentioning in your post, your character has gone through a very serious event and you are contemplating how it will affect them.  It shows you care about the campaign and the story, and I’d love to have you at my table.

Your character has gone through trials and tribulations, and while maybe they weren’t personally aware of the gravity of what it could be it’s not like they’ve never heard of those things happening before.  Your character doesn’t have to do any of those three specifically, they can do shades of all three or none at all.  I think retirement is short sighted.  You said it yourself, your character was just flat out unable to prevent that.  You witnessed it happening but pure unfiltered evil can happen in a fantasy setting and it’s important to reconcile that.

If you’ve been playing for 1.5 years too, your character has a bond with this party.  You’ve accomplished terrific things together.  You aren’t just friends, they’re basically family.  Families help each other through tough times, and there will be arguments.  There will be dark days.  There will be times where you feel helpless and out of control and just like you are going through the motions.  Even level 20 characters, leaders of kingdoms etc have days where they feel its hopeless.  It’s how they act and react.

It's your job as a player to make sure that you character finds a reason to stay with the group, such that you as a player can play with your friends. "It's what my character would do" is never a valid argument if it prevents your character from staying in the group and thus prevents you as a player from playing with your friends.

Hello again and thanks about all the answers & suggestions! Meanwhile I had a talk with the DM and the other players, and we're going to work something out - probably my character will take some break from adventuring for a bit, while I'm going to play another one as substitute for a bit (I just hope that I don't start to bond too much with he substitute, now that would be annoyind, but knowing myself I likely will, hehe).

Also during the talk the DM severely apologized several times for 'going overboard' - to be fair, it *was* very atmospheric, but the radical mood drop probably was what surprised me and the other players the most. The other members of the group certainly did not expect it to turn this dark too, but they mostly proclaimed that their characters will not beat themselves up over it too much.

Again, thank you all for your replies, it definitely improved my (likely) rather narrowed view on the issue.
- Miri