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

[Crimson Longinus]

I would imagine many drow follow Lolth for the same reason many people at least claim to follow real world religions; either out of fear of Lolth's followers or fear of Lolth herself.

I think I recall reading some bit of lore from some edition saying that drow believe Lolth can see through the eyes of any spider. The idea that the Spider Queen could be watching from even the tiniest spider in your home and possibly instruct her faithful and/or demons to kill you would be terrifying.

And to me this seems terribly unconvincing and boring. Certainly the Lothite drow would see Lolth as awesome, and sure might fear her, but also love her. She should be fearsome and ruthless protector of the drow, some sort of awe inspiring Spider-Kali.

 

[Oofta]

I never got around the playing it (yet,) but I had a character concept based around that. I was thinking the character would most likely be a cleric.

The idea was that the character came across whatever the equivalent of the Dead Sea Scrolls would be for a follower of Gruumsh. After failed attempts to bring this new gospel of Gruumsh to light in the character's tribe, the character sets out to spread the new word. With both more-traditional orcs and faiths of other races being hostile to this new faith, the character finds few allies in the world. So, signing up with the PCs and being on the move is one of the few options left for the character. Along the way, the character would hope to gain more insight into the found texts and possibly seek out more lost pieces of the OG (Old Gruumsh) Testament.

I can see a couple of spins on the Gruumsh story. One is that Gruumsh is simply a liar, that he was given a fair shake but was never satisfied with the negotiations and always wanted more. Even though he was given an equal amount in the eyes of everyone else, in his eyes (eye?) he was given next to nothing. If given the forest, he wanted the minerals from the mountains. If given the mountains he wanted the fertile valleys and so on.

But as written, the FR lore is pretty bad. Gruumsh exists in my campaign world, but he's one of the Jotun of Norse mythology and kin to the evil giants there (not all Jotun were giants, and my version only uses Norse mythology as a starting point anyway).

So what would the "new gospel" of Gruumsh look like?

 

[Warpiglet-7]

I never got around the playing it (yet,) but I had a character concept based around that. I was thinking the character would most likely be a cleric.

The idea was that the character came across whatever the equivalent of the Dead Sea Scrolls would be for a follower of Gruumsh. After failed attempts to bring this new gospel of Gruumsh to light in the character's tribe, the character sets out to spread the new word. With both more-traditional orcs and faiths of other races being hostile to this new faith, the character finds few allies in the world. So, signing up with the PCs and being on the move is one of the few options left for the character. Along the way, the character would hope to gain more insight into the found texts and possibly seek out more lost pieces of the OG (Old Gruumsh) Testament.

Fun!

I thought about something that subverted expectations too. I was thinking about a yuan ti that followed a coatl. Maybe a good aligned warlock or cleric?

trying to bridge the reptilian gap I wondered if his good was less emotional and more Vulcan but still perhaps LG.

I like your idea better!

 

[Micah Sweet]

That’s the thing.

That's one reason why I want just get rid of alignment. Stories are far more interesting without this bizarre labelling of objective good and evil. Just tell the story and let the listener decide who's good!

Regarding to that, I find many attempts to make traditionally evil races such as orcs or drow less problematic rather meh. Usually they start with some sort of "sure, the orcs who follow Gruumsh/drow who follow Lolth are evil, but there are other groups that are good!" And I have nothing against adding more diversity and having those other groups, but it still fails to properly interrogate the nature of 'evil.' Like why many drow actually follow Lolth? Does Lolth actually have some legit point? These Lolthist drow probably wouldn't see themselves as evil; give them an understandable angle which may be antagonistic to many people, but make it more interesting than just 'evil.'

Because anything more than what they're doing would threaten the brand.

 

[Oofta]

Fun!

I thought about something that subverted expectations too. I was thinking about a yuan ti that followed a coatl. Maybe a good aligned warlock or cleric?

trying to bridge the reptilian gap I wondered if his good was less emotional and more Vulcan but still perhaps LG.

I like your idea better!

Most of the drow that reject Lollth in my campaign have decided on a life of logic and asceticism and are called grey elves. So basically drow are Romulans, grey elves are Vulcans.

 

[Argyle King]

I can see a couple of spins on the Gruumsh story. One is that Gruumsh is simply a liar, that he was given a fair shake but was never satisfied with the negotiations and always wanted more. Even though he was given an equal amount in the eyes of everyone else, in his eyes (eye?) he was given next to nothing. If given the forest, he wanted the minerals from the mountains. If given the mountains he wanted the fertile valleys and so on.

But as written, the FR lore is pretty bad. Gruumsh exists in my campaign world, but he's one of the Jotun of Norse mythology and kin to the evil giants there (not all Jotun were giants, and my version only uses Norse mythology as a starting point anyway).

So what would the "new gospel" of Gruumsh look like?

That's a good question.

As you said, there are a couple of different ways the story could be spun.

