Argyle King
Legend
If they only attacked evil races, they would be good. Good and evil are black and white. Simple.
Which circles back to my original question: how sure of a being's evilness must one for it to be that simple?
If they only attacked evil races, they would be good. Good and evil are black and white. Simple.
Sure- I’ve done it before in another thread on ENWorld when this came up before. I don’t remember the thread or details from back then, though.
What were the main enemies in Stargate: Atlantis? An advanced race of corpse-white creatures.
In another recent thread sparked by some of these same issues, I posted that I think that aesthetics don't always track morality.my own view is admittedly "skewed" by influences from sword-&-sorcery, Arthurian fantasy, anecdotal experience with combat, and etc. So, I ask questions as a way to explore where others feel the default lines of morality should be.
I think a long range archer sniper is somewhat dubious, although if s/he only starts shooting once the battle is on that seems less egregious. And to make a typical FRPG game work, we have to make some allowance for archer PCs.For me, I'm not really sure what makes sense. I would agree that certain types of attack are seen as morally dubious. (That could be an entire discussion about combat and honor -lawfulness?- on its own. Is the long-range archer less good than the melee paladin? The unarmed monk using only their fists?)
I've got no views about hypothetically good Mindflayers. To me it seems to live in the same space as vampires in some contemporary fiction who drink cow blood or rely on blood drives or whatever. If others want to explore those possibilities of course they can go to town, but it's not something I'm going to default to in my own FRPGing.One the other end of the spectrum, there are canon examples of devils who were redeemed (and there's some level of consent and non-evil thought presumed possible by the elevation of tieflings to a PC race. With that in mind -in a game where killing creatures is assigned point values- I'm never sure where the general consensus about right/wrong is seen to be.
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It gets even more complicated when things like Mindflayers are considered. To reproduce, Mindflayers engage in an act which is a severe violation of a sentient being's body autonomy. So, how would a hypothetically "good" Mindflayer have a family without engaging in acts which would be seen as less-than-good by others?
I don't play very often. In FRPGing, my default PC is a knight of a religious order (so a cleric or paladin in D&D). But on the weekend a friend and I started a new Burning Wheel campaign with a PC each and mutual GMing.I prefer to play characters who talk first and hit second. Usually. I will sometimes play characters who are, how shall I put this? A-Holes. But I prefer for my characters to have reasons for any fighting they do. The reasons can and do change from genre to genre and campaign to campaign. There are some lines I will not cross for my own reasons. There are other lines I will not cross out of respect for the other players' needs.
Well…therianthropy and “bestial” kinda go hand in paw. It’s just a sliding scale. A spectrum, if you will. On one end, you’ve got more animorphic races like Kobolds, troglodytes, Sahuagin, lizard men, true anthropomorphic animals, etc. On the other, more human-looking types with exaggerated fangs, claws and suchlike. In the middle are the shapeshifters.The Wraith - space vampires.
Sci Fi is a good source of advanced evil races but as you intimate in reference to the Omecs, even there they tend to be analogous to Elfs/Vampires (Wraith) or Hobgoblins (Kromagg). The problem of Orcs is them being cast as primitive other rather than merely hypermilitant.
The challenge is to present a race that is both savage-beastial and humanoid and not a therianthrope
This is absolutely spot on, on many levels. You’re right that societal rules are not clear on many aspects and in fact can and do change, even within a society, a sub group on a regular basis.@pemerton
I find a lot of what you say to be reasonable and thoughtful.
Most of my "struggles" come from when conversations about real-world bias intersectwith fantasy (especially fantasy built upon very different assumptions about what is "real") in a way which puts most of the topic into extremely binary terms of assumed offense on the part of the creator(s) of a narrative. In terms of conflict, morality has (I believe) areas of gray. Hypothetically, this is why many legal systems includes a human component in the form of a judge (and/or jury) rather than strictly adherence to written law.
(Related: On the other end of things, it's why I believe extremely lawful antagonists can sometimes be scarier than evil; there's a complete absence of empathy or emotional motivation for such a being. The cosmic horror of being so far beneath a being's view of "right" that nothing about you matters is like being a bug headed toward an inevitable windshield.)
Which, in and of itself is somewhat contradictory I guess because there are settings in which alignment (good/evil) is defined as tangibly binary.
In the past, I've taken the position that the "reality" of a fictional world would (to some extent) need to be considered to determine if something like "always evil" orcs is badwrongfun. But that position has been said to be bad because of a fallacy which I don't even personally agree is a fallacy from the perspective of either logic or ethics.
In world where they're literally bred and biologically programmed to contain "evil" -which is an actual tangible and objective thing, I don't see it as wrong for a PC to have the general attitude of "yeah, f' those guys."
