When all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like nail. And when all your rules are about combat, every problem can be solved with swords and fireballs.
One issue that we often allude to in these threads, but rarely dwell on, is the nature of violence in Dungeons & Dragons. We will often cheekily refer to so-called "murderhobos"* and whether violence is essential to D&D, but this is more a post (and a thread) about the nature of violence in society, fiction, and D&D. About the way that our culture celebrates violence, and the way that the rules of D&D channel activities toward violence; in effect, the ways that the game itself rewards violence. That's the reason why I started this with the quote I did; traditionally, D&D prizes combat, and when the rules of the game are geared toward combat (violence), it is more likely that every problem can be solved through combat (violence).
*Or as I often incorrectly refer to it as, the "hobomurder" nature of D&D, which ... um ... apologies to the hobo community.
My purpose is not to assign any sort of blame, by the way, but simply to look at the issues. As most of you know from my threads, I love D&D, and play both 5e and various TSR-era editions of D&D (as well as other games).
This brief examination will look at three issues; first is a look at violence in culture generally, second is the rules focus of D&D toward violence with a little history tossed in, and third is how this impacts the game today.
Brief examination? HA HA! No. I am the Marcel Proust of thread-starters, which I assume means that I enjoy the occasional madeleine.
A. Natural Born Killers.
You shoot me in a dream, you better wake up and apologize.
It is inarguable that popular culture favors and fetishizes violence. This is not something new; Edmund Burke, when writing on the sublime in 1757, observed, "Whatever is fitted in any sort to excite the ideas of pain, and danger, that is to say, whatever is in any sort terrible or is conversant about terrible objects, or operates in a manner analogous to terror, is a source of the sublime. ... Little more can be said than that the idea of bodily pain, in all the modes and degrees of labour, pain, anguish, torment, is productive of the sublime; and nothing else in this sense can produce it." We enjoy seeing violence and cruelty , so long as it is inflicted upon someone other than ourselves. A public hanging or a public execution used to be a popular event - the prior version of today's stylized John Wick film. What is past is prologue.
This trend arguably became even more pronounced in America due to the adoption of the MPAA ratings code in 1968, which began to ratchet up the amount of allowable violence through the 70s and 80s while perversely clamping down on almost everything else (from profanity to sexual expression); eventually getting to the strange phenomenon of movies wherein a still-beating heart could be ripped out of a chest in a human sacrifice and scrape by with a PG-13, but two curse words or sexual innuendo, let alone actual nudity, sent a movie to the realm of R. It doesn't take a genius to realize that the producers of culture are responding to incentives; they know that they can amp up the violence in movies and still get an acceptable rating, while profanity and sexual expression will relegate them to an R rating that reduces the possible audience. And while this is less of a concern now with streamers, it was certainly the case that with television shows that were broadcast over the air (that actually feels weird to say now, doesn't it?), you could have more violence and action than profanity or sex.
But integral to this is the phenomenon, in both movies and in television, of the "inverse ninja law." Specifically, that the hero would be able to dispatch numerous unnamed minions and henchmen with varying amount of bloodshed depending on the nature of the show/movie. For the most part, mere identity within an evil organization or opposition to the hero is sufficient for death. The audience didn't need to know who you were specifically, they only needed to know that you were "coded" as evil in order to root for your demise. While the identities and affiliations of these evil organizations has changed over time, the idea that you dispatch those coded as "evil" has not.
Brief aside- It is a fascinating project to look at the evolution of "evil" in Hollywood over time. In order to avoid going afoul of any board rules, I won't get into details, but politics (who America views as the "enemy") and economics (the markets Hollywood sells to) have caused the affiliations of the various minion groups to evolve.
And this trend continues to today. For the most part, it is unremarked upon, unless it is elevated to the level of conspicuous slaughter so over-the-top it almost becomes a parody of itself (such as John Wick) or it arguably calls attention to the tension it has with deeper themes (such as Snyder's Man of Steel). Violence is part and parcel of modern popular culture. It is almost impossible to imagine a world where violence wasn't a regular and accepted part of the popular culture landscape.
B. If Orcs Weren't Made out of XP, I Wouldn't Kill Them.
That woman, deserves her revenge and … we deserve to die. But then again, so does she. So, I guess we’ll just see. Won’t we?
