D&D General Should Adventurers Behave More Like Bounty Hunters? What Would Be the Implications?

[Hexmage-EN]

First, let me do some quoting from the Wikipedia article on bounty hunters:

"A bounty hunter is a professional person who captures fugitives or criminals for a commission or bounty. Bounty hunters enjoy significant legal privileges, such as forcibly entering a defendant's home without probable cause or a search warrant; however, bounty hunters are legally exposed to liabilities that normally exempt agents of the state."

Let's say a young green dragon has been getting his sycophantic kobold followers, enslaved lizardfolk and ogre minions, and a mysterious nothic ally to raid settlements and caravans for treasure and people to eat. An adventuring party was tasked to take care of the threat by representatives of the nearby city, assuming that this band of vigilantes would slay all these monsters and bring back the dragon's severed head as proof.

Weeks later, the Lawful Good party returns to the city with a caravan of bound monsters they suspect are the culprits. Said suspects had attacked the party on sight, despite the party requesting that the suspects peacefully turn themselves in for questioning. Now the city has to figure out how to securely detain and feed a large, poison breathing dragon, two ogres, a nothic with dangerous gaze abilities, and dozens of other suspects. Evidence has to be collected, witnesses found, defense attorneys have to be assigned to the dragon and other creatures, trials have to be held, etc.

Going by the laws of the Clovis Concord detailed in Explorer's Guide to Wildemount (laws which do not include capital punishment even for murder, in contrast to its neighboring nations), let's say the young green dragon stands accused of:

• theft in the amount of 85,000 gp
• 15 counts of slave ownership
• failure to pay taxes
• 10 counts of damage to private property
• 5 counts of assault with intent to kill
• 22 counts of murder

If judged guilty on all counts, the young green dragon faces:

• 200,170 gp in fines
• repossession of wealth equal to unpaid taxes to the Clovis Concord
• 222 years, 195 days imprisonment

Even assuming that this young green dragon is six years old, the beginning point of its age category, by the time its sentence is over it will be 228 years old and in the adult category. At this point the now adult green dragon will possess lair actions while in his prison lair (summoning grasping roots, thorny bushes, fog that inflicts a short term charm affect). In addition, the region within a mile around the prison lair will spawn thicket mazes, and the adult green dragon will be able to see and hear through the eyes and ears of rodents and birds.

So if the Clovis Concord is really serious about applying the law equally to a captured dragon, they'll need to construct a special prison in anticipation of the abilities their prisoner will eventually develop. Then they'll need to pay to keep the dragon fed for over two centuries. Even if the dragon doesn't escape on its own and isn't broken out by dragon-worshiping cultists or whatever during that entire time, what happens when the now adult green dragon's sentence is up and by law is free to go? Is it going to be a reformed Lawful Good adult green dragon, is it going to relish the newfound freedom to exercise the power it has gained as its grown to immediately go on a rampage, is it going to go off somewhere and amass an army to raze the countryside while it searches for its captors' descendants to systematically slaughter them?

Realistically, I imagine that dragon is going to be mysteriously assassinated in its prison before it reaches the adult age category.

Frankly, considering how much money and space keeping a single dragon imprisoned and fed would require (not to mention the martial and magical power needed to stop an escape attempt), I can't imagine it happens often at all, even in a place like the Clovis Concord where there is no such thing as capital punishment. Imprisoning hill giants and other such creatures would have their own challenges. Perhaps the Clovis Concord has an agreement with a legal authority comprised of good Metallic Dragons to extradite draconic criminals to? Similarly, does a legal authority of Storm Giants occassionally show up to take custody of criminal giants?

Regardless, if the laws of the Clovis Concord do not use capital punishment for murder, should Lawful characters refrain from killing in self-defense? Should Good characters in general do so? What do these adventurers do with subdued opponents? Do they let them go, or should a Good adventuring party always prepare for the possibility that once they've defeated a villain that they'll be carting said villain and all their intelligent minions back to the local authorities? Will they need to expend resources buying sufficient means of transportation for the detained creatures, hirelings to help keep an eye on the detained creatures, and enough food and water for the party, their hirelings, and all the detained creatures, no matter how big the latter are and how much nourishment they require?

D&D 5E, by RAW, allows a character who reduces an opponent to 0 HP with a melee attack to declare the attack was non-lethal. This can have an impact on a party looking to subdue rather than kill, as a ranger attacking with a bow or a wizard hurling a fireball is not allowed by RAW to say enemies reduced to 0 HP by these attack methods were nonlethal. A wizard, for example, would need to refrain from using damaging spells unless they knew the damage would not kill the target.

Personally, I'm considering adjustments to the nonlethal damage rule. Rather than just letting a power attacking fighter with a greatsword deal a crit and say "it's okay, I attacked nonlethally", I think it would make more sense for an enemy reduced to 0 HP by such an attack have to make a Constitution save whose DC is 10 or the damage taken, whichever is higher, or die. Alternatively, I could say that downed enemies are considered to be making death saves that they normally always fail, giving the party a limited chance to stabilize creatures reduced to 0 HP by even arrows and fireballs. Just brainstorming here.

I imagine there would be very few adventuring parties who would act this way. At best they'd subdue the villain they were hired to deal with and kill anyone who got in their way.

Anyway, enough out of me for now. Feel free to weigh in on what I've written, alternatives I didn't consider, and whether or not you as a DM or as a player would bother with such things in the first place.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

I think that this sounds like a great idea for an alternative campaign!

That said ....

