What would you have done?

[D+1]

Count Rugen is essentially helpless and at Inigo's mercy. He's begging for his life. Inigo doesn't capture him nor bring him to trial. Instead he kills him. Evil? If not, why not. If so, then is Inigo a villain in the movie rather than a hero?

In strict D&D terms? Not evil, but definitely non-good. Westley is the really interesting case for discussion. Why? Because he's been a PIRATE for many years. That means robbery on the high seas, looting, pillaging, and killing. The killing he even alludes to when speaking with Buttercup when she hasn't yet recognized him. He may have been speaking facetiously just to goad her but he admits that AS A PIRATE as soon as you start letting people live then nobody wants to bother to surrender and then it's nothing but work work work all the time. Now the point about being the Dread Pirate Roberts was that the mere reputation was the key, but did Westley ever kill to maintain and reinforce that reputation? And even if not he still robs people for a living for many years. NOT a good alignment at all.

 

[kigmatzomat]

If I'm not prepared for the players to f*** it up, I don't put it in the game.

This is probably the single most valuable statement made in the entire thread.

 

[Rel]

He may have been speaking facetiously just to goad her but he admits that AS A PIRATE as soon as you start letting people live then nobody wants to bother to surrender and then it's nothing but work work work all the time.

Is that really what he said? I own the movie and I've watched it many times but it's been a while.

If that is what he said then it makes no sense. If you have a reputation for "taking no prisoners" then nobody will want to surrender to you and THEN it is "work, work, work". But if you at least occasionally take prisoners (especially if you ransom them back) then a rational, outmatched enemy WILL be likely to surrender.

 

[twofalls]

Responses to many posts -

John Morrow - I did in fact read the article as promised but didn't post a reply as you invited me not to. Very interesting article by the way, I'm an emotional person just like my mother, and I can see how emotions play a large part in my decision making processes. I think there is a lot of merit to your suspicion that I was identifying with the NPC's that were killed. I felt, and still feel that what was done was wrong. I see that the majority of the folks posting here don't agree with me on that point, and they have good arguments, but it seems my basic moral fiber simply wont be swayed on this issue about killing helpless folk. It became personal when my friends said they themselves would do the same, that really got to me. I was thinking emotinally, they were thinking rationally, and then they became emotionally invested when I became angry and started to defend themselves.

Princess Bride happens to be one of my all time favorite movies. Was the Swordsman wrong to kill the evil bad guy? Yeah, in the strictest sense he was. A victim's sense of justice is a lot different than impartial justice as you, I'm sure, are aware of (being why impartiality is so striven for in most justice systems). You could argue that the PC's were victims and were thus dealing out a victims justice, but the situation, after having defeated their attackers just didn't feel that way. Thats the best (read: most honest) answer I'd have for that argument.


D+1 - I bascially agree with most everything you said. I think this thread has become so large and so intricate with other peoples suggestions and assumptions though, that you are assuming some things about my play style that aren't accurate. So I'm not going to address your post point for point... Yep, I made a mistake. I've made quite a number of mistakes over my career as a GM, and have learned a lot about managing small groups because of them. I've broken up a group because of a bad decision before. In the final analysis however, I'm a darn good GM and have had a lot of accolades over my career for it. Right now I have a lot of people who want to play in my games (many more than I can fit in my groups), and all of this is why I know its true. So mabye cut me a few feet of slack please?


Malic - I'm very sorry your game wasn't able to be pulled together. For my part, my game was rescued because these fellows are all very good friends and inclined to be forgiving. Heck I've known some of these guys for over 20 years. When I put moral quandries into the game I do so trying not to be invested. The situation that started this thread was unique (something that many posters don't seem to be getting) in that I took it personally. It just happened that way. Maye the stars were aligned against me that day in a particular fashion, or I had a conversation a week ago that impacted my emotions that day, or making love with my wife that morning wasn't as good as it normally is. I just can't say why that situaiton put me off so much, but it did. I absolutly feel that what was done was murder and was wrong. I also know that I over reacted to it. I always have docked xp for alignment infractions. Of the many things that this thread has me thinking about, that's the one thing that I can think of right now that will end up changing in my games because of it. I'd argue that you can't be 100% divested from moral delima's that you weave into your stories. Perhaps you can 100% not react outwardly to them, but not be 100% emotionally unattached. That's a human condition IMO.

Runesong42 - If they were Orcs? I can't say if I would have reacted the same without going through the whole thing excatly as it happened without having gone through all the fallout I have since. I'd like to say yes, I can say that I would still consider it reprehensible and wrong. Would I have reacted the same way? How can I give you an honest answer?

 

[John Morrow]

In strict D&D terms? Not evil, but definitely non-good.

I curious for two reason. First,several people claimed that this sort of thing is clearly and undisputably Evil. Neutral is not Evil. I'm more curious about the claim that it's always Evil. Second, there is the claim that heroes don't do this sort of thing. Does a hero necessarily need to be Good?

Of course to other issue that comes into play is whether Good characters are obliged to stop a Neutral character from doing something that is not Good but also not Evil. In other words, maybe a Good character wouldn't execute a bound prisoner who works for an Evil force but are they obliged to stop a Neutral character from doing so?

Westley is the really interesting case for discussion. Why? Because he's been a PIRATE for many years.

Absolutely. And even Fezzik starts out working for Vizzini with Inigo to kidnap Buttercup. Yet they get to redeem themselves and ride off into the sunset with Westley and Buttercup as heroes, while the Count is killed and the Prince is spared. And let's not forget that Westley not only threatens people with death as a Dread Pirate but also essentially threatens to maim the Prince to get him to surrender.