I am not going to dwell too much on the "murderhobo" past of D&D; I think that it is both true and overstated (and, of course, plug The Elusive Shift if you really want to know more about how people played back in the day). That said, I am going to briefly interject a bit about the word and the Mandela effect. Given that murderhobo is closely associated with early D&D, when do you think the phrase first started being used?
How about approximately 2007?
Source
The idea behind amoral adventurers killing everything in sight did have a long history in the game. There was a reason that the designers had to "stat up" shopkeepers in the City State of the Invincible Overlord in the 70s to keep PCs from slaughtering them to take their stuff; but there were a multitude of games and a multitude of styles. As Peterson showed in The Elusive Shift, not every game was murderhobos killing everything in sight. Some people took the rules and concepts of D&D and used them to play games that focused heavily on diplomacy!
Yet ... the rules of D&D, both then and now, favor violence. While there have always been different ways of getting XP (gold pieces, milestone, etc.) the one, sure-fire way that has always existed for getting those sweet sweet XP you needed to level up your character? Killing.
How do you get more stuff? Killing the things that have the stuff.
Pre-published adventures (modules, APs)? Assume that you will kill stuff, with VERY few counter-examples.
Spells? Mostly for combat.
Rules and abilities for characters? Geared toward combat.
Combat rules? Almost all about lethal combat, not subduing.
Social skills? Always vastly underdeveloped compared to combat sections in every edition of the game.
And so on. Heck, the game descended from wargaming, and people discuss the necessity of a grid or battlemap for playing! While you don't need to play D&D in a violent manner, it is very hard to avoid doing so. The rules of the game itself presuppose that you will engage in a lot of combat. You can play D&D without violence, but ... at a certain point, if you aren't having any combat, you might ask yourself, "Self, why am I playing D&D with no combat? I mean, maybe I should be playing Monsterhearts instead?"
C. Relevance to the Current Situation.
There’s a special rung in hell reserved for people who waste good scotch.
Circling back around, I understand why we want to have moral absolutes in D&D. If there is something that is evil, irredeemably and unalterably so, then it makes sense to kill it. There can be no argument, no quarter given, no moral qualms whatsoever about the just use of violence. Movies that have a lot of violence tend to avoid nuance, because you aren't supposed to be questioning the violence! Instead, it's just another faceless evil-coded minion that got in the way of the righteous protagonist. To bring this back to D&D and use the easiest example, if there is a demon that is unalterably evil, then destroying that demon must be good.
Given D&D is a game that is inextricably tied into violence, then, there might be some questions raised when it is not a demon, but a human or humanoid; perhaps it is as simple as an 80s film, and in this fiction, by opposing the protagonist, they must be put to the sword. Or perhaps not. That's the issue that we have seen struggles with. The game itself, while a fantasy game, is also clearly influenced by the westerns that were consumed by the creators of the game when they were growing up. The idea that we code the "bad guys" (with alignment) and that the adventurers are their own source of justice in some fantasy frontier (and, of course, an inn ... which often resembles a western saloon as much as Tolkien) with the ability ... no, the RIGHT to dole out the justice, is deeply ingrained in the history of the game.
I keep circling around to this issue because I am torn between competing impulses; on the one hand, D&D is a game, and a fiction. It is fun and escapist. To sit around and spend all my time wondering about the morality of killing kobolds seems about as sensible as worrying about the ethics of capitalism while playing Monopoly.**
**Yes, I know that the game we play was actually derived from a game that was supposed to point out the sins of capitalism. But we all know that Elizabeth Magie was crushed by the powers of capitalism. So ... irony?
...and yet, maybe there is something about this underlying violence. I am certainly less comfortable blithely ignoring the issue completely than I was. I am just uncertain what, if anything, there is to do. As I have discussed previously, when I was reading B2 again to run for a teen group, I realized that I couldn't run it. I don't make judgments about those who still love it - because I still love it!- it's just that there was a little too much "women and children" that I had an issue with, and I found that I couldn't run it. It felt wrong.
The violence and well, the themes suddenly went from subtext to OH MY GOD MY EYES I CANT UNSEE THIS NOW.
