D&D General Inherently Evil?

[DEFCON 1]

Gonna be honest here:

A big part of my objection of 'inherently evil' creatures is the fact that this label is used as a justification for killing/harming them.

Which historically is the point of calling any group inherently evil.

Yep. I mean what exactly is the reason or need to have a race considered "inherently evil" or "inherently good"? What is gained by having that? I think you are absolutely right in that it's an easy shorthand for allowing the players to kill them with little to no thought about the morality of such action.

But thing is... we as a society right now in the 21st century have no need for anything of that sort-- because countless amounts of our 21st century entertainments already do that. Thousands upon thousands of video games have us slaughtering innumerable people with little to no thought on the morality, but merely as a game mechanic. Countless board games involve death on a grand scale and almost all of our thoughts about that are merely regarding the strategic ability and gain for doing so to increase our scores. Movies and television shows represent the wholesale murder of every single type of creature in existence as purely a plot point. D&D has always primarily been designed for combating other creatures and killing them and taking their stuff. No moral justification ever necessary. So there's just no need for an "inherently evil" race, because the D&D game is built from the ground up on the deaths of other creatures (sentient and otherwise) just as the mechanic for which the game is played.

It seems to me that the only other time where the desire for an inherently evil or good race ever seems to come up is when you have that one person who wants to play the lone character that goes against their nature. They all want to be Drizzt. The desire to be a special snowflake runs deep in our gaming worldview, because it somehow seems like a more difficult or interesting roleplay challenge. The one bright light in the sea of darkness.

The only problem with that though is the trope has been done over and over and over and over so many freaking times that it's no longer impressive when someone tries it... and in fact many times it's just sad. Because they think that sort of background puts them halfway to an interesting character already. But in point of fact, those shortcuts do not in any way make me think your character is more interesting if the way you play it is bland and uninvolving. I will 10 out of 10 times take the player who can be engaging, make interesting choices, and push themselves, their fellows players, and the story forward... even if their character is just a stock human being who grew up in a good home with all of their family still living quietly and happily back home with no one having been killed to compel the character to adventure and their character abilities just came about through growing up and learning them and no strange ritual or encounter with a crazed being instilling them in them.

Playing a character with a "bland" backstory like that and still being a compelling and awesome character in the game? THAT'S the impressive part. And in truth makes you more of a special snowflake player and character than any of the other hundreds of Cantina-race lone wolves who have seen their entire families murdered and fridged, and which has sent them out into the world with a desperate need for adventure and revenge.

 

[akr71]

Make them brutal. Not just violent toward outsiders. But internally brutal. A lot of people talk about "Alpha Wolves" as if it were a positive and natural thing, which it isn't by any stretch of the imagination, but apply that to your Gnolls.

Not to derail the thread, but the 'brutal' comment is key I think. I love dogs. I think wolves are beautiful majestic animals. I few months ago I watched a documentary about arctic wolves. At one point a rogue/lone wolf was trespassing on the packs' territory. He avoided them for a bit, but they eventually tracked him down. They didn't just chase off the trespasser, they didn't kill and consume the trespasser as food. They attacked as a pack until he was so badly injured, that he couldn't defend himself, couldn't even move. Then the pack left. They left the trespasser to suffer and die in what we would consider an inhumane manner (because they are wolves, not humans).

Were those wolves evil? No. Were they brutal? Absolutely.

To the OP, I would avoid 'inherently evil' humanoids altogether. As others have said, if you remove free will, then is it even evil?

 

[Lyxen]

Were those wolves evil? No. Were they brutal? Absolutely.

Yes, they committed an evil act, which in itself does not mean that they are evil. Once more, to quote the PH "few people are perfectly and consistently faithful to the precepts of their alignment."

And I think it's a good example because of course alignment is a human concept, but it still covers non-human / low intelligence actions.

To the OP, I would avoid 'inherently evil' humanoids altogether. As others have said, if you remove free will, then is it even evil?

Because free will is not something which is absolute, for once, and because influence is something that happens even if you have free will.