If the character were to discover that much of their upbringing was a lie, I think it could be interesting to explore what it's like to wrestle with now knowing the truth while carrying the pain of disillusionment. What would it mean for a character to realize "wait... we -and more importantly, I- actually are the bad guys"? Taking this path might mean the character goes on a journey of self-discovery and writing a new story for those willing to hear it: like an Orcish Buddha.

If the character were to discover that parts of the story had been cut out to fit an agenda, that could take the form of carrying a blasphemous gospel. Orc leaders would oppose it because it could undermine their eons-long justification of waging war without a particular end-goal in mind; leaders of other groups would oppose it because it may bring to light that they're not the heroes they had thought they were. So, what does that mean for the OG Cleric? Lame answer, but I don't know. Maybe the part of the story which was cut out was that there is actually a place set aside for orcs somewhere -some sort of mythical Orcish Garden of Eden. In that case, there are further complications because others may want the resources found there. To take a cliche route, this may mean borrowing heavily from the movie Water World, the Mad Max movie with the kids and the airplane, and Oregon Trail.

It's an idea I have in a notebook somewhere. I haven't put much thought into what the new gospel would actually say.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

They may be capable of affection, but they're still merciless murder hobos. It's why ours are indoor only.

They TEND towards being merciless murder hobos.

We had 2 Maine Coons, a brother & sister. Sis was smaller, but was an avid hunter of whatever made it inside the house.

Her bro? The only thing he EVER succeeded in hunting down were bags of Tender Vittles, obtained Ocean’s Eleven style. I watched bugs walk within inches of his paws that he didn’t swat at until they were 6+’ away. And yes, he watched them get close and then get away.

 

[Steampunkette]

I agree that the Lucifer thing has many interpretations. So, I don't find that particularly useful here, but it was an easily identifiable story.

In terms of good/evil, it appears that many of these interpretations are very ego-centric. That is to say that the bunnies, angels, and such are not really good/evil because they do not act in accordance with the human definitions of what those things are. With that in mind, how it is any more (or less) valid for a human being to judge the actions of a bunny, angel, or devil as not being a real (as defined by human interpretation) version of good/evil any more than the same judgement can be made when looking at Orcish behavior and culture?

Good and Evil are externally defined in relation to the narrative, Argyle. An Orc is individually good or evil based on the morality defined by the setting. So the Writer of the setting's morality as interpreted by the DM and Players.

This is because of certain assumptions: Free Will and Sapience.

The Bunny has Free Will but is not sapient, so it eats it's young and is not evil.

The Angel is Sapient, but has no free will, so it performs whatever deeds it is ordered to without compunction.

You've gotta be free to make a choice to be culpable for your actions, and aware of the implications of your choice, for morality to mean anything at all.

 

[Steampunkette]

They TEND towards being merciless murder hobos.

We had 2 Maine Coons, a brother & sister. Sis was smaller, but was an avid hunter of whatever made it inside the house.

Her bro? The only thing he EVER succeeded in hunting down were bags of Tender Vittles, obtained Ocean’s Eleven style. I watched bugs walk within inches of his paws that he didn’t swat at until they were 6+’ away. And yes, he watched them get close and then get away.

Worth Noting: Cat's can barely see within one foot of their face.

The way their eyes are positioned and the structure of the eye makes them very good at pouncing at a distance. But once something is close it becomes a fuzzy shape that they can't really focus on.

Part of why they have whiskers.

 

[Argyle King]

Good and Evil are externally defined in relation to the narrative, Argyle. An Orc is individually good or evil based on the morality defined by the setting. So the Writer of the setting's morality as interpreted by the DM and Players.

This is because of certain assumptions: Free Will and Sapience.

The Bunny has Free Will but is not sapient, so it eats it's young and is not evil.

The Angel is Sapient, but has no free will, so it performs whatever deeds it is ordered to without compunction.

You've gotta be free to make a choice to be culpable for your actions, and aware of the implications of your choice, for morality to mean anything at all.

Good points.

How does that intersect with settings in which orcs are more of the Tolkien variety? Meaning, they were created with some form of bio-magical-engineering to serve an evil overlord?

In D&D, the question I've seen raised elsewhere is one of exploring nature vs nurture. What capacity does a being have to reject its inherent programming? And, of importance to PCs wanting to be "good," at what point can it be justified to say that my need to stab a thing in the face to reach the treasure behind it outweighs the chance that the slavering hordes in front of me are redeemable? Heck, what does it even mean to be redeemable?

With something like an angel, it seems a bit egotistical to assume that I have some better understanding of good & evil than a cosmic being (said to be) crafted from some manner of elemental goodness. Typically, I think that's beyond the scope of normal play. In a conversation about morality, ethics, sentience, and action, I think it's worth exploring.

In the case of the redcap, we're saying it's evil because it's created to be; in the case of an orc or a drow (in a world where divine entities tangibly exist) we're saying that how they were crafted doesn't define how they are now at this point. For a redcap, looking like the guy who hangs out at the corner of the gas station down the road from my house isn't enough to say it counts as humanoid, but -for other creatures- it does count.