D&D General A History of Violence: Killing in D&D

[Frozen_Heart]

I'm kind of surprised it hasn't happen yet. There are many things a lot of people don't want in D&D because it can't be treated with the gravity it deserves or it might inflict trauma on players, but somehow violence isn't one of those things. And that really seems wild to me. The argument I've heard is that it's unlikely a player ever had to deal with orcs attacking their village, which is fair, but here in the United States how many people have been affected by violence one way or another? Something like 95% of all schools here in the US have active shooter drills. If you've graduated from high school in the last decade there's a good chance you remember active shooter drills like I remember tornado or fire drills.

The reason it's not happened is because DnD is still 'officially' a wargame at heart, with 90% of the rules devoted to combat. So removing the 'murder' part of evil is a lot harder than removing all the other evils.

But then once you've removed all possible evils from the game, and the world is perfect, why do you need the heroes at all?

Once the world is perfect in every way, and there is no need for heroes anymore, people will start arguing at the next goalpost, which is "why does dnd need to exist at all?"

We seem to be circling right back round to the 'DnD makes kids evil and violent' moral panic.

 

[Guest 85555]

Humans need metal action....

 

[CleverNickName]

Well, I don't have much to say about D&D combat being right or being wrong.

But I have lots to say about D&D combat being boring.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I'm kind of surprised it hasn't happen yet. There are many things a lot of people don't want in D&D because it can't be treated with the gravity it deserves or it might inflict trauma on players, but somehow violence isn't one of those things. And that really seems wild to me. The argument I've heard is that it's unlikely a player ever had to deal with orcs attacking their village, which is fair, but here in the United States how many people have been affected by violence one way or another? Something like 95% of all schools here in the US have active shooter drills. If you've graduated from high school in the last decade there's a good chance you remember active shooter drills like I remember tornado or fire drills.

Because there's no adequate replacement available if you take out or heavily curtail the violence. It just wouldn't sell the way the bigwigs want it to.

No financial motive.

 

[Warpiglet-7]

I love your whole post. But, hooo boy let me tell you, there are OPINIONS about the relationship between violent media and violent behaviour. And research. Soooo much research. Which remains extremely difficult to interpret, at least in terms of coming to strong conclusions about specific violent acts. Certainly it has long been known that watching and engaging in violent entertainment does strongly correlate with more aggressive behaviour in the immediate aftermath, though typically this is tested against inanimate objects in lab experiments (c.f. bobo doll et al). There is some statistical evidence similarly suggesting a short term behavioural tendency towards aggressive behaviour after experiencing violent entertainment, including some types of sporting events, and especially with younger males operating in large groups.

I am not aware of any research suggesting such a correlation between D&D and violence, specifically, and I'd be surprised if there was such a correlation as violence in D&D is highly abstract by comparison to, say, a movie. I also note that violent games, including hyper violent video games, are extremely popular in some cultures that have extremely low rates of violent crime (i.e. Japan).

While I agree with the conclusion that there not likely a link between playing D&D and violent behaviour, I can guarantee that there is plenty of research that could be interpreted to imply such a link, especially if someone has an agenda.

Oh for sure—-watching violent porn is not helpful for attitudes. But D&D specifically there is next to nothing out there…

And I think very weak for video games…

 

[Lanefan]

But the future? The future is VTT. And VTT? That's combat. That's violence.

VTT? Violence Takes Teamwork? Violent Table Talk? Violence Tells Tales? Vio...er....um....

...ah, screw it: just kill 'em all and let their gods sort 'em out.

 

[Reynard]

The reason it's not happened is because DnD is still 'officially' a wargame at heart, with 90% of the rules devoted to combat. So removing the 'murder' part of evil is a lot harder than removing all the other evils.

But then once you've removed all possible evils from the game, and the world is perfect, why do you need the heroes at all?

Once the world is perfect in every way, and there is no need for heroes anymore, people will start arguing at the next goalpost, which is "why does dnd need to exist at all?"

We seem to be circling right back round to the 'DnD makes kids evil and violent' moral panic.

The reason is because D&D violence is action movie violence by default. Sure, some tables elevate gore and I am sure some try and make violence dramatic and meaningful. But in published materials and public facing games, the violence would fit into the MCU.

If the game actually promoted home invasion and armed robbery the way so many posters like to pretend it does, there would certainly be pushback. But it doesn't, and never really has.

The D&D of the future isn't going to eliminate combat to appease pearl clutching church ladies.

 

[Shiroiken]

Combat ethics are not something I've normally had to deal with over the decades, but I have to say the combat seems to be the first option most players consider. Even back in AD&D, when players were incentivized to avoid combat (the risk/reward ratio was bad), there were players who thought with their swords/spells.

I had an interesting session with a paladin player in 2E, who was on his way to slay a red dragon. He encountered an old man on the way to its lair, who engaged him in a philosophical debate. The dragon had done nothing to the paladin personally, nor to any of his friends and family. The town who hired him was never attacked, only outlying farms. The dragon never killed any people, but only farm animals. Because of this, the old man argued, the dragon was nothing more than a mindless beast, so killing it would be an act of murder, with the paladin an evil assassin. The paladin made various arguments, which the old man countered. I almost had the player believing that killing the dragon would cause him to lose his paladinhood... until he figured out the ruse. The old man was actually the dragon, trying to talk the character into leaving him alone. The paladin correctly assumed the dragon had been lying about his actions (he'd eaten many villagers) and attacked.

I had a jarring moment early on in 3E when a player (who was also a DM) pointed out that killing a Fire Giant NPC would more than give them enough xp to level, not counting what else they got from the session. The adventure did not assume the party would fight the giant, as it was well above the typical encounter difficulty for their level, but the group seriously considered it. They only decided not to because I pointed out that they could only gain 1 level per session, and they didn't want to "waste" the xp. It might be important to note that their battle cry was "death to all of oppose us!"

While "milestones" have taken away the xp incentive, the bloodlust seems to remain. In my last session, the objective was to locate and retrieve the mcguffin. The quest giver suggested the options of sneaking in or attempting infiltration. The group instead chose to go from section to section, murdering everyone in sight. While some of the fights would have been unavoidable, twice on the way to the mcguffin they started unnecissary fights. After retrieving the mcguffin, they decided to continue "clearing out" the place before they left.

 

[Guest 85555]

The D&D of the future isn't going to eliminate combat to appease pearl clutching church ladies.

But their like the core demographic of the game

 

[MGibster]

If the game actually promoted home invasion and armed robbery the way so many posters like to pretend it does, there would certainly be pushback. But it doesn't, and never really has.

At least for as long as I've been playing D&D, we weren't attacking bandits, goblins, orcs, or any other creature because we wanted to take their stuff. We were attacking them because those bandits, goblins, and orcs were attacking people. i.e. They were a threat to surrounding communities and our characters were tasked with taking care of the problem. We were supposed to be the good guys.