D&D General D&D doesn't need Evil

[payn]

So, I want to dive into this a little further. I recognize that many people find the label of “evil” useful (I’m not going to get into big E vs. little E here, I don’t think it’s really relevant to the point). But I struggle to understand why. Maybe you can help me make sense of it.

Let’s look at a more specific example, instead of talking in broad, abstract terms. And let’s use an example that’s less loaded than always-evil races. Let’s say instead we’ve got a villain. Call him Stroud Van Shmarovich. Now, Stroud is clearly a bad guy, who does lots of bad things. He’s a tyrant who rules over the duchy of Blargovia, oppressing its people and menacing one woman in particular - Aileen - who he wants to force to become his bride. And imagine also that he’s a vampire, so he literally feeds on the blood of Blargovians to sustain himself, and he will theoretically rule forever if someone doesn’t kill him. So, the adventurers have to track down a magic spear (cause it’s like a big stake!) and kill him to save Aileen and free Blargovia.

What does it matter whether we describe Stroud as evil or not? Does it change the adventure in any way?

Change the adventure and/or story no. Although, it matters mechanically. Good and Evil characters have certain abilities strengths and weaknesses. It's iconic for protagonists and antagonists to equip themselves for the big fight. Spells that offer protection, weapons that pierce defenses, and methods of scrying and hiding. It makes the adventure interesting from the game perspective. Alignment further allows nuances to this dynamic that can grow into planar and cosmic levels of adventure. Some folks really appreciate this element of D&D even if its grown out of fashion with many modern gamers.

 

[Bedrockgames]

So, I want to dive into this a little further. I recognize that many people find the label of “evil” useful (I’m not going to get into big E vs. little E here, I don’t think it’s really relevant to the point). But I struggle to understand why. Maybe you can help me make sense of it.

Let’s look at a more specific example, instead of talking in broad, abstract terms. And let’s use an example that’s less loaded than always-evil races. Let’s say instead we’ve got a villain. Call him Stroud Van Shmarovich. Now, Stroud is clearly a bad guy, who does lots of bad things. He’s a tyrant who rules over the duchy of Blargovia, oppressing its people and menacing one woman in particular - Aileen - who he wants to force to become his bride. And imagine also that he’s a vampire, so he literally feeds on the blood of Blargovians to sustain himself, and he will theoretically rule forever if someone doesn’t kill him. So, the adventurers have to track down a magic spear (cause it’s like a big stake!) and kill him to save Aileen and free Blargovia.

What does it matter whether we describe Stroud as evil or not? Does it change the adventure in any way?

I think in D&D the argument might be it will matter mechanically for things like protection from evil, detect evil, etc. However it is worth noting that in Ravenloft, you can't detect evil, only law or chaos, so it would be purely information on the GM side, not the PC side.

My view on this again is I think any number of appraoches are fine. it is just a game. Some games like having shorthand for those kinds of things. D&D has had alignment for its run so it is pretty deeply baked into everything. It was always something we could and did ignore from time to time, but taking it out certainly is going to impact the people who didn't ignore it. And I always found it useful for things like magic items, class abilities, etc. Knowing that something only affects evil characters for example is useful if you have a tag that tells you this monster, this npc, etc are evil.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

There is no reason for the FR to have the Weave, or to have evil gods like Bhaal. It's just a design decision, put in place because the designers want a certain ambiance in their setting. Maybe they wanted necromancy to be evil because they did not want neutral zombies and skeletons all over the place being used as tools by indifferent people. Or maybe it's to support the core setting of the FR where people who animate bodies are usually evil. What makes this decision more hamfisted than any other ?

In any case, note that even low level undead are evil in 5e, contrary to 3e for example. They are based on negative energy after all. The decision is consistent.

You don’t seem to be engaging with what I actually said.

The weave isn’t hamfisted. That has literally nothing to do, on any level or in any context, with whether or not it’s “just a design decision” nor whether it is necessary for the setting to work.

