Killing as fun and games: a question for the Good Guys

[Sound of Azure]

I cannot image how 'good' and 'neutral' people could ever come to enjoy killing as fun and games.
In other words, I cannot figure out a way to save Medegia, assuming the Canon restrictions that:

Medegia receives no outside help, planar or native.
Medegian people have nowhere to flee or hide.
Medegian people, have no access to artifacts or relics.
Medegian people, have no adventurers, to save them.
Medegian people, are on their own.

Yours Sincerely
Edena_of_Neith

The trouble is, the canon restrictions took place in a time line where the nation of Midegia had little/no warning. In our hypothetical situation, they have 100 years to get their act into gear.

Points 3 and 4 are no longer necessarily true, nor do points 1 and 5 have to remain true. Even 2 could be changed with the right institutions in place.

 

[Mallus]

Sometimes killing is involved, and sometimes it isn't.

But usually it is.

Good people wouldn't enjoy it (killing), even if it is necessary.

Whereas good players enjoy killing %95 of the time, even if they're collateral deaths. And they especially like the killing if a critical hit is involved. This is the bedrock moral truth of D&D.

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

That's what player characters are for.

If you have a moral quandry about killing Ivid, find a way to raise him from undead and attone for his evil, or banish the army, or put it out of phase, or banish it to an evil plane, have a sleeping plague decimate the army, or shift the good aligned folk to a good plane. There are any number of imaginative solutions. EDIT: Not to mention a Frodo-esque character, who doesn't have to be high level to achieve the end required.

If I were the leader of Medegia, I would have had my clerics throw a foreseeing into the future.
What they saw would surely have alerted me to the imminent destruction of my country.

I would have begged the nymph in the forest to help us, pointing out that her forest would be put to the torch by these marauders.
Had she helped, her Nymph's Aura would have struck down the invaders by the thousands.

I would have used the old Polymorph Other to change orcs into white dragons (in the old rules, an automatic mental change to dragon is ensured) and watched the fun. Or changed them into white puddings and green slimes. Or how about beholders? Or illithid? Or even purple worms (mashed orc, anyone?) Or even nymphs, if the spell would change their minds as well so they gained the full powers.

I would have had my priests Cause Disease on the enemy army, as you suggested, something particularly devastating like the Black Death. Then had Fire Elementals burn anyone trying to escape into Medegia.

Trees are amazingly strong. I would have begged the Treants to activate the trees. And watch as giant oak trees swept orcs up by the dozens and crushed them (ala Isengard in the film.)

Rock to Mud could have been used to sink attackers, or their war machines, or to lure them into structures which were then collapsed.

Heck, I would have gathered every mage and priest available, and brainstormed for *any* answer. And personally gone and begged the 'monstrous' population to help.

-

Unfortunately, what goes around, comes around. Every tactic I used or thought of, the superior (more powerful) opponents working for Ivid could also have used.
But at least I would have gone down fighting, and Medegia would have been remembered for it's audacious final defense.

That's from a 'good guy' perspective. Sadly, I still go down in that scenario. Because every trick I can play, they can play better. (sighs)

 

[WillieW]

Then you definitely need a Frodo.

 

[Sound of Azure]

But usually it is.

Whereas good players enjoy killing %95 of the time, even if they're collateral deaths. And they especially like the killing if a critical hit is involved. This is the bedrock moral truth of D&D.

Sure. I'd say that has more to do with winning, and the show of power (for what ever purpose) and/or clever thinking. In other words, overcoming a challenge.

People like to win, and critical hits (and rolling high on dice) would seem to satiate that desire. All in my opinion, of course.

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

Frodo is a classic conception, yes.
The idea of an individual or several individuals embarking on a quest to save everyone, is a classic. In countless books and films it is there.

It's a great idea, and much of what D&D is based on, is that: It's heroic roleplaying at it's finest.

-

I was just suppositioning that Medegia had no Frodo, no adventurers, to quest and save it.
They just had to figure out a way to save themselves, defend themselves, against Ivid's juggernaut.

(looks completely stumped)

I can't figure out a way for them to succeed and survive.

(just looks frustrated)

Why must the 'bad guy' always win, or lose only because the writer 'makes' him lose?
I want the 'good guys' to WIN, and win on their own. I want being 'good' to pay dividends!

