D&D General Violence and D&D: Is "Murderhobo" Essential to D&D?

[Snarf Zagyg]

It's murderhobo, not hobomurder.

I used to be with it, until they changed what it was. Now what I am with isn't it and what is it seems weird and scary to me. It'll happen to you!

 

[Bawylie]

I did the “What is right?” argument for d&d once in college. We were 20 and played 3rd ed which had recently come out. Our DM had us talking to a Night Hag and we got some help from it for some quest and then we killed it. The DM was furious and told us all that was an alignment shift toward evil (Good got dropped to Neutral and Neutral dropped to evil).

We all objected (not least among us the lawful good dwarf who was the DM’s brother). Our DM’s position was that the Night Hag had no ill intent or ulterior motives in helping us achieve the quest and that killing her unprovoked was an act of evil. The players’ position was that a Night Hag was listed as Always Neutral Evil and that destroying an evil creature could never be considered an evil act because it removed a significant amount of evil from the world. (Moral particularism vs Moral Absolutism, or moral utility perhaps).

In the end, we made the DM decide whether morality was an absolute feature of his game or if it would always be relative to circumstances. (Can we just kill monsters or are they all gonna show us photos of their kids?).

We decided we’d all rather play in a morally absolute world for that game, not least because we never wanted to argue alignment ever again, and because we wanted to focus on high adventure stuff with a side of character growth rather than play d&d like an overwrought game of Vampire the Masquerade.

In my own games (decades later), I don’t discuss alignment as a feature of the game (but I know for my setting how it works). The only thing I tell the players is that characters must be adventurers and not defective. They can have whatever motivation or goal they want but they have to go on adventures (none of this “why should my character care?” BS) and they can’t run like psychopaths. This arrangement has worked ever since I started it and never once given me a problem (though I speak only for my own game here, and pass no judgment whatsoever on any of your games which I am sure are delightful).

 

[Phion]

I did the “What is right?” argument for d&d once in college. We were 20 and played 3rd ed which had recently come out. Our DM had us talking to a Night Hag and we got some help from it for some quest and then we killed it. The DM was furious and told us all that was an alignment shift toward evil (Good got dropped to Neutral and Neutral dropped to evil).

We all objected (not least among us the lawful good dwarf who was the DM’s brother). Our DM’s position was that the Night Hag had no ill intent or ulterior motives in helping us achieve the quest and that killing her unprovoked was an act of evil. The players’ position was that a Night Hag was listed as Always Neutral Evil and that destroying an evil creature could never be considered an evil act because it removed a significant amount of evil from the world. (Moral particularism vs Moral Absolutism, or moral utility perhaps).

In the end, we made the DM decide whether morality was an absolute feature of his game or if it would always be relative to circumstances. (Can we just kill monsters or are they all gonna show us photos of their kids?).

We decided we’d all rather play in a morally absolute world for that game, not least because we never wanted to argue alignment ever again, and because we wanted to focus on high adventure stuff with a side of character growth rather than play d&d like an overwrought game of Vampire the Masquerade.

In my own games (decades later), I don’t discuss alignment as a feature of the game (but I know for my setting how it works). The only thing I tell the players is that characters must be adventurers and not defective. They can have whatever motivation or goal they want but they have to go on adventures (none of this “why should my character care?” BS) and they can’t run like psychopaths. This arrangement has worked ever since I started it and never once given me a problem (though I speak only for my own game here, and pass no judgment whatsoever on any of your games which I am sure are delightful).

Got to respect that no BS hustle.

 

[Umbran]

The players’ position was that a Night Hag was listed as Always Neutral Evil

So, the GM's response should at that time have been... "And where did your PCs find a copy of the MM to know that?"

 

[toucanbuzz]

I'm trying to think of an instance where Frodo stabs an orc and can't think of one. Troll, yes. Nazgul, sorta. Orc...no?

And even more to the point, the evolution of Frodo's feelings about the morality of killing Gollum are one of the core themes to the story.

Okay, I was wrong about Frodo. He officially kills no orcs. In the movies (had to look this up), Sam kills 7, Merry kills 2+ (the big battle was hard to track), and Pippin kills at least 3. Halflings, err hobbits, kicked orc ass. Classic good vs. evil, standing up against overwhelming darkness and odds because it's the right thing to do, with a diverse group of people of all different races and backgrounds. That's the fun stuff.

 

[toucanbuzz]

I loved 80s TV with all the low morality that went with it, when I was a teenager. There was also a few shows that did not kill such as A-Team and G.I. Joe cartoon where everyone would just get their weapons shot out of their hands or crawl out of the tank before it blew up. A-Team had all the bad guys rubbing their heads and crawling away after the fight. We played a few games like this where the monsters were defeated and would end up crawling away or just be knocked out.

In the 2018 GaryCon, a buddy of mine got into a 1980s game where you had to follow TV rules and your pregen character came inside a VCR case. Bad guys didn't die, they only got boo boos and ran away, that kind of stuff. He had a blast with the silliness of it.

 

[Bawylie]

So, the GM's response should at that time have been... "And where did your PCs find a copy of the MM to know that?"

Nah, because he’s not an A-hole.

“Whom’stever could’ve known this lich would be a villain?”

And what are the odds a guy named Remus Lupin ends up a werewolf?

But I’ll tell you, in that game, my character Coleridge was a cleric of Oghma specialized in diviniation. I made a magic compass that had hands on it that detected magic, detected evil, all kinds of stuff. That character took crazy notes about the campaign and every creature and place we ever visited. He prepared divination spells exclusively and got yelled at for insufficient healing (not that the healing was insufficient - it was an in-game in-joke). In game, we knew the Night Hag was evil.

 

[Umbran]

Yep. And that's fine.

Though, thinking about it... maybe no. I think "other==Evil, if it is other enough" is a weak position. When shifting to make the violence more honestly justified is mere sentences away, why not take the stronger stance?

 

[Eyes of Nine]

I do wish there was more in D&D 5e around social interaction. There's certainly no ritual moment like there is around combat "Ok, everyone roll initiative". Part of that is because there's no procedure explicitly stated around social interactions. Perhaps there should be, perhaps not.

BTW, Morale rules are optional in 5e.

 

[Fenris-77]

I do wish there was more in D&D 5e around social interaction. There's certainly no ritual moment like there is around combat "Ok, everyone roll initiative". Part of that is because there's no procedure explicitly stated around social interactions. Perhaps there should be, perhaps not.

BTW, Morale rules are optional in 5e.

I'd be happier to take the initiative out of combat. Setting aside how that might work, I think softening the line between "in combat" and the rest of the game can only be a good thing. Players might feel more ready to switch gears rather than just staying on combat because they're "in combat".