This is something I keep circling back to. Violence is fun. It is fun to engage in combat! I like it! I mean, if I didn't enjoy the combat, I would be playing a different game. But sometimes, in some circumstances, it just gets too much. It goes from John Wick to Eastern Promises, if you know what I mean. And I believe that the re-examination of alignment with regard to intelligent humanoids is part of that.
But the future? The future is VTT. And VTT? That's combat. That's violence. But as we know from videogames, pixel violence isn't real. ...Right?
One issue that we often allude to in these threads, but rarely dwell on, is the nature of violence in Dungeons & Dragons. We will often cheekily refer to so-called "murderhobos"* and whether violence is essential to D&D, but this is more a post (and a thread) about the nature of violence in society, fiction, and D&D. About the way that our culture celebrates violence, and the way that the rules of D&D channel activities toward violence; in effect, the ways that the game itself rewards violence. That's the reason why I started this with the quote I did; traditionally, D&D prizes combat, and when the rules of the game are geared toward combat (violence), it is more likely that every problem can be solved through combat (violence).
*Or as I often incorrectly refer to it as, the "hobomurder" nature of D&D, which ... um ... apologies to the hobo community.
My purpose is not to assign any sort of blame, by the way, but simply to look at the issues. As most of you know from my threads, I love D&D, and play both 5e and various TSR-era editions of D&D (as well as other games).
This brief examination will look at three issues; first is a look at violence in culture generally, second is the rules focus of D&D toward violence with a little history tossed in, and third is how this impacts the game today.
Brief examination? HA HA! No. I am the Marcel Proust of thread-starters, which I assume means that I enjoy the occasional madeleine.
A. Natural Born Killers.
You shoot me in a dream, you better wake up and apologize.
It is inarguable that popular culture favors and fetishizes violence. This is not something new; Edmund Burke, when writing on the sublime in 1757, observed, "Whatever is fitted in any sort to excite the ideas of pain, and danger, that is to say, whatever is in any sort terrible or is conversant about terrible objects, or operates in a manner analogous to terror, is a source of the sublime. ... Little more can be said than that the idea of bodily pain, in all the modes and degrees of labour, pain, anguish, torment, is productive of the sublime; and nothing else in this sense can produce it." We enjoy seeing violence and cruelty , so long as it is inflicted upon someone other than ourselves. A public hanging or a public execution used to be a popular event - the prior version of today's stylized John Wick film. What is past is prologue.
This trend arguably became even more pronounced in America due to the adoption of the MPAA ratings code in 1968, which began to ratchet up the amount of allowable violence through the 70s and 80s while perversely clamping down on almost everything else (from profanity to sexual expression); eventually getting to the strange phenomenon of movies wherein a still-beating heart could be ripped out of a chest in a human sacrifice and scrape by with a PG-13, but two curse words or sexual innuendo, let alone actual nudity, sent a movie to the realm of R. It doesn't take a genius to realize that the producers of culture are responding to incentives; they know that they can amp up the violence in movies and still get an acceptable rating, while profanity and sexual expression will relegate them to an R rating that reduces the possible audience. And while this is less of a concern now with streamers, it was certainly the case that with television shows that were broadcast over the air (that actually feels weird to say now, doesn't it?), you could have more violence and action than profanity or sex.
But integral to this is the phenomenon, in both movies and in television, of the "inverse ninja law." Specifically, that the hero would be able to dispatch numerous unnamed minions and henchmen with varying amount of bloodshed depending on the nature of the show/movie. For the most part, mere identity within an evil organization or opposition to the hero is sufficient for death. The audience didn't need to know who you were specifically, they only needed to know that you were "coded" as evil in order to root for your demise. While the identities and affiliations of these evil organizations has changed over time, the idea that you dispatch those coded as "evil" has not.
Brief aside- It is a fascinating project to look at the evolution of "evil" in Hollywood over time. In order to avoid going afoul of any board rules, I won't get into details, but politics (who America views as the "enemy") and economics (the markets Hollywood sells to) have caused the affiliations of the various minion groups to evolve.
And this trend continues to today. For the most part, it is unremarked upon, unless it is elevated to the level of conspicuous slaughter so over-the-top it almost becomes a parody of itself (such as John Wick) or it arguably calls attention to the tension it has with deeper themes (such as Snyder's Man of Steel). Violence is part and parcel of modern popular culture. It is almost impossible to imagine a world where violence wasn't a regular and accepted part of the popular culture landscape.
