Is D&D a Moral Universe?

[shilsen]

I'm in the "amoral universe", or if one prefers, "neutral universe" category. The D&D universe seems to be fairly well-balanced between law and chaos, good and evil. This balance - as jayaint points out above - is maintained mainly through conflict.

[Insert tongue in cheek]On the other hand, since paladins are a core class and blackguards are a PrC, and Protection from Evil as written is stronger than Prot. from Evil/Law/Chaos, perhaps good does have a slight preponderance in its favor.[Remove tongue from cheek]

 

[hong]

D&D is a Mr Universe. Whoever has the most hit points wins.

 

[Umbran]

I don't think the Core Rules really stipulate it one way or another. The rules present options, and it is up to the DM to decide exactly how it plays out.

On the whole, I think the game is best played with an amoral or slightly immoral universe. If the universe is really moral, then in the long run it does not matter if the PCs fight the good fight or not, because good will win in the end.

Good could have fewer but more elite forces, while Evil is numerous, ruthless, but not quite as capable. That isn't the direction they chose.

Mirror images are available, but it is up to the DM to decide what's actually used. Blackguards are in the DMG as an option. Do any actually show up in the campaign? Only your DM knows for sure.

In general, it is a bit more difficult to build good drama when the opposition is generally weaker than the main character, even when they are more numerous. You don't get the same sense of risk fighting a goblin as when fighting an ogre, even if there's going to be a whole lot more goblins after this one.

 

[John Morrow]

My thought is that 3/3.5 tries very hard to make the universe so symmetrical as to be amoral. If Good has Holy Word, Evil should have Blasphemy. If Good has paladins, Evil should have blackguards. If Good has holy swords, Evil should have unholy ones. The two sides are equally powerful. Is the universe operating on a kind of Manichean idea? I don't know my history of philosophy well enough.

I think the D&D universe is a blank slate such that the drama of the individual characters, both PC and NPC, create the moral tone of the setting. Good and Evil are not going to win their battles based on equal equipment and classes but on building uneven numbers and overall cleverness and effectiveness.

Personally, I think you can have balance (favoring neither Good nor Evil) without having all this mirror-imaging. Good could have fewer but more elite forces, while Evil is numerous, ruthless, but not quite as capable. That isn't the direction they chose.

You could also have Evil be fewer in number but more powerful and elite and Good being the numerous innocent rabble that't not as effective. All that's true, but I think the way that D&D does it is more versatile and easy to adapt.

 

[Greatwyrm]

Well, here's one view...

Evil will always win, because good is dumb.

 

[nopantsyet]

I think it was created in such a way as to leave that open to interpretation. Given powerful forces for Good, Evil and Neutrality, you can really arrange whatever morality you wish. (Speaking for the core cosmology.)

Speaking for my own interpretation, my multiverse is not inherently moral. It inherently Is. (I will explain.) The different groups of "good" and "evil" creatures are governed by more complex agendas, which may or may not correlate to a particular morality.

However, that is irrelevant. The multiverse is the manifestation of a higher power, barely comprehensible to even the greatest of gods. Translated from the highest gods' understanding and language to that of the common man, they are Is and Not, which represent existence and destruction on a metaveral level. Constantly striving against eachother Is to be and Not to disjoin in a cyclical pattern.

This is a rather imporant balance to see maintained, but fortunately there is a large margin for oscillation. Planes wink into and out of existance at an alarming rate. Think of it as Oroboros--two snakes eating eachothers' tails. At the edges, where they meet, an energy is manifest that results in brutal, chaotic and colorful worlds that are in turmoil at every planar level. In a very real, but mostly incomprehensible way, the results of those conflicts--even minor ones--contribute the the fate of that world.

No, nothing exceptionally unique. But it's nice to have something you can call "incomprehensible" in a fantasy game. It justifies the multiverse being too disparate to have an inherent morality. And its interesting to imagine what the calmer worlds might be like. What does that even mean, when conflict and struggle are an inherent part of life?

It also means there are migrant gods...It's nice when eons of being "God of Small Containers," you are finally promoted to "God of Humidity" on another. And feel bad for the worlds where those are major dieties! Think of the domain spells!

 

[M.L. Martin]

I think the core rules and most of the 'standard D&D' settings assume a morally dualistic universe--Good and Evil are equal and opposite, locked in unending conflict in which neither can (or in some cases should) ever triumph. Dragonlance makes this explicit, and I think you find it in Greyhawk, the Forgotten Realms, and the extraplanar structure of the core game as well. As an example of the last, the souls of the damned can ascend to demonic or devilish stature, just as the righteous dead become angelic.

The farther you get away from the 'core', the farther you can get from the Manichean approach. Ravenloft, for example, could be characterized as either Evil-dominant or Good-dominant, depending on what conclusions you want to draw from the evidence.

FWIW, Middle-Earth is a 'Good-dominant' world, and a strong argument could be made for the Star Wars Galaxy as well.

Matthew L. Martin

 

[Torm]

I agree with what several others have said: The design of the game is amoral, to allow flexibility.

The actual answer to your question is subjective to every gaming group and gamer: Inquire Within.

 

[Voadam]

In the thread on shilsen's weird paladin, the issue came up (at least for me) of whether the D&D universe is an intrinsically moral one. Is the D&D universe one whose nature is intrinsically good, one in which evil doers are ultimately punished and those who do good, ultimately rewarded? Or is D&D's a universe in which life is not fair, in which evil has just as good a chance of triumphing as good and whose natural laws are ultimately indifferent?

From reading the core rules, I'm not sure of which model I favour. So, what do people think? Is D&D like the universe the existentialists believe in, one in which you can be good but the universe is not on your side? Or one in which most theistic people believe in, one in which although things are often unfair, in the end the intrinsically good nature of the universe will result in justice ultimately prevailing? Does D&D occupy a single position on this issue or is it incoherent? Does D&D give you the option of running things either way or does it force you to share its position?

Under core rules there is an afterlife, those who go to the evil ones are tormented, those who go to the good ones end up in heaven.

The key issue is "ultimately".

In FR however when you die where you end up (tormented or rewarded) depends on your standing with your one patron god. Good and Evil is not really a factor.

In Ravenloft evil doers are punished, that's the whole point of the dark lords and those who succumb to evil temptations. Of course innocents and heroes suffer as well and the only rewards are also poisoned curses of the dark powers. Since it is all hateful and malicious I would say it is an evil dominated world, although an argument can be made that the punishment of evil is good period.

Of course with a game that has reincarnation, it is not hard to posit a Karma system as well. It doesn't really mesh with druidic reincarnation though as the form has nothing to do with past sins or good lives.

And if you are talking about on the campaign story level as opposed to the game world cosmological level then good through the instrumentality of the PCs is designed to triumph over evil. That is the basic set up of the game. Call of Cthulhu and Ravenloft would be examples where heroes deal with evil but do not expect to ultimately triumph over them, just deal with lesser levels that are within their powers to affect.

 

[Voadam]

Personally, I think you can have balance (favoring neither Good nor Evil) without having all this mirror-imaging. Good could have fewer but more elite forces, while Evil is numerous, ruthless, but not quite as capable. That isn't the direction they chose.

It isn't? How many fiends do you see in the MM compared to celestial types? Fiends top out at CR 20 with pit fiends and balors. Compare them to the Solar.

Look at dragons. Evil chromatic and good metallic have equal numbers of species but the metallics as a group compare significantly better on power and CR ratings than their evil counterparts.

How many good creatures in the MM compared to evil ones? Evil has numbers, but good has the top of the CR chart dominated.