D&D General Identity of Monsters Post-Alignment (+)

[AbdulAlhazred]

So, firstly, lets not retread old ground. The game is changing, lets talk about how to use classic intelligent monsters in a game where they have no assumed alignment, and no racial monocultures. Please do not try to rehash the argument happening in another thread.

If you've been doing so for years, share your stories! If you have ideas or questions about specific monsters and what can set them apart from eachother without having monocultures or assumed moral natures, ask!

Yeah, I never was terribly fond of classic D&D's "1 monster = 1 culture" thing. I mean, forget monsters, they did it for EVERY race, except MAYBE humans, and even then we have mostly had a fairly Western European view of humanity as well...

So, I did kind of leverage the classic D&D races and subraces to a degree in my original ur-D&D campaign, but I was about 14 then too, and it was 1976... As it evolved conceptually there are various 'elvish' cultures. Depending on the exact rule set in use at that time they have had slightly different abilities, but mostly they're just different traditions. Same with dwarves, there are several dwarf cultures. Monster races too, each goblin tribe has different traditions. Some are fairly friendly/peaceful, others not so much, but calling them 'good' or 'evil' would be too simplistic.

Dragons OTOH, I always conceived of them as really sort of having this very polarized kind of set of attitudes. The Chromatics really are just, perhaps culturally, 'evil', and the Metallics 'good'. I do like how 4e shaded that though, all dragons are giant egos which don't really brook anyone 'disrespecting' them, and are all quite capable of 'teaching you a lesson'. The chromatics are brutal and greedy, the metallics see themselves as patrons and upholders of virtue, but they are just as greedy and often it is hard to tell the two apart.

Orcs, they all have a certain sense of honor according to their own ideals. You might not like it, and they might be perfectly fine with the idea of eating you, but... Of course this is only the orcs of the Midrealms. Other orcs are different! The ones in the far north are xenophobic.

There's a Dragonborn culture (located a long way from the main campaign area) which is all terribly concerned with 'face' and other people's perceptions of their actions. Presumably they are only one possible cultural type, but it is a minor race that hasn't really been elucidated much.

Oh, and hobgoblins of the Hobgoblin Hills love pizza. Favorite toppings vary by individual.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

To me the obvious elephant in the room is orcs. I grew up with the Hobbit and to a lesser degree LotR. Tolkien's goblins/orcs were not universally evil, but often did evil things because they were compelled to by a greater evil. I guess WoW and others have more ambiguous orcs now, but I've always given them a fluid alignment.

I would consider Tolkien Orcs to be unredeemably and universally evil, having been created as such. Moreover they basically are pawns of the will of their masters, though it seems they have some independent ability to think and act on their own. Even so, they never act in a kind or 'good' manner. Of course you could invoke various cultural perspectives on that perhaps.

Tolkien also admitted freely that they were a stand-in for 'oriental people', in other words a racial/cultural stereotype, of the worst kind no less.

So, yeah, I would consider that any baggage from the Tolkien part of orcs is pretty much toxic. Tainted at the very least.

 

[Chaosmancer]

To the kobolds this is smart.
To everyone who is used to squish kobolds it looks cowardly.
And as the original topic were mercenaries, when they tend to run unless they have superior numbers they are not very good mercenaries (and certainly not very well paid ones).

How does that make them bland? What is the difference between kobolds and gnomes when you remove all stereotypes and everything "could be a lie"? Except for their looks nothing, despite being two entirely different species.

I'm reminded of something that I read once on a thread about making a goddess of commoners, poison and fate.

The idea of a "fair fight" is a lie perpetuated by the strong. Of course the Knight with his hundreds of hours of martial training, high-grade armor that protects him from harm and expensive weapon that can kill a man with a single blow wants a "fair fight" in a 1v1 match in an open field against a man with no training, no weapons, and no armor. Heck, he'll even give the noobs weapons and armor, it isn't like the guy knows how to use them.

Using traps, ambushes and poisons is perfectly fair. These are things that can level the playing field between the weak and the strong.

And so, why label fighting smart as being "cowardly" when the only people who can afford to be "brave" in a life or death situation are those who are more powerful than their peers. Call me a coward all you want, my goal is to live and get home to my family, not die so someone else can claim I did "the honorable thing" by fighting someone ten times my weight and triple my size swinging a weapon bigger than my entire body. That's just giving the big guy exactly what he wants.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

What have folks done with Gnolls?

I’m actually wondering where to put them in my Islands World setting, but I definitely think I’ll make them more like spotted Hyenas. Social, pack-oriented, generally matriarchal in their more traditional groups, with women being bigger and stronger than men, etc.

Their primary native languages would all be very tonal, as well.

I feel like having an incredible bite would impact everyday habits, but I’m blank on how ATM.

There are a few gnoll cultures in Erithnoi. Khem is a land occupied by a nomadic gnoll culture. They are fairly excitable and once they get revved up they are likely to go a bit nuts and then all kinds of stuff happens. OTOH they are extremely good at exploiting their environment and have a fairly well-developed material culture (albeit they travel light and don't need a lot of equipment). Various clans have different traditions, although they are all one linguistic/cultural group. They are amenable to trade, and do so on fair terms. At other times some of them are known to hunt outsiders. Overall they are feared and mistrusted, but there are people who interact with them regularly.

