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

[Raven Crowking]

This is an interesting question.

(Minor nitpicks: LotR has a moral order that is as explicit as that of Narnia, just not as in-your-face as that of C.S. Lewis. I would argue also that there are elements of inherent moral order in the Conan stories as well, and certainly in other REH stories. Just because Conan isn't always aware of such an order does not mean that Howard did not craft one. Conan's moral order is more closely related to Lovecraft's, where moral agency may or may not exist, but evil agency definitely exists. People in the Conan stories encounter direct evidence of faked gods, but also of real divine agency, going back to the very first Conan story.)

Of course, having an inherent moral order doesn't mean that is known, or even knowable, to the characters in the milieu. In any AP-type game, one could argue that the DM acts as the arbiter of the moral order, determining what the characters are "meant" to do, and rewarding them for thier sacrifices along the way!


RC

 

[1Mac]

It's funny, but even the darker, crueler fantasy I've read (Glen Cook and Joe Abercrombie are whom I'm thinking of, among others), there is an implied moral order, or at least the desire for one. "It sucks that things are so sucky," seems to be the mode of the more sympathetic characters. For example, early in The Black Company saga, Croaker is watching some whales breech and reflects on the beauty of the scene, lamenting that man always seems to screw up the order the whales represent. Maybe Croaker believes that man is incompatible with the idea of a better world, but he believes in the idea, or there would be nothing there for man to ruin.

I'm reminded (speaking of Narnia) of C. S. Lewis, who wrote something to the effect that if we were truly depraved, we would have no concept of depravity.

 

[S'mon]

I
I'm reminded (speaking of Narnia) of C. S. Lewis, who wrote something to the effect that if we were truly depraved, we would have no concept of depravity.

Hey, we're getting there! >

(see link in sig - no, not the quick NPC system...)

 

[Stormonu]

When I started playing D&D, I had very strong beliefs that there was an ultimate good and evil attribute to every act; I had no concept of "gray areas". As I've gotten older and more experienced, the black and white of good and evil has slowly given way to employing games that are more and more gray. My own campaign world has been evolving from a world of black and white into a moral quagmire, but it's not quite there yet, though I can see elements of "grayness" starting to show up in it. In many ways, though, I despise it and I'd like to go back to a world that seemed more black and white - both in reality and in the fantasy games I play in.

 

[Nagol]

My campaign worlds typically have several moral orders.

There is an overall obective moral/ethical measure in my D&D games -- that's what alignment is for. However, specific expressions are molded by the spiritual forces in the area.

Major cultures and religious influences project their moral order on the underlying "stuff" of the universe. After all, the gods are demonstrably real and the requirements of the pantheon are proven to be real.

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

It depends IMCs, but I tend to have little in the way of explicit moral order. I suppose I tend to define an absolute moral order (the practically physical good and evil that comes with having aligned planes, spell descriptors and the like) which bookends the "real" sort of moral greyness that people deal with in life. The moral order of reality is typically sufficient for most in-game purposes.

Moral order, of course, is not to be confused with Molar Order, the assumption that "he who has the biggest teeth wins," a premise which also typically plays a large part in my games.

 

[I'm A Banana]

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 love this question. As a bit of a scholar of religion and morality, it enters into all of my world designs on some level, and I really like playing with it in the different settings.

For me, it mostly depends on the setting I'm going for. Usually, in D&D, with its alignments, there is a clear Good and clear Evil (and clear Law and Chaos, too). Morality is something like the radioactive spider bite -- it gives you superpowers.

In a setting like Planescape, the idea is played with a little bit more. There's certainly a Good and an Evil, but which individual actions might work toward which ends are much more ambiguous (a Celestial is selling weapons to fiends in the hope that they will eliminate each other, but these weapons are also used on innocents. Acceptable loss, or is this celestial falling and just doesn't know it yet?). I like prodding the issue in more mundane settings too, but it isn't always apt.

I also have run a fantasy setting where judeo-christian-islamic philosophy and mysticism is taken to be literal truth (you can go right up to the gates of the Garden of Eden and talk with the Cherub there, if you want), but even within that model, you have things like Paradise Lost where there is some sympathy for the Devil, even if the Devil is ultimately evil, and The Divine Comedy, where church authorities burn in hell while Love is enshrined in heaven, and Arabian poetry, where demons are a natural part of creation just as angels are, and the like. It is clear what is evil and what is good, but what an individual does is less clear, because the only true and accurate judge is God Himself (and you can only hope and guess at his desires through the Revelations in the Holy Books, assuming that no mortals have tampered with them...).

So I find most of my settings deal with morality in one way or another, but generally leaves the fine distinction purposefully obscure. You don't know if your individual action is good or evil, and your character probably won't know until long after their death and ultimate reward/punishment, unless you make it obvious. You must continually question yourself. Which, to me, plays like a moral gray line, but with consequences.

Of course, I've played in more nihilistic settings, or amoral settings, too, and they have been fun. I am drawn to the moral question personally though, so it's reflected in a lot of the D&D stuff I create.

 

[Hussar]

Speaking specifically for D&D, at least 3e on down, I would have to say that yes, there is an absolute moral order in a D&D setting.

Good and Evil are reified forces in D&D. Being Good or Evil has physical consequences. How can it then be subjective? To me, that would be like saying Gravity is subjective - if I believe I can fly, then I can throw myself at the ground and miss.

I really have a problem, at least in versions of D&D where alignment has real, physical consequences, with the idea that morality is somehow in the eye of the beholder.

Now, if you remove those consequences, then morality is up for grabs. But, when I can objectively measure morality - detect evil spells do exactly that - then morality becomes an objective force.

 

[Psion]

When designing a setting for D&D... yeah. It part of the metasetting, I like it, I plug into is. The attempt to downplay/scuttle this in 4e is one reason I dislike it.

The idea of Paladins (and other individuals with lofty ideals) struggling against corruption and evil, for the ultimate good of all, and creatures and beings that are irredeemibly corrupt and reveling in it to be a principle fantasy (and more specifically, D&D) staple.

Not that I don't also have settings that lack this. My Zothique/Dying Earth-esque Twilight Dominion setting for Fantasy Craft is driven by personal foibles, where man struggles to find meaning in a universe where nothing has meaning of its own.

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"?

The source of the standards... in my default D&D setup, I assume it transcends even the recorded gods of the setting. It's a cosmic order that even gods are a slave to, perhaps even more so than mortals. Indeed, I often consider mortals to have a free will that loftier beings lack.

Not that this often comes directly into play, but is more of a default assumption merely because it's
1) Consistent with many real world ideologies/traditions.
2) The best way I can reconcile ultimately inconsistent deity behavior with a universal moral realism. Mortals I can understand as having a lack of perception of what they moral reality is. Deities would not define the moral reality (otherwise they could by definition never do wrong), but understand it in a way that mortals can't.

 

[howandwhy99]

Gods have Alignments, so yeah. At least for D&D.