D&D (2024) Playtest 8: Cantrips

[Chaosmancer]

Akshually... I didn't say influencing me without magic was evil. I said I was offended by a lot of it. Technically, I said:

"I am offended by lots of marketing and influencing, and politicians, and being forced to choose between bad choices, and I think Enchantment is the most evil spell school in the game. So yeah. If someone tries to manipulate me, I may get pissed."​

I can see where someone can think I meant both. But the thing they have in common is I don't want to be manipulated, whether magically, or nonmagically.

Even then, I recently posted an amendment to my position in post #344, clarifying that most magics are reasonably usable when fighting for one's life against an enemy, but what matters is using magic on innocents or those who don't mean you harm. Enchantment-users often think they are being soft, kind, or nonviolent when charming or dominating others, but that only matters when you don't want to kill an enemy/villain. But if you use it on an innocent, there is no question in my mind that you're being a villain yourself, no different than if you fireballed them. Murder is not the only unforgivable trespass.

I saw your clarification after I posted.

I largely don't disagree with your position, which is why it is so weird people seem to have taken such a strong stance against what I'm saying. It seems really basic to me.

 

[Mistwell]

So you are an absolute authority on the exact levels of morality that exist?

All morality? No of course not. For that scenario? Yes, absolutely. I think you'd fail a test of a portion of the "are you suffering from psychopathy" test if you'd say burning someone alive is morally equal to saving their life by briefly turning them back using a mental suggestion spell, yeah. That would be clearly a "difficulty telling the difference between right and wrong" issue.

You have the answers to perfect morality? Congratulations on your prizes for solving one of the longest running sections of philosophy.

I didn't say or imply that.

You have made a value judgement that mind control is less evil that killing people.

No I made a value judgement for that particular scenario then you decided to generalize the statement as a strawman.
For which I am thankful because it answers the question "Are you just saying this for a cheap shot on the Internet" rather than actually unable to tell the difference between right and wrong.

We find torture more evil than cleanly murdering someone (the idea of "humane" comes to mind). By stealing in that scenario the perpetrator has begun a process that led to the extended, potentially years long, torture and torment of an individual, potentially leading to their deaths. Is a six second death truly less horrific than a death that is extended over years, with immense suffering and shame?

Theft is pretty well universally considered a lesser evil than murder. I am unaware of any religion, any philosophy, humanism, legal code, tradition, or otherwise which would rank theft as a worse evil than murder. This would, again, be one of those "fails the psychopathy" question, if you actually meant it. But I am assuming this is just for argument sake.

And, the fact that you think the law is at all relevant here...

Law over the major felony topics is a reflection of a societies moral conclusions about these kinds of matters, often based directly on a societies greatest philosophers.

And, I think you seriously don't get the sheer unadulterated horror and pure evil that comes from forcing someone to expose themselves in public, against their will. You may need to revisit the concept of "A Fate Worse than Death"

It's not a fate worse than murder. Again, there is no moral code across the world that I know of that ranks it as WORSE than murdering people. Again, one of those "unable to tell the difference between right and wrong" type questions. That one is a softball ethics question - it has an actual generalized answer. Like the theft vs murder one.

 

[Mirrorrorrim]

I saw your clarification after I posted.

I largely don't disagree with your position, which is why it is so weird people seem to have taken such a strong stance against what I'm saying. It seems really basic to me.

Funnily enough? I can imagine playing an Anti-Enchanter dark hero who seeks evil casters who manipulate the minds of innocents, to punish them for crimes against individual sovereignty. "Go ahead, Jafar. Jump off the cliff. Now."

 

[Chaosmancer]

All morality? No of course not. For that scenario? Yes, absolutely. I think you'd fail a test of a portion of the "are you suffering from psychopathy" test if you'd say burning someone alive is morally equal to saving their life by briefly turning them back using a mental suggestion spell, yeah. That would be clearly a "difficulty telling the difference between right and wrong" issue.