In the far south are another group of gnolls. They became corrupted by the demon lord Yeenoghu, though not all of them are mindless demon worshippers. While demon worship is a somewhat nihilistic kind of practice, they nevertheless have a culture, though it is fairly 'typical MM gnoll' in tenor.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

No idea why you bring real world references into it.
Kobolds being cowardly alone and relying on numbers was and still is one of their defining traits over all editions which had nothing to do with alignment.
If you remove every negative (and why stop just with the negative ones?) characteristic for everyone because at some point something similar was used as an insult in the real world you end up with bland and generic races as the "it could be a lie" can be used about every defining trait for everyone.

I think the thing with Kobolds started with the folklore it was built from, a small trouble-making spirit which hid in the dark. They were supposedly the reason why copper would be spoiled (nickel contamination). That was evolved into one of the humanoid types defined to represent different grades of troops in Chainmail's fantasy supplement, where they were the very weakest type. Naturally they had poor morale, that was how the system worked.

OD&D simply brought in all those creatures wholesale, so they became these little doglike guys. The one in the 1e MM looks kind of like a dog with small horns and weird ears, and either mail armor, or else scales, but it is hard to be sure which it is, though I lean towards the mail. Later they acquired their lizard-like traits and then, presumably based on that, a draconic affinity.

So, I agree it was not portrayed as some sort of slur on kobolds. More a racial characteristic inherent to their natures, that they are little scavanger-type humanoids who are too small to fight toe-to-toe with bigger folk. They are smart enough not to try. They already had a sneakiness in their background from folklore, and this simply got played up as a way to explain their overall nature, sneaky trap-building scavangers who don't fight, at least fairly. Then of course they got tarred with the 'humanoids are evil' brush, but that was just basically a Gygax thing.

 

[dave2008]

I would consider Tolkien Orcs to be unredeemably and universally evil, having been created as such. Moreover they basically are pawns of the will of their masters, though it seems they have some independent ability to think and act on their own. Even so, they never act in a kind or 'good' manner. Of course you could invoke various cultural perspectives on that perhaps.

Have you read the hobbit? They were most definitely not Evil in that book. He later changed them when he wrote the silmarlion and LotR, but originally they were not big evil

Even in LotR the disperse once Sauron and the evil driving them is gone

Tolkien also admitted freely that they were a stand-in for 'oriental people', in other words a racial/cultural stereotype, of the worst kind no less.

So, yeah, I would consider that any baggage from the Tolkien part of orcs is pretty much toxic. Tainted at the very least.

I believe he specifically described them as being like mongrels

 

[tetrasodium]

I do kobolds as mainly focusing on two areas of industry. The first being the construction & maintenance of sewage & drainage systems beneath towns (obviously not the tunnels they live in). The second being attempting to compete with Kundarak for vaults where ensuring things within are as difficult to reach as possible, often to the point where the only way in & out is teleport between two unlinked warrens. Both are hardcore into tuckers kobolds territory & everyone knows you wait at the sign where you call out or perhaps ring a bell & wait for someone to greet you

 

[Hussar]

As far as the whole "cowardly" part of kobolds, Moldvay Basic describes them as:

These small, evil dog-like men... prefer to attack by ambush.

They are also given a morale of 6 (8 with a chieftain present) which means they have the lowest morale of any humanoid. All other humanoids range from 7-12. In fact, the only monster in Basic D&D with a lower Morale score is a normal rat. Non-combat humans also have a morale of 6.

So, cowardly is part of the race from very early days.

 

[Vaalingrade]

2e described them as cowardly and said these half-hit die humanoids liked to attack with "overwhelming odds or trickery" rather than one-on-one in a fair fight against a creature that was likely to have many more hp than they do.

So it straight up is the ISO Standard 'we hate smart people' rhetoric they used against bows and planes.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Have you read the hobbit? They were most definitely not Evil in that book. He later changed them when he wrote the silmarlion and LotR, but originally they were not big evil

Numerous times, it was the first thing I ever read. lol.

I don't recall any section of The Hobbit which contradicts the depiction of Orcs in LotR. More than that, LONG before Tolkien wrote The Hobbit he had firmly established the mythology and history of Middle Earth, and orcs place in it is quite clear. I am of the opinion there is nothing especially that changed here. Nor is it inconsistent, IMHO for Tolkien to assign various motives to orcs/goblins in The Hobbit which are not all centered on bloodlust, cannibalism, etc. My recollection of their motives in marching to war however were that they were after the gold that they knew Smaug was sleeping on. I don't know any higher motive they had, though certainly they might have also had beefs with elves and dwarves over issues where they weren't entirely the 'bad guys'. That doesn't make them GOOD, it just means nobody is perfect. I mean, IRL we can come up with similar analogies which do not let evil people off the hook or redeem them.

Even in LotR the disperse once Sauron and the evil driving them is gone

I believe he specifically described them as being like mongrels

They are described as a race made by Morgoth in the beginnings of the First Age by the corruption and domination of elves (that is presented as one, presumably true, account). I cannot say exactly what Tolkien might have believed, if anything, about their potential to be 'saved' in the absence of a 'dark lord' to rule over them. He never addressed this at all. They were 'stock evil'. At no time does an orc or goblin act out of mercy, compassion, love, or a will to improve itself or do good. Not in any published work of Tolkien of which I am aware.

In a letter, he described the inspiration for orcs being something like 'Mongols' and how they were intended to invoke the fear of 'oriental hordes' or something like that. You can find the text online, it has been quoted on this site at least once before.