D&D 5E (2014) I thought WotC was removing biological morals?

[Waller]

Removing alignments from monsters as I understand it is to say that no creature is biologically 'evil'. But is there a material difference between saying a race is evil and saying a race is homicidal?

I'm not sure I have a point to make, other than that I'm slightly confuised as I thought that was what they said they were going to stop doing?

 

[Malmuria]

I'm not sure what wotc is doing, but I think the difference is in humanoid beings who have societies, especially those that are similar in organization and description to humans (elves, orcs), and those that don't so much. I remember at one point they described fey and shadowfell creatures as being expressions of a particularly strong emotion. In this particular case, redcaps have a magical faerie origin and are not a 'race' in the same way dwarves are, for example.

 

[overgeeked]

It's probably a question of how a redcap is created. These things probably spring up from the Feywild itself when someone commits murder. So they're not a biological race so much as a created entity, like elementals, demons, and devils. The trouble with biological races being evil is that they're also coded with decades of real-world racist tropes that target specific real-world cultures and people.

 

[Charlaquin]

Redcaps aren’t a humanoid race, they’re fae creatures.

 

[JEB]

I'm not sure what wotc is doing, but I think the difference is in humanoid beings who have societies, especially those that are similar in organization and description to humans (elves, orcs), and those that don't so much. I remember at one point they described fey and shadowfell creatures as being expressions of a particularly strong emotion. In this particular case, redcaps have a magical faerie origin and are not a 'race' in the same way dwarves are, for example.

While this distinction is plausible, it's not one Wizards has consistently drawn. If fey creatures can be described in this way without it being essentialist, what about satyrs and eladrin? How does one determine which monsters are creatures of instinct and which are creatures with authentic free will?

Of course, one could reasonably assume that the behavior in a given monster's entry is simply a default, and that variations and exceptions exist. But that was also explicitly the case with alignment, and it didn't stop people from finding it problematic...

Perhaps we may see some attempt to thread the needle on this subject in Fizban's (which is supposed to include alignments and default traits, but also exceptions to the norm, for dragon personalities).

 

[DemoMonkey]

It's perfectly possible to be homicidal and any alignment.

Citation: Player Characters

 

[aco175]

I can get on board with fey creatures being immoral and bloodthirsty and needing to be fought as monsters instead of PCs. Not sure how this would read if redcap was changed to orc or drow and if the plausibility that they are of a certain type would work. It seems that there needs to be an evil race, but it cannot be one that some associate with an Earth race.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Redcaps aren’t a humanoid race, they’re fae creatures.

Whilst I don't necessarily think these redcaps are super problematic, that's not why. I really don't think that it matters what the mechanical category is. The racist depiction of orcs wouldn't stop being problematic if they were classified as monstrosities instead of humanoids.

 

[tetrasodium]

redcaps are a (scottish?) mythical monster, if anything that description from wotc might actually tone down how horrible they were in myths.
edit: The caps were red because they were soaked in blood of their victims or those who fell in battle & the redcap would often die if it ever dried out. A non-homicidal redcap is almost a paradox since that would make it something else

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I think redcaps shouldn't be a species, they should an organisation or subculture of gnomes. It's like a violent gang or cult in which some gnomes join. Then the biological essentialism angle is gone.