Personally, I'm considering adjustments to the nonlethal damage rule. Rather than just letting a power attacking fighter with a greatsword deal a crit and say "it's okay, I attacked nonlethally", I think it would make more sense for an enemy reduced to 0 HP by such an attack have to make a Constitution save whose DC is 10 or the damage taken, whichever is higher, or die. Alternatively, I could say that downed enemies are considered to be making death saves that they normally always fail, giving the party a limited chance to stabilize creatures reduced to 0 HP by even arrows and fireballs. Just brainstorming here.

No. Do not water it down so that NPCs/"monsters" can be subdued by fireballs.

Part of the exciting nature of the campaign you seem to be brainstorming up is that you can't just use the normal tropes of D&D.

If I was player in this campaign, I would enjoy coming up with new solutions to the challenges that non-lethal capture presents. Don't water it down.

 

[prabe]

I agree with @Snarf Zagyg that it sounds like a premise for a campaign, or maybe some specific thing inside a more-conventional campaign, and that part of the challenge would be not being able to use "standard tactics." I'm not sure how much it'd be worth it to go into the logistics of keeping large things fed and imprisoned, but that might depend on the table.

 

[Cadence]

I wonder how quickly the laws of the Clovis Concord would add "transportation" (temporary exile or sent to a penal colony) to the list of punishments after they were confronted with a case or two of this?

 

[jgsugden]

D&D is a role playing game. Characters play a role in the story. One of the most important elements of that story is the setting created by the DM. However, the players drive the story which leads the DM to further create story around their actions. To that end, I think the game is more about the journey of exploring issues like this than picking a safe destination and only moving towards it.

A DM might create a situation in which a mountain clan is raiding a nearby village to steal resources. They are starving, and their leader believes the only way to survive is to attack the nearby village and take resources. The village is on the edge of starving and these thefts will result in people dying. The PCs arrive on the scene and take on the task to stop the villagers from starving and being killed in the raids.

This adventure could go a lot of ways. The PCs might go find the clan and exterminate them. They might go find the clan and help them provide alternative resources. They may find the clan and arrest the leader and bring them back for trial by the village's leaders. They might drive the clan off to live elsewhere. Maybe they help the village relocate. That is for the PCs to decide and implement as best they can.

The DM should be having the world react to their decisions, or their questions, and present them with different views. Maybe some in the village are screaming for blood and vengeance. Others are just begging for anything to save them. Others may advocate for non-violent solutions. As the PCs engage and react, the world should respond.

If we cut that off, and give the PCs the mission to hunt down and ethically capture the prisoners, it dictates more of the story to the players. It removes their agency. It turns the entire village into a unified singular voice, and ignores the challenges that exist in a more realistic setting. I encourage giving the players the agency.

 

[Oofta]

Do the laws apply to all creatures with above-animal intelligence? Because as a player, I would look at this and say "this is not workable". You point out a young dragon, but what if it was ancient? What if it was a balor or a beholder? How would you even go about constructing a prison?

But assume you spend the millions of gold it would require to construct such a prison. What purpose does it serve? I mean, sure it sucks for the dragon to spend a couple hundred years in prison, but this is a creature that could live to well over a thousand. Release them in two centuries and there's no reason to think it won't just start back on it's destructive path for another millennia.

There are simply some threats that can't be contained. Either you negotiate so they are no longer a problem or they are eliminated. Unlike real world individuals, fantasy individual creatures can rival small armies in power and capability.

So that would be my take. No super-max prison could hope to hold some of the monsters in the book. It goes back to another thread - at what point should Batman just kill the Joker? If the Joker escapes every single time and causes more death and chaos every time, what is the most moral thing to do in the long term?

 

[prabe]

I wonder how quickly the laws of the Clovis Concord would add "transportation" (temporary exile or sent to a penal colony) to the list of punishments after they were confronted with a case or two of this?

Seems likely to me, possibly combined with some sort of planar travel. I'm not sure the policy is all that practicable when the "miscreants" are giants or dragons or the like.

 

[Oofta]

Yeah - one other option is that if the monsters could be contained temporarily until judgement is passed and then sent to a different plane that might be a solution. But ... isn't that just potentially making it someone else's problem or killing them by other means?

 

[prabe]

The DM should be having the world react to their decisions, or their questions, and present them with different views. Maybe some in the village are screaming for blood and vengeance. Others are just begging for anything to save them. Others may advocate for non-violent solutions. As the PCs engage and react, the world should respond.

If we cut that off, and give the PCs the mission to hunt down and ethically capture the prisoners, it dictates more of the story to the players. It removes their agency. It turns the entire village into a unified singular voice, and ignores the challenges that exist in a more realistic setting. I encourage giving the players the agency.

This is why there's some thinking of it as a premise for a campaign--at least by my thinking, it'd require a good deal of player buy-in.

That said, I think if there was an adventure that revolved around bringing something back alive, that isn't strictly speaking a removal of agency if the PCs accept the gig, at least by my lights. There are many possible reasons why the goal would be to bring it back alive, and they don't all (or even most) involve principled refusal to kill.

 

[prabe]

Yeah - one other option is that if the monsters could be contained temporarily until judgement is passed and then sent to a different plane that might be a solution. But ... isn't that just potentially making it someone else's problem or killing them by other means?

If we're talking about something like a dragon, even keeping it imprisoned is just making it someone else's problem--it's just that the "someone else" is in another time, not another place. But yes, as you implied with your comments about the Joker, a principled refusal to kill kinda implies a willingness to either solve the same problem repeatedly or to inflict it on someone else.