B. If Orcs Weren't Made out of XP, I Wouldn't Kill Them.
That woman, deserves her revenge and … we deserve to die. But then again, so does she. So, I guess we’ll just see. Won’t we?
I am not going to dwell too much on the "murderhobo" past of D&D; I think that it is both true and overstated (and, of course, plug The Elusive Shift if you really want to know more about how people played back in the day). That said, I am going to briefly interject a bit about the word and the Mandela effect. Given that murderhobo is closely associated with early D&D, when do you think the phrase first started being used?
How about approximately 2007?
Source
The idea behind amoral adventurers killing everything in sight did have a long history in the game. There was a reason that the designers had to "stat up" shopkeepers in the City State of the Invincible Overlord in the 70s to keep PCs from slaughtering them to take their stuff; but there were a multitude of games and a multitude of styles. As Peterson showed in The Elusive Shift, not every game was murderhobos killing everything in sight. Some people took the rules and concepts of D&D and used them to play games that focused heavily on diplomacy!
Yet ... the rules of D&D, both then and now, favor violence. While there have always been different ways of getting XP (gold pieces, milestone, etc.) the one, sure-fire way that has always existed for getting those sweet sweet XP you needed to level up your character? Killing.
How do you get more stuff? Killing the things that have the stuff.
Pre-published adventures (modules, APs)? Assume that you will kill stuff, with VERY few counter-examples.
Spells? Mostly for combat.
Rules and abilities for characters? Geared toward combat.
Combat rules? Almost all about lethal combat, not subduing.
Social skills? Always vastly underdeveloped compared to combat sections in every edition of the game.
And so on. Heck, the game descended from wargaming, and people discuss the necessity of a grid or battlemap for playing! While you don't need to play D&D in a violent manner, it is very hard to avoid doing so. The rules of the game itself presuppose that you will engage in a lot of combat. You can play D&D without violence, but ... at a certain point, if you aren't having any combat, you might ask yourself, "Self, why am I playing D&D with no combat? I mean, maybe I should be playing Monsterhearts instead?"
C. Relevance to the Current Situation.
There’s a special rung in hell reserved for people who waste good scotch.
Circling back around, I understand why we want to have moral absolutes in D&D. If there is something that is evil, irredeemably and unalterably so, then it makes sense to kill it. There can be no argument, no quarter given, no moral qualms whatsoever about the just use of violence. Movies that have a lot of violence tend to avoid nuance, because you aren't supposed to be questioning the violence! Instead, it's just another faceless evil-coded minion that got in the way of the righteous protagonist. To bring this back to D&D and use the easiest example, if there is a demon that is unalterably evil, then destroying that demon must be good.
Given D&D is a game that is inextricably tied into violence, then, there might be some questions raised when it is not a demon, but a human or humanoid; perhaps it is as simple as an 80s film, and in this fiction, by opposing the protagonist, they must be put to the sword. Or perhaps not. That's the issue that we have seen struggles with. The game itself, while a fantasy game, is also clearly influenced by the westerns that were consumed by the creators of the game when they were growing up. The idea that we code the "bad guys" (with alignment) and that the adventurers are their own source of justice in some fantasy frontier (and, of course, an inn ... which often resembles a western saloon as much as Tolkien) with the ability ... no, the RIGHT to dole out the justice, is deeply ingrained in the history of the game.
I keep circling around to this issue because I am torn between competing impulses; on the one hand, D&D is a game, and a fiction. It is fun and escapist. To sit around and spend all my time wondering about the morality of killing kobolds seems about as sensible as worrying about the ethics of capitalism while playing Monopoly.**
**Yes, I know that the game we play was actually derived from a game that was supposed to point out the sins of capitalism. But we all know that Elizabeth Magie was crushed by the powers of capitalism. So ... irony?
...and yet, maybe there is something about this underlying violence. I am certainly less comfortable blithely ignoring the issue completely than I was. I am just uncertain what, if anything, there is to do. As I have discussed previously, when I was reading B2 again to run for a teen group, I realized that I couldn't run it. I don't make judgments about those who still love it - because I still love it!- it's just that there was a little too much "women and children" that I had an issue with, and I found that I couldn't run it. It felt wrong.
