D&D General Worlds of Design: Is Fighting Evil Passé?

When I started playing Dungeons & Dragons (1975) I had a clear idea of what I wanted to be and to do in the game: fight evil. As it happened, I also knew I wanted to be a magic user, though of course I branched out to other character classes, but I never deviated from the notion of fighting evil until I played some neutral characters, years after I started.

Picture courtesy of Pixabay.​

“The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don't do anything about it.” Albert Einstein

To this day I think of the game as good guys against bad guys, with most of my characters (including the neutrals) on the good guy side. I want to be one of those characters who do something about evil. I recognize that many do not think and play this way, and that's more or less the topic of this column. Because it makes a big difference in a great deal that happens when you answer the question of whether the focus of the campaign is fighting evil.

In the early version of alignment, with only Law and Chaos, it was often Law (usually good) against Chaos (usually evil). I learned this form from Michael Moorcock's Elric novels before D&D, though I understand it originated in Pohl Anderson's Three Hearts and Three Lions. That all went out the window when the Good and Evil axis was added to alignment. That's the axis I'm talking about today.

This is a "black and white" viewpoint, versus the in-between/neither/gray viewpoint so common today. But I like my games to be simple, and to be separate from reality. I don't like the "behave however you want as long as you don't get caught" philosophy.

Usually, a focus on fighting evil includes a focus on combat, though I can see where this would not necessarily be the case. Conversely, a focus on combat doesn't necessarily imply a focus on fighting evil. Insofar as RPGs grow out of popular fiction, we can ask how a focus on fighting evil compares with typical fiction.

In the distant past (often equated with "before 1980" in this case) the focus on fighting evil was much more common in science fiction and fantasy fiction than it is today, when heroes are in 50 shades of gray (see reference). Fighting evil, whether an individual, a gang, a cult, a movement, a nation, or an aggressive alien species, is the bedrock in much of our older science fiction and fantasy, much less so today.

Other kinds of focus?

If fighting evil isn't the focus, what is?

• In a "Game of Thrones" style campaign, the politics and wars of great families could provide a focus where good and evil hardly matter.
• "There's a war on" might be between two groups that aren't clearly good or evil (though each side individually might disagree).
• A politically-oriented campaign might be all about subterfuge, assassination, theft, and sabotage. There might be no big battles at all.
• A campaign could focus on exploration of newly-discovered territory. Or on a big mystery to solve. Or on hordes of refugees coming into the local area.

I'm sure there are many inventive alternatives to good vs evil, especially if you want a "grayer" campaign. I think a focus on good vs evil provides more shape to a RPG campaign than anything else. But there are other ways of providing shape. YMMV. If you have an unusual alternative, I hope you'll tell us about it.

 

[FlyingChihuahua]

What world? Human sacrifice is evil, no matter the holy or noble ends you're trying to achieve.



No, its not.

The ends are noble, the means are not. They're evil.

A new setting for D&D, essentially.

It's a thought experiment, although it seems you honestly cannot grasp the fact that there are different moralities from your own and potentially different worlds and/or cultures from your own.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Nah. No one's looking at everything in black and white. Elements of black and white is what people are talking about. Grand evil and good. Anyone who says that isn't a big part of the genre is being disingenuous. The stuff in the middle is still grey, players will still struggle with their actions and doubt themselves, moral conundrums will still ensue. Struggle and growth makes fiction great. If I want orcs to play the part of black in my game they will, period. I don't need a sermon about how they can be good if they really tried. I could just as easily pick that version if I wanted. But I didn't. I'm not going to tell someone else they 'picked wrong' because they wanted some other race to play the big bad and I can find a way to read the rules that implies that not every member of that race has to be evil. That's an arrogant and annoying way to discuss a shared hobby.

Oh I agree that it’s a matter of preference and there is no right answer. If “all orcs are evil and worthy of slaughter” works for a group, that’s perfectly fine for that group. If “orcs are sentient creatures and should be treated accordingly” works for another table, that’s great.

But I do think some folks are going a bit hard into real morality to justify their preference rather than simply stating it as a preference.

I do think that we can look at the act of taking life as being inherently good or bad. If a killing can be justified, it’s more a case of it becoming a necessary evil rather than being something good. Would you agree with that?

By good I simply mean what someone would generally prefer. Something they might look at and think “wow, I’m glad I did that”.

Killing, even at its most justified, doesn't tend to foster that feeling. It’s something most of us would prefer to avoid having to do unless there were no other option.

Would you agree with that? If so, then I think it’s pretty easy to see that it’s inherently evil.

And then, those games where paladins happily slaughter creatures....while perfectly fine....should be justified (as much as one needs to justify ther gamibg preference) on their simplicity rather than any reflection of real life morality.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Murder and killing are not the same thing. Your use language is deliberately vague to force something to appear vague that is not vague.

I don’t think I’m being vague at all. I’m looking at it at its most basic.

Is the act of taking life good or evil?

If you think it’s good, tell me why.

If it’s only situationally good, then ask yourself if that means its good....or is it just a necessary evil?

I would say to look at the effect that killing, even a fully justified instance of it, has on the person who does it. See the effects and then explain to me how they are good.

 

[Flamestrike]

No, he just has his own opinion on the idea of "redeeming" orcs (which he views the "redeeming" as "annihilating their culture and making them adopt our more 'civilized' ways") much the same way people has seen those same effort to First Nations people in Canada or Aboriginal Australians (seriously, look that stuff up, it's horrifying)

Im well aware its horrifying.

