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Message: <blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 9748820" data-attributes="member: 6790260">Given the kinds of negative consequences that come from treating bad people as if they were "nice" people, I'm not so sure about that last bit.I do agree that it is more complicated. But at least from where I'm standing, the simple solution is for the GM to have people that are more complex than 100% bad or 100% nice. Like:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">People who don't want to do bad things, but they're poor and they (or someone they know) is sick, so in desperation they do bad things</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Groups who have problematic beliefs, but beliefs that can be re-interpreted or understood in new ways that don't cause problems</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">People who are living an extremely marginal existence not by their own choice, but because of factors beyond their control, and thus breaking rules or the like in order to survive</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Folks who only fell slowly, but by the time they realized how deep they were in, they couldn't get out</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Folks who can be persuaded to be good for some other, much much lesser cost than the usual costs of "we treated you kindly and you repaid us with horrible violence" etc.</li> </ul>I have used literally all of these in my campaigns. I've also had some people who were genuinely rat bastards, and some people who could've been sympathetic--e.g. they did fall into the above categories--but they didn't go wrong because of being in that category, that just was another motive on top of already being a terrible, terrible person. Like you can have a person who genuinely doesn't feel any remorse and thus derives joy from being a mob enforcer in order to make money to buy the medicine their sick grandmother needs. You can have a person who was born into a wicked family...but who is totally on board, personally, with hurting others and doesn't see any problem with their actions. Etc.I'm not saying the players and the system can't contribute. I'd even say they should contribute. But the GM bears the lion's share of the responsibility, especially in D&D land, where the system explicitly puts so damn much down to unmitigated GM discretion. If we're going to say that the beautiful thing about D&D is that the GM has awesome, unlimited power to do anything and everything they want, disregarding any rule, ignoring any restriction, should they feel it warranted--then that necessarily comes with the expectation that they take the blame when they use that power poorly rather than effectively. And if we're going to say that the system and even the players need to shoulder some of the responsibility, that necessarily implies that system and players need some actual power to back that up. Placing responsibility--and thus blame for failure--when the person or thing in question has no power to actually implement it, is inherently unfair and illogical.</blockquote>

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