 

[Oofta]

Not to derail the thread, but the 'brutal' comment is key I think. I love dogs. I think wolves are beautiful majestic animals. I few months ago I watched a documentary about arctic wolves. At one point a rogue/lone wolf was trespassing on the packs' territory. He avoided them for a bit, but they eventually tracked him down. They didn't just chase off the trespasser, they didn't kill and consume the trespasser as food. They attacked as a pack until he was so badly injured, that he couldn't defend himself, couldn't even move. Then the pack left. They left the trespasser to suffer and die in what we would consider an inhumane manner (because they are wolves, not humans).

Were those wolves evil? No. Were they brutal? Absolutely.

To the OP, I would avoid 'inherently evil' humanoids altogether. As others have said, if you remove free will, then is it even evil?

They weren't evil. They weren't even particularly brutal. They were efficient. They did not look at the interloper as food, they looked at them as competition, someone that could be consuming prey that they needed.

They did what they needed to do to stop the drain on their resources, nothing more, nothing less. Had they continued to attack the lone wolf there's a chance one of their pack would have sustained an unnecessary injury. They knew they had incapacitated the threat to their pack and didn't need to expend more resources or take any additional risks. Efficient.

 

[Steampunkette]

So we are talking anything that is sapient eating anything that is sapient becomes cannibalism?

I'm suddenly reminded of yet one more thing I hated in Baldur's Gate 3, you can eat a 'roast dwarf', in combat no less, to regain hit points.

As any race.

Yup! That's my take on it. Otherwise "Elf Kabobs" being sold on a street corner in Athkatla becomes acceptable...

You can't expand what cannibalism is just because you want Thri-kreen or gnolls to be more wicked. Humans eating demons would be gross, and possibly lethal(I can't imagine eating bits of the abyss embodied into living form is good for you), but it's not cannibalism.

Yes, as a matter of fact, I can! That's how Language works, you see. You can definitely consider your definition to be the "One True Definition", I can express my belief that it's a broader term which would encompass, say, intelligent aliens if they were ever to come to Earth, and society as a whole decides who is right going forward as one use or the other wins out.

But?

WotC agrees with me.

 

[Steampunkette]

What's the moral problem with cannibalism? I can see the taboo originating because of health concern and the contamination from the assumption that the cannibal kills an innocent to eat him (and the taboo against desecrating a corpse), but by itself, is there something morally wrong to eat sentient flesh? Using body parts of the deceased carries no moral value in itself: it's socially accepted with organ transplant. We don't see it as an evil necessity to save a life but as a thing that is morally neutral. I am pretty sure that if there were another sentient species, we'd readily eat them, much like we eat pork, whale, squids, dogs and monkeys, unless we had granted them the same rights as humans ; and then we wouldn't eat them not because it's morally wrong but because body part would presumably be as difficult to find as human ones are in the real world. Much like very few countries have actual laws against eating legally acquired human flesh ; it's just that it's impossible to find the required product. There is, for example, no legal problem with making human cheese (Breast Milk... Cheese? You've Got Questions, We've Got Answers). It's absolutely gross to me, but I think it results from the social taboo, not any moral explanation I can imagine against it, not different from the taboo I have against eating insects (which are a delicacy in many parts of the world).

So while your stance on cannibalism is that it's a moral wrong to eat sentient species and it was called man-eating because there was no other sentient species, my stance is that the taboo originated specifically from eating Homo sapiens after killing/desecrating it, not as a general taboo against eating sentient beings. It also depends on how alien you make your sentient species. If they are humans with pointy ears and darkvision and you consider orcs, humans and elves as six sexes of the same species, I can see a general taboo against sentient-eating emerging, as the taboo against "eating self" would apply. On the other hand, if you have a perfectly sentient species evolving with say, praying mantises like the thri-kreen, and praying mantis practice sexual cannibalism, would they evolve a taboo against eating humans?


In a fantasy world, I guess it would be a strongly contested practice and induce horror and be used as an excuse to go to war (these humans are hunting elfs like us! they say we taste like chicken!) and even within human communities the debate would be strong, but I don't see a published setting adressing it (they are eschewing a lot of things like gender inequalities, racism and slavery, I don't see them trying to include dietary habits of sentient species in a poly sentient species world ; especially if it's to have "it's OK to eat elves, but dwarf eating is gross!" and I can't really see it coming up a lot in a typical game anyway...). I'd also see a taboo against destroying corpses being much more prevalent, since it can block Raise Dead, so cremation would be seen as an evil thing to do to an opponent, even more than killing him, since you kill him and make his return more difficult.

