World Building - Is there a "Moral Order" in your Setting?

[shadow]

The heavens declare the glory of God;
the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
- Psalm 19:1 (NIV)

The universe that we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but pitiless indifference.
- Richard Dawkins "Out of Eden"

While working on a world building for a D&D setting, I started thinking about the concept of morality as it relates to a heroic fantasy game like D&D. Are the characters in the setting fighting for what is objectively right, or is right simply defined by what the characters desire?

Most religions assume that there is some type of morality built into the universe. In Judaism, Christianity, and Islam this morality comes from God the creator. While Hinduism isn't monotheistic, it teaches that there is a universal law of rta that exists in the universe.

When it comes to fantasy settings, it seems like most "high fantasy" settings definitely go for an objective moral order. Right is very clearly defined and objective. This is not to say that characters have to be perfect, but you definitely see an objective morality that comes from God, a religion, or simply a higher law.
For example, in Narnia, good and evil are not just subjective words, but real forces with Aslan (a metaphor for Christ) being the source of good.
While The Lord of the Rings don't have the obviously religious references of Narnia, there is a clear moral order to the story. (In the Simarillion, however, there is a clear religious element.)

Toward the other end of the spectrum, there is "sword and sorcery". In this genre, moral focus is generally not the focus of the story. Instead, the focus is on the action. Of course, the characters don't always have to be completely amoral, but most of the time questions of whether the characters are "on the side of right" are left out.
For example, Conan stories generally leave out the question of what is right and wrong and focus on Conan's exploits.

To the extreme end of the spectrum are "postmodern fantasy" that assumes a fairly nihilistic outlook on morality. The lines of hero and villain are blurred, and there is really no way that right and wrong can be objectively defined.

When building a setting do you think of such things? Are there objective moral standards in your setting? What is the source of such standards? Do you incorporate moral themes in your setting as a DM? Do your players get into moral themes, or are they more interested only in the action? (Or do the players use the game as a form of escapism and play completely amoral character?) If you do incorporate moral themes into your setting, how do you do so without "being heavy handed and preachy"?

I would like to hear your perspectives on this issue.

 

[El Mahdi]

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[Mallus]

Is there an implicit moral order in my settings? Good Lord no.

There are, occasionally, moral quandaries the PC's blunder into, like drunkards at night in search of a place to relieve themselves, governed more by expediency than decorum. Much like said drunkards, the PC's frequently make a mess.

 

[GnomeWorks]

Dragons and other fantasy absurdities are things that I can deal with. I can extrapolate their impact, logically and with reason, and therefore make them make some amount of internal sense.

Objective moral truths, however, make me ridiculously twitchy. Given the existence of deities (or a deity, whatever), I could try to justify them philosophically... but the concept irks me to no end.

Approaching morality from a "there are consequences to your actions" approach works just fine, for me. There's no need to throw objective moral truths into the mix.

 

[TerraDave]

My current setting is the first time I have really had an underlying moral order, with certain universal "truths" known across the world.

Its can be an interesting world building element. How much the players notice...well, that depends.

 

[TerraDave]

Just to follow up. With alignment and a cosmology, D&D has long had a kind of defualt moral order. 4E plays that down a little bit, but some sort of moral order has been there going back to the days when there where 3 alingments.

Of course, D&D has also long had murderous LG paladins and CE assasins with hearts of gold...

 

[Bluenose]

Of course there are. Several, in fact, which contradict each other in various ways. Objective universal truth no, people who think their way is right yes.

 

[S'mon]

Interesting question!

Well, my primary long term campaign world, Ea, is primarily influenced by modernist fantasy such as the Swords & Sorcery of Fritz Leiber, so there doesn't appear to be much of an objective moral order there. Deities draw their power from the number of worshippers (this was the foundation of the Worship Points System that Eternity Publishing uses).

Recently, in 2008, I created a new world influenced by CS Lewis and to a lesser degree Tolkien, as well as the BECMI D&D alignment system, that raises the possibility of an objective moral order, though not one necessarily automatically discernable by the PCs, just as Lewis' protagonists often err.

It's a world where both the Church of the Unconquered Sun (Mitra) and the enemy Temple of the Horned Moon (Bafomet) consider themselves to be in the right, but the Bafomites ultimately serve Chaos while the Unconquered Sun serves Law. It's my first attempt at a hierarchic moral structure influenced by Christian theology, and has raised lots of interesting moral questions for me, though I'm not sure that comes out in play much. "Can Goblins be redeemed?" is a running campaign thread, though.

Edit: The lack of relativistic morality in this setting occasionally makes players very angry, eg the player of a half-orc who liked to kill elves and feel good about it. He eventually had to leave.

 

[Hand of Evil]

As a DM, my soapbox, I define good and evil, it is part of my world myth and cosmology. Just saying a thing is evil, just does not cut it for me, I have to say a thing is evil because of the following:

• Worship of a listed evil god
• Life Stealing - cold blooded murder
• Slavery/Mind Control
• Being an Orc - they do all the above
• ETC.

 

[lin_fusan]

I feel that whenever I try to apply an objective moral order in my games, my players decide to flaunt that as much as possible.

Conversely, whenever I decide that there is no objective moral order in my games, my players decide to assume and establish one as soon as possible.

The result is that more and more I assume no order in order to let my players choose how they want to go.