So, while you pound the drums of me being a psychopath and you being a morally just and upright person... when did we get to comparing "I saved your life" versus "I killed you"? Because, to me, that sounds kind of like saying that a robber who pulls a gun, and threatens to murder someone for not putting the money in the bag is correct and good compared to the robber who shoots the teller and takes the money. Which, to me, kind of sounds like splitting hairs. I mean, if you want "well, I could have killed you instead" as the high point of morality... good luck with that.

Again, I don't see any value in this "which is MORE EVAL!!" in this discussion.

I didn't say or imply that.

You have definitely declared that you know which thing is more moral, without question! How is that not solving the problem of morality? I mean, whether or not killing someone can be moral is a huge debate. After all, is killing a serial killer who is sitting drinking coffee in Starbucks morally acceptable? That's not an easy question to answer, when you start digging down into the implications.

No I made a value judgement for that particular scenario then you decided to generalize the statement as a strawman.
For which I am thankful because it answers the question "Are you just saying this for a cheap shot on the Internet" rather than actually unable to tell the difference between right and wrong.

You just love accusing me of everything under the sun, don't you? I never GAVE a specific scenario, and your "do you murder someone or mind control them to leave" isn't specific either. Are you mind controlling a mother to abandon her child or murdering a suicide bomber in a park? Details matter in these things, and you just keep defaulting "but MURDER!" like that somehow removes any possible horror that comes from mind control.

Theft is pretty well universally considered a lesser evil than murder. I am unaware of any religion, any philosophy, humanism, legal code, tradition, or otherwise which would rank theft as a worse evil than murder. This would, again, be one of those "fails the psychopathy" question, if you actually meant it. But I am assuming this is just for argument sake.

So an action that leads to a swift painless end is more evil than an action that causes years of pain and torture? I didn't just say "stealing" in my original example, I was making a specific point. Kind of darkly amusing that just above you accused me of not being serious because I "generalized a strawman" and you keep equating "steal their life savings and leave them destitute and starving in the streets" to "stealing" like those two things are perfectly identical.

Law over the major felony topics is a reflection of a societies moral conclusions about these kinds of matters, often based directly on a societies greatest philosophers.

It is currently illegal to give water to people who are thirsty, with the express purpose of denying them water so they do not stay in line to vote.

It used to be illegal to help someone escape an abuser who beat them near to death.

It is illegal in some states to give food to people who are homeless and hungry.

I can keep going. Laws = morality isn't a good stance. Now, sure, you can say that law on "major felonies" is different... unless you want to talk about state employees and murder. Or things like selling poison that directly links to the death of hundreds, but being rich.

Sure, the law is going to say that being rich and stealing from the poor, forcing them into poverty and debt-slavery, ruining their lives and locking them out of any hope of returning to their normal lives isn't going to be as bad as shooting someone. But the law quite often is far more lenient to those with wealth and power than it is to those without, and has been for many centuries.

It's not a fate worse than murder. Again, there is no moral code across the world that I know of that ranks it as WORSE than murdering people. Again, one of those "unable to tell the difference between right and wrong" type questions. That one is a softball ethics question - it has an actual generalized answer. Like the theft vs murder one.

Do I need to spell out sexual assault to you? Do I truly need to explain how utterly violating it would be to force someone, against their will, to walk out into a crowd, strip naked in front of that crowd, and put their entire body on display for that crowd. All seemingly willingly, but actually because no matter how much you scream inside your head your body moves on its own? Because your will has been supplanted, and you are turned into nothing more than an object of ridicule? Can you conceive of the levels of trauma that would induce in someone, potentially for the rest of their lives?

Murder is not worse than torture. Not to the degree that acknowledging that torture can be horrifying in a way that murder isn't makes me a psychopath, or to the degree that it is a softball question. And if you don't think forcing someone to degrade themselves, giving them no control over their own actions, maybe no control over their own thoughts, isn't a horrific torture of the self, then you have led a truly blessed life. Because you can't seem to conceive of how dark, how vile that would be. You can't seem to picture the person who laughs at the idea of killing you, because they are going to do far, far worse than end you in this moment. They are going to destroy you, over time, with you as an unwilling meat puppet.