But its false for two reasons. Firstly if a human culture existed in the borders of my kingdom, with practices of the Orcs (rapine, demon worship, human sacrifice, wanton slaughter) those cultural practices can (and should) be stamped out.

You dont get a green light to say [insert abhorrent cultural practice here] is part of out culture and you're a colonial bastard on principle for wanting those practices to stop.

Secondly he's been arguing all thread that its OK and not evil or horrific to slaughter Orcs where you find them because they have those exact cultural practices (and it makes them an existential threat); but is claiming non violent removal of those practices to be somehow evil and horrific in the same breath.

If the practices are evil enough to justify slaughter on sight, why are we getting up in arms about non violent removal or prohibition of those practices?

 

[Flamestrike]

A new setting for D&D, essentially.

It's a thought experiment, although it seems you honestly cannot grasp the fact that there are different moralities from your own and potentially different worlds and/or cultures from your own.

Oh man, if you want to create some fantasy world where good is evil and evil is good, or moral relativeism and subjective belief in your own alignment is all that matters, go nuts. LG people can engage in genocide for a 'greater good' like world peace, genuinely think they're good people, actually achieve a good end, and wind up in Heaven or safely read the Book of Exalted deeds or whatever. Who am I to stop you?

The accepted logic is that a person prepared to do evil things for a good end is evil. They're an antihero. Frank Castle is under no illusions about his own evil. The man literally met Satan and was totally unsurprised to know he's going to Hell on death. Thanos is evil (despite his noble - if stupid - end goal). Dexter is evil notwithstanding the fact his victims are evil as well.

 

[Oofta]

You equated Orcs to (in your words) indigenous peoples, in order to make the point that eradicating evil aspects of their culture was wrong.

You cant argue (on one hand) Orc culture is reprehensible and evil (making them deserving of slaughter by the forces of good) and the next minute equate that culture to a human culture and call 'colonialism' for wanting to end that evil with non violent means!

You completely missed the point. You claim orcs evil because of their culture. I've stated repeatedly that humans are not inherently good nor evil.

I dislike the trope that orcs are just some backwards indigenous people that could be reformed as a species if we just sent them to reeducation centers. In the US we forced an entire generation of Native Americans into boarding schools to try to civilize them. Stripped them of all cultural identity, language, everything about their heritage. It was evil.

In theory my campaign could have an orc that betrays his inner nature. It simply never happens for a variety of reasons. Let's say an abnormal orc is like sociopaths. They're 1 in 100. Raised in orc culture? They're either going to be killed for showing mercy or go along with their society to survive. Raised in a "good" environment? Well, 99% will revert back to their nature so that's probably not going to happen often enough to matter either.

So I simply don't want to deal with it in my game because the odds of it happening are so incredibly small.

But again, killing other sentient creatures is not valorous or an act of good. Stopping evil creatures from killing other innocents when you have no option but to kill them is also not evil IMHO.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Tell that to Gandalf. He directly advocated the opposite (with regards to Smeagol).

If Frodo had have ignored that advice and killed Smeagol (wholly corrupted by the One Ring) out of hand, Sauron would have won.

There was a moral there that Tolkien was trying to make; 'killing things just because they're evil' leads to a greater evil.

That was a very weak counter argument. Gollum is neither an orc nor a goblin. He was from the race that hobbits descended from and was basically neutral to good, though selfish and greedy, before finding the Ring in the river and the taint and corruption starting almost immediately, resulting in the murder of his partner.

Gandalf knew that history and knew there was still good hiding inside Gollum as Smeagol when he gave that advice to Frodo.

 

[Aaron L]

But how evil is evil?

Most Lawful Evil characters can work by changing perspective. Colonial Empires are usually such.

But Chaotic Evil characters just bent on sadism, torture and chaos for no logical reason are impossible to play and remain mentally untouched as a human being.

Interestingly, that isn't actually the intended meaning of Chaotic Evil, according to the 1E DMG; CE was the attitude of "survival of the fittest" and such an individual would do whatever they felt like without caring how their actions affected others. Only a moronic Chaotic Evil character with a 5 Intelligence would act that way; basic human Intelligence would tell them that random murders and such would just be self-destructive and unite everyone else against them (Unless they were so incredibly powerful they could get away with it, maybe.) A realistic Chaotic Evil character would be a completely amoral psychopath who dismisses the weak and poor as worthless and balks at authority, but not usually a serial-killer. Demons are Chaotic Evil taken to its uttermost extreme, not the baseline of the Alignment.

 

[Aaron L]

I dislike the trope that orcs are just some backwards indigenous people that could be reformed as a species if we just sent them to reeducation centers

Amen to that! I utterly despise this current post-modern trend of recasting Orcs and the like as just being disadvantaged minority outsiders that are driven to Evil by their poverty and disadvantaged culture. Orcs aren't human beings; they are born Evil. Their default attitude is to cruelty and domination (I hate them being recast as Chaotic Evil, too; they were Lawful Evil.) They are Evil spirits clothed in flesh (along with Goblins, Hobgoblins, Kobolds, etc.) just like Elves are Good spirits clothed in flesh. Which is why Raise Dead didn't work on any of them in 1st and 2nd Editions; they didn't have souls. They were spirits.

 

[DammitVictor]

War is a continuation of economics by other means.

All the rest is commandeering of culture and narrative to justify war.

Economics is the ecology of intelligent life. Beyond being the means by which we distinguish ourselves from lesser beings, it is also the means by which we sustain ourselves-- it's our food chain and our respiration cycle.