“All undead are evil” (and btw how is consistency relevant, here?) is hamfisted because it doesn’t have any lore backing it up, it’s just a flat declaration without any explanation. Negative energy is barely even a thing in 5e, and there is no mention of using it being inherently evil.

All undead are evil because the book just kinda says so, and people don’t question it because tradition.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Change the adventure and/or story no. Although, it matters mechanically. Good and Evil characters have certain abilities strengths and weaknesses. It's iconic for protagonists and antagonists to equip themselves for the big fight. Spells that offer protection, weapons that pierce defenses, and methods of scrying and hiding. It makes the adventure interesting from the game perspective. Alignment further allows nuances to this dynamic that can grow into planar and cosmic levels of adventure. Some folks really appreciate this element of D&D even if its grown out of fashion with many modern gamers.

In 5e, this isn’t really a thing, though. Protection From Evil and Good works regardless of the alignment of the undead creature.

 

[Oofta]

In 5e, this isn’t really a thing, though. Protection From Evil and Good works regardless of the alignment of the undead creature.

Protection/detect evil and good is really mislabeled in 5E. That gives more flexibility for different campaign settings but can be confusing.

In my campaign world, necromancy and undead are evil because the soul of the dead person is tied to the animated body and unable to move on. But my take on it means little or nothing for other campaigns.

 

[Lyxen]

With Moorcock though both the folk of Law and Chaos, could do evil and good.

Sort of, honestly, while we are shown that ultimate law is as terrible as ultimate chaos, in the books, the gods of Law are all good (although I agree that we see few of them), and the gods of Chaos are mostly evil, actually, I'm struggling to remember a god of chaos which is not pure evil.

That does not mean that they are not all dangerous, but Corum clearly points out that he also saw things that way when all the gods end up dead.

 

[Charlaquin]

All you're asking here is a semantic question - does it matter if the word "evil" shows up in the description or not - as your description clearly paints him as evil (and Evil) without using the actual word.

In the bit I bolded you could swap out the word "bad" for "evil" and it wouldn't change a thing.

So, what you’re saying is, no, it doesn’t matter if we call him evil or not.

 

[Charlaquin]

But you HAVE described Stroud as evil. You even use the synonym "bad" right in the first sentence to set the tone. You then proceed with a full paragraph description as to what "bad" means, here, in case there is any doubt. Using the word "evil" is ONLY unnecessary because you've made it superfluous.

That’s my point. The word evil is superfluous. As long as you have villains who are villainous, you don’t need the game to call them evil.

Assume you don't have a paragraph, say it's just an initially quick NPC named Ned. An alignment descriptor can be a useful 2 word (or even 2 letter) shortcut to help portray the NPC and how he fits into the scheme of the adventure.

Why wouldn’t I have a paragraph?

 

[Charlaquin]

A rose by any other name and all that. What does it hurt if we label Stroud evil? It doesn't mean he can't be complex or have some redeeming qualities. But I don't see "evil" as being much different from any other descriptor. As others have said, using a bunch of words that will get interpreted as evil doesn't change anything, it's just wordier. Not inherently a bad thing, but doesn't really change the description in the end either.

Isn’t that what the OP is getting at though? As long as you have villains who oppose the protagonists, it doesn’t matter if you call them “evil” or not.

 

[Charlaquin]

I think in D&D the argument might be it will matter mechanically for things like protection from evil, detect evil, etc.

Not in 5e it doesn’t.

My view on this again is I think any number of appraoches are fine. it is just a game. Some games like having shorthand for those kinds of things. D&D has had alignment for its run so it is pretty deeply baked into everything.

Is it though? I’m pretty sure if you removed alignment from 5e it would change almost nothing. You wouldn’t be able to do double damage to Rakshasa with piercing weapons, I guess.

It was always something we could and did ignore from time to time, but taking it out certainly is going to impact the people who didn't ignore it. And I always found it useful for things like magic items, class abilities, etc. Knowing that something only affects evil characters for example is useful if you have a tag that tells you this monster, this npc, etc are evil.

Right, but 5e already doesn’t have more than a handful of abilities like that. And if you’re homebrewing then in, adding alignmebt back in via house rule would be trivial.