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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Shiroiken" data-source="post: 9417128" data-attributes="member: 6775477">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.</blockquote>

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