All you seem to be able to picture is "Well, we were going to murder that guy, but we messed with his mind instead, and since he's alive we did the good, morally right thing" Like somehow "but I didn't kill them!" is the only moral standard that matters to you. When I KNOW that the worst evils are committed by people who intentionally don't kill their victims, to prolong their suffering.

 

[Horwath]

You could have also knocked them out, and not killed them. You could have also bribed them. You could have also simply snuck past them.

Just because you chose an option that was not murder doesn't mean you immediately chose a "good" option. It may be a better option, it may be an acceptable option, but I really balk at "Our other choice was killing them, so therefore we did a good thing" Because quite often in the world that would make many horribly evil things "good" because they could have just killed you instead.

knocking someone out might attract more attention from someone else, calls for even more violence.

Bribe can get the guards in whole lot of trouble down the line, it's better to be a sucker(fail saving throw) than corrupt when getting interrogated why you were not at your post.

sneaking is sometimes not possible or very difficult. Sometimes you must take the easiest path for all included.

and to be honest, me and I believe most people, if the someone wants me out of the way for some time from certain location, I would rather be Obi-waned to go home and get some sleep as oppose being beat up unconscious.

Charm/suggestion/dominate is violation, but degree of what you do determines the severity of that violation.
It can go from degree of simple lying(charisma check) to downright horrible abuse of power over someone that is under enchantment.

 

[Mistwell]

So, while you pound the drums of me being a psychopath and you being a morally just and upright person.

No I think we're both morally just. I think you're just exaggerating for effect on the Internet for the purposes of a debate and know darn well burning someone alive is the morally worse choice.

.. when did we get to comparing "I saved your life" versus "I killed you"?

The scenario was using a spell to make them forget they saw you and turn back - rather than fireball them to death. That's saving their lives with the spell.

Because, to me, that sounds kind of like saying that a robber who pulls a gun, and threatens to murder someone for not putting the money in the bag is correct and good compared to the robber who shoots the teller and takes the money.

No not correct and good, where is that weird absolute coming from? It's not as evil to rob someone and not harm them, than it is to rob someone and also murder them. This is not a difficult ethical choice here.

Which, to me, kind of sounds like splitting hairs.

I doubt the bank teller thinks whether they are murdered or not is splitting hairs. It's absurd to say the difference between the person living or dying is inconsequential hair splitting. Again, if I didn't think you were doing this for the purposes of an argument on the internet, someone who actually seemed to believe that was a hair splitting scenario would, yeah, be having difficulty understanding the difference between right and wrong. But I feel pretty confident you know the difference and are just playing games here with this argument.

I mean, if you want "well, I could have killed you instead" as the high point of morality... good luck with that.

Who said or implied "the high point of morality." That's not just an ordinary strawman it's a giant Godzilla sized strawman. That's a pretty disingenuous take on this. If you don't want to have the discussion and just figured I'd walk away if you behaved that way, maybe try just saying you're done with the conversation rather than resort to that?

Again, I don't see any value in this "which is MORE EVAL!!" in this discussion.

Well the rest of friggen humanity does in fact see meaningful differences between theft and murder, for instance. Things are not generally either "good" or "bad." They usually are somewhere on a line with one end of the line being the worst possible bad and the other end being the best possible good. Speeding 10 mph over the speed limit on the freeway is bad, but not very far down the line toward bad. Stealing a can of soda from a store is closer to the bad end than the good end than the speeding example. Murder is well further down that line towards the bad end than the good end, than stealing. And while not all morality is universal, THAT morality is pretty darn universal in all nations. Every non-psychopathic person understands murder is a worse bad than stealing a can of soda, as a generalization.

You have definitely declared that you know which thing is more moral,

Yeah that's no sense of pride in that. Any child could answer that level of morality question just as easily.

without question! How is that not solving the problem of morality? I mean, whether or not killing someone can be moral is a huge debate. After all, is killing a serial killer who is sitting drinking coffee in Starbucks morally acceptable? That's not an easy question to answer, when you start digging down into the implications.

