Should D&D Morality be Less PC?

[mmadsen]

One of the things that's been lacking in D&D, in terms of challenging the status quo, is the thinking. Everything is done up in modern terms in view of how people act, how they treat each other, etc...

For most of D&D's audience, anything resembling typical attitudes from the past is also breaking strong modern taboos -- and I suspect few modern players could play along with casual racism, sexism, nationalism, etc. without overreacting either against it or (nervously and "humorously") for it.

If you read enough history -- especially primary sources -- you learn to take such attitudes for granted, but many players struggle with even the littlest things, like lords expecting loyalty from their subjects, everyone understanding their station, etc.

So, if your group enjoys real history -- or pulp fiction by authors, like Howard, who read real history rather obsessively -- go for it. Otherwise, accept that a quasi-medieval mercenary company happens to have 21st-century university student values...

 

[JoeGKushner]

I think 'authentic' portrayals of race, gender, religion, and any number of other difficult issues are not likely to make their way into the core game. The game has to be PG-13 to sell, and has to be extra careful because of the general biases against D&D.

I am, however, quite happy to see those issues explored in some form, as I think D&D is a wonderful artistic medium and a great venue for exploring all manner of topics, including "mature" ones.

I'd buy that first arguement the second WoTC stops using cheesecake in its art.

 

[JoeGKushner]

So, if your group enjoys real history -- or pulp fiction by authors, like Howard, who read real history rather obsessively -- go for it. Otherwise, accept that a quasi-medieval mercenary company happens to have 21st-century university student values...

That I think is interesting because it gives the players different ways of thinking than the natives. One of the things that I enjoy about some fiction is how things are going the way they've gone for hundreds if not thousands of years precisely because that's the way things have gone and then the hero (or the PC) comes in and says, "Man, this is stupid. We need to do X" and begins to do so.

So much of modern D&D is set up where there everyone already has a modern mindset but yet everything else is stuck in the past. It creates a "man why haven't they fixed X, Y, and Z if they believe in A, B, and C."

 

[JoeGKushner]

I'm not grasping what you are advocating for here, exactly.

D&D tends to be mostly based on medieval cultures - chattel slavery wasn't so much in it, as serfdom.

IIRC though, wasn't Dark Sun basically like that, though? (Don't remember, been a while).

And as to social status charts, sure you could add them (I think UA had them? Dragon did anyway), but for the most part adventurers are already pretty much lower class people anyway, or are once they become them. But again, while class existed, kings basically were essentially bandit kings or warlords originally. Only in recent times are they really considered sophisticated or whatever (and I'm not sure even then...)

In terms of slavery, if you go a little abroad, even now, it's still a problem. One of the reasons the United States destroyed the Barbary states was they were slave takers of United States Citizens and the live those slaves lived was not an easy one.

In many 'civilized' cultures, slavery is pretty much the way it is. Norsemen had slavery for example. Egyptians built an entire warrior caste off them as did the muslims with captured Christians.

 

[mmadsen]

One of the reasons the United States destroyed the Ottoman Empire...

Wait, what?

 

[Ahnehnois]

I'd buy that first arguement the second WoTC stops using cheesecake in its art.

I'm right with you there.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Wait, what?

Completely my fault. I was thinking of the Barbary states via 1778-1830

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

There's nothing wrong with the morality in D&D. I just wish some of the people who played it would wake up and smell the napalm; there's more to the world of moral philosophy than liberal Western jurisprudence and the Comics Code Authority.

 

[Jawsh]

There's nothing wrong with the morality in D&D. I just wish some of the people who played it would wake up and smell the napalm; there's more to the world of moral philosophy than liberal Western jurisprudence and the Comics Code Authority.

Citation needed

 

[mlund]

An interesting twist on morality is culpability. Imagine you have someone who is Good otherwise, but has a limited vision of what constitutes "people" that's been handed down to him by others? Do characters become Good because they realize the person-hood of the oppressed, or is do people realize that reality because they are Good?

That said, Good and Lawful Good people are the exception, not the rule. Most people are Unaligned. They are largely benign in their comfortable social context. They aren't particularly spiteful or malicious, but they don't look much past their own proverbial fence in terms of what ought to be as opposed to what is. Their necks aren't being stuck out for any strangers - which is the hallmark of a Good character.

Evil is more common than Good too, because it is easier and vastly more profitable in worldly terms.

- Marty Lund