In world where some higher level of sentience is ascribed and the conflicts are more nuanced than programmed bad guys, I think it's different.
In either case, I think it's a problem if all of the bad guys are made to look and act like a marginalized real-world group. So, I acknowledge that as why some depictions of D&D races are not acceptable.
Though, I am also find it worthwhile to ask what level of (if any) real-world inspiration is allowed to be used when creating a fantasy culture. When writing a story, can an author borrow aspects of a culture or religion upon which to base an idea? Is it expected that every aspect of a story is somehow wholly original? I would guess that the answer is somewhere between, but even asking those questions or trying to explore them often leads to assumed offense or assumed bigotry in contemporary culture.
None of which is meant to imply that the various -isms do not exist in fantasy. In many cases, they very clearly do.
This took a very different turn from how I thought I would respond. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I do not think the societal rules for what's okay and what isn't are always very clear, and I think there are times that it's even less clear when things such as art, narrative, and story are explored. If violent conflict is also in the mix, I think it's even less clear.
What are the generally acceptable rules of engagement concerning whether or not a PC stabbing a foe is okay?
As screwed up as it may sound, IME there have been times when it seemed reasonable to choose my own survival over something (or someone) else -even without wizards or demons being involved. Years afterwards, I did struggle with whether or not that made me a bad person, but it seemed to make sense at the time. I can't say with certainty that my own individual decisions would be different or better in a D&D world.
Well…therianthropy and “bestial” kinda go hand in paw. It’s just a sliding scale. A spectrum, if you will. On one end, you’ve got more animorphic races like Kobolds, troglodytes, Sahuagin, lizard men, true anthropomorphic animals, etc. On the other, more human-looking types with exaggerated fangs, claws and suchlike. In the middle are the shapeshifters.
And as I noted, a race need not be bestial in any way to be evil.
But let’s say you WANT something truly bestial. 9 times out of 10, you’re probably going to use a predatory species.* You still don’t have to go with the usual suspects, the ones that get used in stereotyping humans. Why not something in the badger family- an evil race of anthro wolverine?
What about shrikes? Every one of those little guys is a tiny, flying Vlad the impaler.
Hell, I reworked the bat-like Seshayans from StarDrive into rulers of the Underdark, fallen into forgetful decadence, unaware of their former greatness.
* Ibixians were CN, as I recall. Equicephs were LE.
Tolkien didn't think of his orcs as fallen angels, at least if fallen angel is considered synonymous with demon as it is in Christianity.Tolkein’s Orcs were his fallen angels
To me there seems to be a lot going on in what you've posted. Probably too much for me to fully respond to all of it.Most of my "struggles" come from when conversations about real-world bias intersect with fantasy (especially fantasy built upon very different assumptions about what is "real") in a way which puts most of the topic into extremely binary terms of assumed offense on the part of the creator(s) of a narrative. In terms of conflict, morality has (I believe) areas of gray.
<snip>
there are settings in which alignment (good/evil) is defined as tangibly binary.
In the past, I've taken the position that the "reality" of a fictional world would (to some extent) need to be considered to determine if something like "always evil" orcs is badwrongfun. But that position has been said to be bad because of a fallacy which I don't even personally agree is a fallacy from the perspective of either logic or ethics.
In world where they're literally bred and biologically programmed to contain "evil" -which is an actual tangible and objective thing, I don't see it as wrong for a PC to have the general attitude of "yeah, f' those guys."
In world where some higher level of sentience is ascribed and the conflicts are more nuanced than programmed bad guys, I think it's different.
In either case, I think it's a problem if all of the bad guys are made to look and act like a marginalized real-world group. So, I acknowledge that as why some depictions of D&D races are not acceptable.
Though, I am also find it worthwhile to ask what level of (if any) real-world inspiration is allowed to be used when creating a fantasy culture. When writing a story, can an author borrow aspects of a culture or religion upon which to base an idea? Is it expected that every aspect of a story is somehow wholly original? I would guess that the answer is somewhere between, but even asking those questions or trying to explore them often leads to assumed offense or assumed bigotry in contemporary culture.
To me this seems to raise a pretty different issue! One reason I prefer to work in political than moral philosophy is that I incline towards particularism in morality; and look to social and political institutions to resolve matters of interpersonal justice.As screwed up as it may sound, IME there have been times when it seemed reasonable to choose my own survival over something (or someone) else -even without wizards or demons being involved. Years afterwards, I did struggle with whether or not that made me a bad person, but it seemed to make sense at the time. I can't say with certainty that my own individual decisions would be different or better in a D&D world.