(sighs, muses)

 

[WillieW]

Maybe you should just think of Ivid's juggernaut as a manifestation of imbalance such as occurs in nature. Locusts. Lemmings. Somewhat fiercer, but nonetheless unconquerable. Such things happen but the world doesn't end.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

Go ask a grizzled sergeant who has survived four tours of duty whether he sees killing as fun and games. With a few exceptions, I'm pretty sure the answer will be "No, it is a deadly serious thing."

As for your scenario of Medegia, sorry, it is a silly situation that I reject. The people of Medegia don't need to learn to kill, they need to learn to fight. Since you have set the boudaries of the scenario such that killing is what gains XP most rapidly, then they have no choice under your constraints. But if fighting is what matters, then they can train and practice, defeating each other without killing, researching new spells, learning to use them - gaining XP without killing. But since you have rejected that idea, based upon the canon of a game system that isn't based upon reality, but based on making a fun and intersting game, it cannot work.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

Frodo is a classic conception, yes.
The idea of an individual or several individuals embarking on a quest to save everyone, is a classic. In countless books and films it is there.

It's a great idea, and much of what D&D is based on, is that: It's heroic roleplaying at it's finest.

-

I was just suppositioning that Medegia had no Frodo, no adventurers, to quest and save it.
They just had to figure out a way to save themselves, defend themselves, against Ivid's juggernaut.

(looks completely stumped)

I can't figure out a way for them to succeed and survive.

(just looks frustrated)

Why must the 'bad guy' always win, or lose only because the writer 'makes' him lose?
I want the 'good guys' to WIN, and win on their own. I want being 'good' to pay dividends!

(sighs, muses)

But the bad guys would win because the game situation you have set up creates the situation - you have written it that way yourself in your post.

Good guys can win because the in most games there are not just good guys and that is all; there are bad guys (tyrants, thieves, orc tribes, viscious natural monsters etc.) to defeat in order to protect others, therefore the good guys can gain XP while remaining good. They don't enjoy the fighting and killing, but they do it because it is important.

If you set up a world where there are no challenges at present to gain XP from, and then you declare that they can't get enough XP by other means, then no, that world is doomed unless they create the challenges themselves.

 

[Edena_of_Neith]

Ok, to answer the Rebukes (not Rebuttals, but Rebukes ...)

I didn't set the scenario up, guys. TSR did.
TSR left Medegia out in the cold, without allies or hope of allies. TSR left Medegia without a capable fighting force or capable leadership, facing a juggernaut of an army sent by a madman and led by demons and madmen.
It's not *my* fault that things are so bleak for Medegia. Blame the Canon.

It's also not my fault that *practice* does not grant experience. But it doesn't. (Or, at least, it grants experience very slowly compared to active adventuring.)
It's not my fault that practicing to the point of nearly killing your opponent, grants no experience.
Heck, with Lifeproofs up you can blast your opponent to -100 hp or even -1,000 hp, and you *still* gain no experience, because it was a practice bout. Not my fault. They set up the system.

I can Houserule that practice grants experience. Fine and well.
But if I do, then *Ivid's* hosts can practice also, and they gain experience as well. Result: no change.
I can Houserule that treasure and magical items grant experience when obtained or even when obtained as gifts. But Ivid can then pull the same stunt. Result: No change.

Actually, there is a change. Ivid's forces would have eagerly practiced, so they could kill better. The peaceful folk of Medegia, would not have practiced as hard. Score 1 for Ivid.

-

OF COURSE the people of Medegia viewed war and killing as SERIOUS. They should have: they all died in war! They were slaughtered in war! It doesn't get more serious than that.
EVERYONE in the Greyhawk Wars who was of a normal personality, a sane personality, viewed the Greyhawk Wars as deadly serious. And they fought for their lives with equally deadly seriousness.

Ivid's forces won and destroyed Medegia because they were more powerful than Medegia's army.
They were more powerful because they had practiced killing, embraced Evil, and had gained great powers by doing so.
The people of Medegia were weaker because they were peaceful, went about normal lives, and left the powermongering to the powermongers. What champions they had, were not powerful enough (especially at Pontylvers (sp?)) to protect their people.
It WAS a matter of power: sheer power. The Bad Guys won through sheer power.

That's how TSR set it up.