The OP asked about an "inherently evil" biological species, the illithid came to mind, but I think their inherent evilness comes from other trait than their dietary and reproductive habits.

Wanted to separate this one out in particular...

Bodily Autonomy.

Very basic principle: Your body belongs to you even when you die. That's why people have, famously, had elaborate rituals for the dead. Preparing bodies for the afterlife, interring them for safekeeping underground or in caverns, preserving the body in pyramids, the shell left behind, for the person who can't do it themself.

It's why your wishes for what is done with your body are generally honored by your family. And when a family disobeys someone's final wishes (Like burying them when they wanted their ashes spread over a specific lake) is frowned upon and seen as selfish or ugly.

It's why you have to write a note that you wish to donate your body to science, rather than Science just taking it. Or Organ Donation, rather than hospitals just yoinking them out the instant your brain activity ceases to help other people in the same hospital.

The fact that it's a desecration plays a part in it, for sure, depending on your particular religious beliefs.

Add in the fact that people think cannibalism lets you take on the power or consume the -spirit- of the person you're eating?

Theft, Destruction of Property, Desecrating a Corpse all rolled into one.

 

[Voadam]

The big difference between normal animals and outsiders is sentience.

I see no reason to say that sentient inherently evil D&D creatures have no free will so they are not actually evil.

Inherent can be their baseline that their free will works from as a base.

Saying inherent means they cannot go against it is taking a hyper-technical definition of inherent to remove the ordinary use of the terms.

For most demons even though they are at base elementals of evil and angels are elementals of good, that does not mean they cannot go against those inherent natures in standard D&D. Angels can fall. Demons can be redeemed. Either on their own or through external influences. This has happened numerous times in D&D history.

You can set up outsiders to be thinking beings completely bound by being good or evil and incapable of stepping out of those types of actions, but that is not the standard D&D setup. It would be really hard to actually implement consistently as a DM.

 

[Alzrius]

For most demons even though they are at base elementals of evil and angels are elementals of good, that does not mean they cannot go against those inherent natures in standard D&D. Angels can fall. Demons can be redeemed. Either on their own or through external influences. This has happened numerous times in D&D history.

You can set up outsiders to be thinking beings completely bound by being good or evil and incapable of stepping out of those types of actions, but that is not the standard D&D setup. It would be really hard to actually implement consistently as a DM.

I agree completely. Just look at Fall-From-Grace (Dragon #264) or Eludecia the Succubus Paladin, to name a few.

 

[akr71]

They weren't evil. They weren't even particularly brutal. They were efficient. They did not look at the interloper as food, they looked at them as competition, someone that could be consuming prey that they needed.

They did what they needed to do to stop the drain on their resources, nothing more, nothing less. Had they continued to attack the lone wolf there's a chance one of their pack would have sustained an unnecessary injury. They knew they had incapacitated the threat to their pack and didn't need to expend more resources or take any additional risks. Efficient.

True enough. I was trying to illustrate that the animal world is brutal, but that doesn't mean evil. It might look evil if you insist on putting human sensibilities on it.

 

[Lyxen]

The big difference between normal animals and outsiders is sentience.

Also, just as there is a continuum between total free will and absolute mental slavery, there is a continuum between a rock and a fully sentient being. Remember that a century ago, some people thought that animals and even children could not really feel pain, for example.

The old classification saying that only humans are sentient on earth has been eroded over time, and in particular the most intelligent mammals (wolves are certainly in that category) are now considered to have a part of sentience.

D&D is even richer than our real world, and there are almost infinite combinations that can be imagined and used here. You might want to restrain yourselves for reasons of taste (which are fine), but there is nothing in the game that forbids low or high sentience inherently evil or good beings. Moreover, it is a common fantasy trope, so perfectly appropriate to the genre.

You can set up outsiders to be thinking beings completely bound by being good or evil and incapable of stepping out of those types of actions, but that is not the standard D&D setup. It would be really hard to actually implement consistently as a DM.

I would also find them less interesting to play, to be honest.