It's why I never used the term "killing" but instead used the term "murder."

You just love accusing me of everything under the sun, don't you? I never GAVE a specific scenario, and your "do you murder someone or mind control them to leave" isn't specific either. Are you mind controlling a mother to abandon her child

It was a D&D example. Mind controlled the NPCs coming our way to forget they saw the party and turned the other way, rather than having to fireball them. I am pretty sure you understand the context of the example when first presented.

or murdering a suicide bomber in a park? Details matter in these things, and you just keep defaulting "but MURDER!" like that somehow removes any possible horror that comes from mind control.



So an action that leads to a swift painless end is more evil than an action that causes years of pain and torture? I didn't just say "stealing" in my original example, I was making a specific point. Kind of darkly amusing that just above you accused me of not being serious because I "generalized a strawman" and you keep equating "steal their life savings and leave them destitute and starving in the streets" to "stealing" like those two things are perfectly identical.

People lose their life savings fairly often. In fact, a huge number of people have no life savings to steal. While some few might commit suicide over it, the overwhelming majority don't think it's the same as the end of their life. Because you have hope of recovery after a loss like that. Most people would answer pretty easily that murdering them is well worse than stealing their life savings. Why don't you ask some of your friends what they think of that question?

It is currently illegal to give water to people who are thirsty, with the express purpose of denying them water so they do not stay in line to vote.

It used to be illegal to help someone escape an abuser who beat them near to death.

It is illegal in some states to give food to people who are homeless and hungry.

I can keep going. Laws = morality isn't a good stance.

I didn't say laws ARE morality. I said the basis of the laws are drawn from moral philosophy.
But you know what? You knew that. You were quoting it, you saw it right there, and you again created an absurd strawman Which makes this conversation useless.

Now, sure, you can say that law on "major felonies" is different... unless you want to talk about state employees and murder. Or things like selling poison that directly links to the death of hundreds, but being rich.

Sure, the law is going to say that being rich and stealing from the poor, forcing them into poverty and debt-slavery, ruining their lives and locking them out of any hope of returning to their normal lives isn't going to be as bad as shooting someone. But the law quite often is far more lenient to those with wealth and power than it is to those without, and has been for many centuries.



Do I need to spell out sexual assault to you? Do I truly need to explain how utterly violating it would be to force someone, against their will, to walk out into a crowd, strip naked in front of that crowd, and put their entire body on display for that crowd. All seemingly willingly, but actually because no matter how much you scream inside your head your body moves on its own? Because your will has been supplanted, and you are turned into nothing more than an object of ridicule? Can you conceive of the levels of trauma that would induce in someone, potentially for the rest of their lives?

It's well along that line towards bad, but not as far along the line as murder. Again, no matter how dramatic you make the example, the overwhelming majority of people prefer not being murdered to that scenario.

Murder is not worse than torture. Not to the degree that acknowledging that torture can be horrifying in a way that murder isn't makes me a psychopath,

Again, I am not calling you a psychopath. I am however saying you are exaggerating for effect during an internet debate and know darn well murder is worse than the basic scenarios I mentioned.

or to the degree that it is a softball question. And if you don't think forcing someone to degrade themselves, giving them no control over their own actions, maybe no control over their own thoughts, isn't a horrific torture of the self, then you have led a truly blessed life. Because you can't seem to conceive of how dark, how vile that would be. You can't seem to picture the person who laughs at the idea of killing you, because they are going to do far, far worse than end you in this moment. They are going to destroy you, over time, with you as an unwilling meat puppet.

All you seem to be able to picture is "Well, we were going to murder that guy, but we messed with his mind instead, and since he's alive we did the good, morally right thing"

You know, I know, everyone still reading this knows I never said or implied it was the "good morally right thing." I have always been, and continue to, say that both are bad but one is worse than the other. YOU knew that, because you said earlier you didn't see the point of making distinctions between two bad things. So you fully understand I was also saying it was bad just one was worse than the other. And yet repeatedly you've pretended I said one was morally good and right. It's rude. Why do you keep tossing that in there for the cheap shot at me when you know I never made such an argument?

