D&D General I really LOVE Stomping Goblins

[Vaalingrade]

Regrettably, I did.

I know you're referring to the band of ex troopers on Endor. Compared to the sheer number of stormtroopers in the galaxy, that is certainly "a few". Comparable to the number of "good drow" PCs and characters from Salvatore novels. I wouldn't use them as the exception that makes Luke or Poe a mass murderer though.

The First Order is a remnant of the fallen Empire. There are thousands more stormtroopers than the ones still indoctrinated by them left stranded from the collapse.

Most Stormtroopers killed that we see are killed in self defense, not hunted down and 'stomped' for fun.

Also Just going to point out that we're now talking about the heroism of killing child soldiers as long as you let them grow up a little before 'harvesting' rather than the regrettable loss of life inherent to conflict with a party that uses such tactics and indoctrination.

 

[Reynard]

On the subject of the interaction between free will and inherent evil, and where agency sits (note: I am sure those more studious in philosophy will have something to say about this, as I am little more than a dilettante on the subject):

Let's presume a goblin is a sapient being with the ability to make choices but is also inherently evil. What's more, the goblin isn't just inherently evil, the goblin is inherently violently evil with a tendency towards pyromania and cannibalism. The goblin is compelled by its nature to burn and kill, but it is fully capable of choose what to burn and kill. Goblins form social orders to pool resources to be better able to burn and kill, and might align with others that present them with more opportunity to burn and kill or keep them safer while doing so or otherwise provide a benefit to the goblins. Individual goblins vary in personality, mostly by preference on the burn vs kill axis, as well as minor random traits such as preference for baby versus adult meat or what kinds of victims' bones make the best decorations.

So, given all this as presented, we can see that goblins can be inherently irrevocably evil, a clear and present danger, and still have complexity and nuance while being absolutely stompable.

 

[Cadence]

In the western, I like how the reaction of the hero (Marshall Dillon, Jim Hardie, the Cisco Kid, Britt Ponset, etc..) often showed how the deed of the person in question was judged

• shoot them down to kill (either pre-emptively if it was the only vaguely legally defensible chance of surviving or not trying to talk them out of drawing on you)
• take them in if possible (beat them physically if possible) and testify against them
• take them in (letting them say good by to relatives) and testify on their behalf
• deal with something else and not chase after them as they left the territory

There are various westerns about the law-man going all out to fulfill the obligation of getting the captive to justice. Of course not everyone in the Western is on the side of law (see almost any Clint Eastwood movie and several John Wayne movies), but there's usually a code.

 

[Alzrius]

Look, we're trying to contrive a scenario that allows one ot slaughter an entire species on sight not only guilt free but feeling good about it. There can't be civillians. There can't be castes or classes or artisans or cooks. Only soldier drones with sword-ready organs and cartoon motivations we disagree with.

This debate is starting to sound oddly familiar...

 

[Vaalingrade]

Let's presume a goblin is a sapient being with the ability to make choices but is also inherently evil. What's more, the goblin isn't just inherently evil, the goblin is inherently violently evil with a tendency towards pyromania and cannibalism. The goblin is compelled by its nature to burn and kill, but it is fully capable of choose what to burn and kill. Goblins form social orders to pool resources to be better able to burn and kill, and might align with others that present them with more opportunity to burn and kill or keep them safer while doing so or otherwise provide a benefit to the goblins. Individual goblins vary in personality, mostly by preference on the burn vs kill axis, as well as minor random traits such as preference for baby versus adult meat or what kinds of victims' bones make the best decorations.

So, given all this as presented, we can see that goblins can be inherently irrevocably evil, a clear and present danger, and still have complexity and nuance while being absolutely stompable.

Except we failed at step 1.

You can't be a sapient being with the ability to make choices and also be 'inherently' anything. That's not how any of those words work.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Half the problem here, I swear, is Tolkien never being able to properly nail down an "origin story" for the orcs/goblins, and instead leaving in bits of multiple approaches he considered, so Tolkienian orcs exist in sort of a superposition of being both perhaps an actual race/species with kids and women and so on (never seen or mentioned IIRC), and being a race created through the destruction of other beings, more akin to zombies or vampires, or even a quasi-machine-race, bioroids grown in pits.

I think this combined in a toxic way with frankly remnant racist/colonialist attitudes held at a low level by the people who created D&D (and EGG certainly had such attitudes) and resulted in the weird situation in early D&D where people are keen on slaughtering what are clearly people as if they were the same as zombies or robots or whatever.

Except we failed at step 1.

You can't be a sapient being with the ability to make choices and also be 'inherently' anything. That's not how any of those words work.

Yup. That's really wild - either they can make moral choices or they can't. If they genuinely can't help being cannibalistic pyromaniacs, we don't get to call them "Evil" in a moral sense for that. We just have to acknowledge that is how it is.

And if we're people doing world-design, maybe we shouldn't have goblins be like that in the first place? Because it really seems like it's going to get creepy and genocide-y.

 

[Mirtek]

This is entirely assuming, in game terms, that knocking out an enemy is easier.

Wasn't that the gist of the "complaint"? Players just kill, because knocking out isn't easier than a full blown fight.

Yet if it were easier, than players would always try to avoid fights by using the easier knockout rule and then kill the enemy while they're down

 

[Reynard]

Except we failed at step 1.

You can't be a sapient being with the ability to make choices and also be 'inherently' anything. That's not how any of those words work.

No. That is a completely artificial constraint you are just asserting. It has neither scientific nor philosophical backing.

There is a pretty good chance neither you nor I actually have free will. If the universe is deterministic, then you are as inherently whatever you are as the goblin is inherently evil. Even if the universe is not deterministic, your choices are driven by a huge number of biological and subconscious properties that undermine your "sapience." Ever been hangry? Congratulations, you don't have free will

 

[Ruin Explorer]

No. That is a completely artificial constraint you are just asserting. It has neither scientific nor philosophical backing.

There is a pretty good chance neither you nor I actually have free will. If the universe is deterministic, then you are as inherently whatever you are as the goblin is inherently evil. Even if the universe is not deterministic, your choices are driven by a huge number of biological and subconscious properties that undermine your "sapience." Ever been hangry? Congratulations, you don't have free will

No, he's right and you're both wrong and literally do not understand your own argument. Literally the "hangry" point you make has been discussed a great and no, you're just dead wrong to say that level of essentially emotional influence negates free will. It was extremely silly of you to bring up science and philosophy when you then just demonstrated unfamiliarity with both.

If there's no free will, then there's no morality, and there's no evil. It's a bleak and horrific vision, but it's consistent.

If there is free will, then you can have morality, and thus call something "evil", but where creatures don't possess the capacity for free will in certain regards, like, say, always reacting to fire by trying to spread it, cannot be called "evil" for that specific behaviour.

 

[Vaalingrade]

There is a pretty good chance neither you nor I actually have free will.

Nope.