The violence and well, the themes suddenly went from subtext to OH MY GOD MY EYES I CANT UNSEE THIS NOW.
Gary Gygax in 2005
Paladins are not stupid, and in general there is no rule of Lawful Good against killing enemies. The old adage about nits making lice applies. Also, as I have often noted, a paladin can freely dispatch prisoners of Evil alignment that have surrendered and renounced that alignment in favor of Lawful Good. They are then sent on to their reward before they can backslide.
An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth is by no means anything but Lawful and Good. Prisoners guilty of murder or similar capital crimes can be executed without violating any precept of the alignment. Hanging is likely the usual method of such execution, although it might be beheading, strangulation, etc. A paladin is likely a figure that would be considered a fair judge of criminal conduct.
The Anglo-Saxon punishment for rape and/or murder of a woman was as follows: tearing off of the scalp, cutting off of the ears and nose, blinding, chopping off of the feet and hands, and leaving the criminal beside the road for all bypassers to see. I don't know if they cauterized the limb stumps or not before doing that. It was said that a woman and child could walk the length and breadth of England without fear of molestation then...
Chivington might have been quoted as saying "nits make lice," but he is certainly not the first one to make such an observation as it is an observable fact. If you have read the account of wooden Leg, a warrior of the Cheyenne tribe that fought against Custer et al., he dispassionately noted killing an enemy squaw for the reason in question.
I am not going to waste my time and yours debating ethics and philosophy. I will state unequivocally that in the alignment system as presented in OAD&D, an eye for an eye is lawful and just, Lawful Good, as misconduct is to be punished under just laws.
Lawful Neutrality countenances malign laws. Lawful Good does not.
Mercy is to be displayed for the lawbreaker that does so by accident. Benevolence is for the harmless. Pacifism in the fantasy milieu is for those who would be slaves. They have no place in determining general alignment, albeit justice tempered by mercy is a NG manifestation, whilst well-considered benevolence is generally a mark of Good
Paladins are not stupid, and in general there is no rule of Lawful Good against killing enemies. The old adage about nits making lice applies. Also, as I have often noted, a paladin can freely dispatch prisoners of Evil alignment that have surrendered and renounced that alignment in favor of Lawful Good. They are then sent on to their reward before they can backslide.
An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth is by no means anything but Lawful and Good. Prisoners guilty of murder or similar capital crimes can be executed without violating any precept of the alignment. Hanging is likely the usual method of such execution, although it might be beheading, strangulation, etc. A paladin is likely a figure that would be considered a fair judge of criminal conduct.
The Anglo-Saxon punishment for rape and/or murder of a woman was as follows: tearing off of the scalp, cutting off of the ears and nose, blinding, chopping off of the feet and hands, and leaving the criminal beside the road for all bypassers to see. I don't know if they cauterized the limb stumps or not before doing that. It was said that a woman and child could walk the length and breadth of England without fear of molestation then...
Chivington might have been quoted as saying "nits make lice," but he is certainly not the first one to make such an observation as it is an observable fact. If you have read the account of wooden Leg, a warrior of the Cheyenne tribe that fought against Custer et al., he dispassionately noted killing an enemy squaw for the reason in question.
I am not going to waste my time and yours debating ethics and philosophy. I will state unequivocally that in the alignment system as presented in OAD&D, an eye for an eye is lawful and just, Lawful Good, as misconduct is to be punished under just laws.
Lawful Neutrality countenances malign laws. Lawful Good does not.
Mercy is to be displayed for the lawbreaker that does so by accident. Benevolence is for the harmless. Pacifism in the fantasy milieu is for those who would be slaves. They have no place in determining general alignment, albeit justice tempered by mercy is a NG manifestation, whilst well-considered benevolence is generally a mark of Good
This is something I keep circling back to. Violence is fun. It is fun to engage in combat! I like it! I mean, if I didn't enjoy the combat, I would be playing a different game. But sometimes, in some circumstances, it just gets too much. It goes from John Wick to Eastern Promises, if you know what I mean. And I believe that the re-examination of alignment with regard to intelligent humanoids is part of that.
But the future? The future is VTT. And VTT? That's combat. That's violence. But as we know from videogames, pixel violence isn't real. ...Right?