Like somehow "but I didn't kill them!" is the only moral standard that matters to you.

Now you're just outright lying about me. Damn, that is really rude.

 

[mellored]

Soo...

Enchantment is now the evil school of magic. An army of mindless non-dead invading the city.

Necromancy is now socially accepted. Doing parlor tricks on the street for change, hiring out skeletons for odd jobs, and talking to recently dead.

 

[Remathilis]

Soo...

Enchantment is now the evil school of magic. An army of mindless non-dead invading the city.

Necromancy is now socially accepted. Doing parlor tricks on the street for change, hiring out skeletons for odd jobs, and talking to recently dead.

On the evil scale:
Abjuration: 2. Mostly protective/healing, but some magic can be used to be exclusive rather than inclusive.
Conjuration: 6. The teleporting part is rather benign, but summoning creatures to fight and die for you is pretty evil.
Divination: 4. Knowledge is power. Learning things that others don't want you to know is invasive.
Enchantment: 8. Forcing others to do things they don't want to do is bad.
Evocation: 5. Creating things isn't inherently offensive, except that in D&D most evocations create blasts of handful energy.
Illusion: 7. The definition of gaslighting. You convince people that reality isn't real and not to trust their senses. We rightly criticize when propaganda does that.
Necromancy: 9. Any messing with the dead is problematic, and even its most benevolent magics share the problems of divination (speak with dead) and enchantment (fear). The only magic that doesn't is raise dead, but that comes with world-building headaches.
Transmutation: 4. A mixture of all sorts of effects, most of which are fine. You can argue there are some issues with bodily autonomy, especially polymorph type effects.

 

[Mirrorrorrim]

On the evil scale:
Abjuration: 2. Mostly protective/healing, but some magic can be used to be exclusive rather than inclusive.
Conjuration: 6. The teleporting part is rather benign, but summoning creatures to fight and die for you is pretty evil.
Divination: 4. Knowledge is power. Learning things that others don't want you to know is invasive.
Enchantment: 8. Forcing others to do things they don't want to do is bad.
Evocation: 5. Creating things isn't inherently offensive, except that in D&D most evocations create blasts of handful energy.
Illusion: 7. The definition of gaslighting. You convince people that reality isn't real and not to trust their senses. We rightly criticize when propaganda does that.
Necromancy: 9. Any messing with the dead is problematic, and even its most benevolent magics share the problems of divination (speak with dead) and enchantment (fear). The only magic that doesn't is raise dead, but that comes with world-building headaches.
Transmutation: 4. A mixture of all sorts of effects, most of which are fine. You can argue there are some issues with bodily autonomy, especially polymorph type effects.

So... are we saying it makes sense for certain worlds to hate magic because it alters not just your reality, but reality for others against their will? Sounds tyrannical to impose your will in ways that alters others' reality. Which means... magic is evil! Inquisitors! Get the torches and pitchforks!

Looks like there are two reasons to hate magic.

1. Ignorance. We hate what we don't understand.
2. Knowledge. Oh we understand it alright, and the majority of magic is for harming others against their will.

 

[Mephista]

On the evil scale:
Divination: 4. Knowledge is power. Learning things that others don't want you to know is invasive.

No, no its not. Violating the privacy of someone's home or their mind is invasive. Knowledge itself isn't the problem.

Necromancy: 9. Any messing with the dead is problematic, and even its most benevolent magics share the problems of divination (speak with dead) and enchantment (fear). The only magic that doesn't is raise dead, but that comes with world-building headaches.

Same here. Speak with Dead isn't invasive or a violation - if the corpse wouldn't want to answer you, it doesn't and nothing can force it to. There's no forceful extraction, there's no breaking into someplace sacrosanct and protected.

Fear spells aren't Necromancy. They're Illusion.