D&D General Deleted

[Chaltab]

In D&D, what makes a demon evil is not its material constitution but its will. Whether that will can be changed, say by a profound example of mercy, is a further question.

I mean that's arguable. The Outer Planes like the Abyss where the demon was created is an expression of the chaotic evil will within the multiverse according to Planescape cosmology. Creatures from the Outer Planes are literally made of, if not the alignment, then of thought-stuff saturated with that alignment.

 

[pemerton]

I mean that's arguable. The Outer Planes like the Abyss where the demon was created is an expression of the chaotic evil will within the multiverse according to Planescape cosmology. Creatures from the Outer Planes are literally made of, if not the alignment, then of thought-stuff saturated with that alignment.

I know what it means to be saturated with water. So I can follow the metaphor in a loose way. But what does "being saturated with thought stuff* really mean? Imbued with will? Or are these like "stickers" stuck to the thing? I agree with @Clint_L that ultimately this does not make sense.

 

[James Gasik]

I know what it means to be saturated with water. So I can follow the metaphor in a loose way. But what does "being saturated with thought stuff* really mean? Imbued with will? Or are these like "stickers" stuck to the thing? I agree with @Clint_L that ultimately this does not make sense.

I mean, it makes about as much sense as Ravenloft being basically made out of horror tropes and old monster movies.

 

[tetrasodium]

I know what it means to be saturated with water. So I can follow the metaphor in a loose way. But what does "being saturated with thought stuff* really mean? Imbued with will? Or are these like "stickers" stuck to the thing? I agree with @Clint_L that ultimately this does not make sense.

You might need to get into some of the bonkers theories of cosmology chardin's like omega point that involves noosphere cognitive layers and so on for that because it depends on some big assumptions about the structure of the universe. If course that's also the reason why so many leanes towards using more grounded stuff in their games over time.

 

[Clint_L]

To me this feels like doing real world moral philosophy though. This argument goes beyond not being able to imagine evil objects and good objets and seems to extend to not being able to imagine evil gods or good gods. Unless I am misunderstanding the point you are making.

Nope, you are understanding it correctly. I am saying that the notion of objective evil is as incoherent as the notion of 2+2=5. I can imagine gods that I would consider evil, no problem. But evil only exists in relationships between things. It is not definable otherwise.

The conceit of a D&D cosmology is that it isn't a subjective moral system. It is a world where morality exists objectively. One doesn't have to subscribe to that worldview to imagine it. I mean we can all imagine the ring of power being an evil object that corrupts people.

There’s no such thing as objective morality. Philosophers have tried to define such for millennia, and have failed. When we claim that a particular morality is objective, we are ultimately really just arguing for our subjective beliefs.

That’s why no one can ever agree on a perfectly agreeable set of standards for the alignment system in D&D. It’s a logically incoherent task. Every moral system is inherently unprovable.

 

[pemerton]

There’s no such thing as objective morality. Philosophers have tried to define such for millennia, and have failed.

This claim is controversial. As I posted not far upthread, I think a majority of contemporary English language moral philosophers would disagree with it.

 

[Chaltab]

I know what it means to be saturated with water. So I can follow the metaphor in a loose way. But what does "being saturated with thought stuff* really mean? Imbued with will? Or are these like "stickers" stuck to the thing? I agree with @Clint_L that ultimately this does not make sense.

I mean we are talking about a cosmology where an infinitely tall mountain or spire is a thing that can apparently exist. It doesn't have to make sense by real world logical standards.

 

[Umbran]

Some of that is so silly to me. Stealth in the cause of good is a last resort?

Sorry, but dedication to the cause isn't supposed to be easy or convenient. If you want easy and convenient, go be a thief, or a fighter. Swing a sword and stab people. Sneak around and kill from behind. Anyone can do that. Even filthy goblins can stab someone in the back and take their purse to line their own pocket. That's not what it means to be a Paladin.

It occurs to me that they seem to be coming at their approach to Paladin morality as though it exists in the real world middle ages, where battles involved big formations and standards and knights were expected to fight honorably--without considering the implications of the D&D world with its dragons, mind flayers, beholders, and demons.

No. They understood that what they were asking for was difficult. They understood that it made things hard. The fact that it was a pain in the tuchus was the point.

The idea is personal sacrifice as a source of power. It isn't a sacrifice if it can be done in passing, so you barely notice that you've done it. You don't come by the ability to smite evil, even where deities cannot go, by taking an easy or convenient road. Your aura of righteousness does not carry the glory to protect you and others, even in the Abyss itself, if you are just some other shlub. The Paladin is the best of the best of the best, sir! And they have to be that best, in word, thought, and deed, every day. Because Evil won't be held at bay by anything less.

(Not that I agree with this as a game design element, mind you. But that's the idea.)

 

[briggart]

Nope, you are understanding it correctly. I am saying that the notion of objective evil is as incoherent as the notion of 2+2=5. I can imagine gods that I would consider evil, no problem. But evil only exists in relationships between things. It is not definable otherwise.

There’s no such thing as objective morality. Philosophers have tried to define such for millennia, and have failed. When we claim that a particular morality is objective, we are ultimately really just arguing for our subjective beliefs.

That’s why no one can ever agree on a perfectly agreeable set of standards for the alignment system in D&D. It’s a logically incoherent task. Every moral system is inherently unprovable.

I do not think we need to be able to define an objective morality in our world to have an objective morality in a D&D game. For a sci-fi analogue, we do not know if faster-than-light speed, time travel, or other popular sci-fi tropes are possible and how they would actually work in our world, but within a particular fiction we can pick the way to achieve FTL, etc. and go on from there. Sometime, the resulting narrative seems to defy the accepted logic of our world, but I'm ok with the fiction describing a world which is not our own.

Similarly, I'm ok with the idea of absolute morality in D&D. If the LG description says that putting milk in tea in Tuesdays in July is the epitome of Evil, and everybody doing so must be killed on sight, that defines what being LG entails within this narrative. The specific details need not be the same for every game. One campaign could follow Gygax interpretation of LG, another could postulate that LG is forbidden from intentional killing under any circumstances, including self defence. Both are fine, as is having only relative moral standards. It's a "what if" scenario: assuming this is true, what kind of stories can we tell?

And as always, the usual caveats: make sure everyone is on the same page, be open to revising things if down the line something turns out not to be working, etc.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Similarly, I'm ok with the idea of absolute morality in D&D. If the LG description says that putting milk in tea in Tuesdays in July is the epitome of Evil, and everybody doing so must be killed on sight, that defines what being LG entails within this narrative. The specific details need not be the same for every game. One campaign could follow Gygax interpretation of LG, another could postulate that LG is forbidden from intentional killing under any circumstances, including self defence. Both are fine, as is having only relative moral standards. It's a "what if" scenario: assuming this is true, what kind of stories can we tell?

What does it even mean for things like this to be "objectively evil?" Reasonable people in the setting would still oppose killing tea drinkers for their milk use or the Gygaxian warcrime paladin. Would this make them evil too? What's the point?