There is an interesting episode of Stargate SG-1 where the team visits a planet where Teal'c had killed a crippled man in cold blood under orders from his Gou'ald master (SPOILER WARNING for this paragraph and the next paragraph if you haven't seen the episode). The dead man's son demands a trial that will likely result in Teal'c's execution. Teal'c accepts the justice while the rest of his team doesn't. When they return to Earth to ask General Hammond for help, he points out that Teal'c likely did some really nasty things while working for the Gou'ald, that he's pretty much a war criminal, and that we don't forgive war criminals because they have a change of heart.

(SPOILER WARNING for this paragraph) Of course at the end, the son forgives Teal'c because he has the opportunity to show that he really is a changed man. But even then, the writers had to be sure the audience would accept the resolution, so they made sure that Teal'c's "crime" was somewhat defensible on utilitarian grounds. They didn't have him commit a really horrible or senseless act of violence that he had to be forgiven for. Why? Because the audience might have balked at letting a real war criminal off the hook, just because he's had a change of heart.

Babylon 5 addresses the same problem from a different angle in the episode Passing Through Gethsemane.

So there is also the thorny issue of redemption with respect to forgiving the sins of those who do horrible things. If they repent, should they be punished anyway or should they be forgiven? Should they be forgiven for whatever they've done? Should they receive no punishment if they repent? Is forgiving them the only Good option? Is punishing them anyway Neutral, Evil, or could it be Good? Can this assessment even be made without consideration of the religous context of the setting and how the afterlife is handled? (I'm talking about a game settings religion -- I don't want to discuss real religion and invite the wrath of the moderators.)

 

[Rel]

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait!

Twofalls, you're still having Morning Sex on a regular basis?

That changes EVERYTHING!

Why didn't you start a thread about that?!

 

[Runesong42]

What if +1, to twofalls

Twofalls,
There is a reason I asked if would feel any differently in the situation if your war criminals were Orcs.

I belive the suitation you presented to your players may have been a little too "real" because the enemies were in fact human. Countless years of murdering Orcs for fun and profit seems to be the staple of many DnD games, and I theorized that if those same prisoners were Orcs, you might have had a little less emotional connection with the scenario as it went down. Or Goblins, even. Or Drow. In fact, insert any random strerotypical DnD "bad guy" race and I wonder if your players would have even bothered to take prisoners...

You're right though, it's pointless to make you guess, but does it at least make you curious?

 

[twofalls]

If they repent, should they be punished anyway or should they be forgiven? Should they be forgiven for whatever they've done? Should they receive no punishment if they repent? Is forgiving them the only Good option? Is punishing them anyway Neutral, Evil, or could it be Good?

I'm not sure I'm qualified to answer your questions John, but I can offer an example from the same game that started this thread. The overall story arc is that the PC's showed up in Shadowdale because they wanted to become Harpers. They were looking to contact Storm Silverhand herself and petition her to enter her organization. While there they discovered three girls had been kidnapped (this from a Module I downloaded and adapted called "Ruins of Castle Grimstead" and the only name I have for the author is Sean '98). The PC's decided that this was a perfect way to prove their worth and did some investigating and tracked the kidnappers to a ruined castle. They were Zhent slavers but the girls had already been shipped out. The slavers leaders escaped, but many of the soldiers were taken captive and returned to the Twisted Tower in Shadowdale for justice.

Lord Morngrym's (the Paladin ruler of Shadowdale and now the PC's Lord) justice was to order them hanged until death. The prisoners begged for mercy as they claimed they had no choice but to be part of the military of the Zhentarim and preform these evil acts as their familys were forfiet in Zhentil Keep if they failed their state duty (this being a hint that not all Zhent soldiers are evil). Lord Morngrym then asked for a champion for the slavers amoung his court, and the PC's stepped forward. This then was then the Lords decision. The Slaver's were to be imprisioned, working indentured service to the families they had wronged (under guard to insure they weren't abused) for two years. The champions (being the PC's) had that time to recover the enslaved girls and return them to their families. If the girls could not be found and brought back, or if they were found slain in their service the lives of the soldiers were forfiet. If the girls were found and returned the soldiers lives would be spared, and their sentences altered to 20 years service, upon which time they would then be freed.

Though a lot of other things have happened in the game, the PC's are closing on the known location of two of the girls (in Darkhold), and have information that one of them has been killed already. In truth, all three remain alive.

 

[twofalls]

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait!

Twofalls, you're still having Morning Sex on a regular basis?

That changes EVERYTHING!

Why didn't you start a thread about that?!

Not going to pursue this one. Will just say that I've been married 16 years to the most beautiful and perfect woman in the world.

 

[John Morrow]

John Morrow - I did in fact read the article as promised but didn't post a reply as you invited me not to.

Sorry. Not trying to goad you into a response. I was just curious if it helped you make more sense of what you were feeling, since the research specifically deals with feelings of disgust and their role in moral assessments.

I felt, and still feel that what was done was wrong. I see that the majority of the folks posting here don't agree with me on that point, and they have good arguments, but it seems my basic moral fiber simply wont be swayed on this issue about killing helpless folk.

[...]

Princess Bride happens to be one of my all time favorite movies. Was the Swordsman wrong to kill the evil bad guy? Yeah, in the strictest sense he was. A victim's sense of justice is a lot different than impartial justice as you, I'm sure, are aware of (being why impartiality is so striven for in most justice systems).

Princess Bride happens to be one of many people's all time favorite movies, which is why I used it as an example (by the way, I've seen a live stage show with Mandy Patinkin and he ended his show with the Inigo line, so that character was certainly memorable). What I'm trying to get to here is (A) whether the issue is really whether or not the person killed is helpless and (B) your sense of what a hero is.

Whether a victims sense of justice is impartial or not (the Stargate SG-1 and Babylon 5 episodes that I mention in another thread also address the victim's sense of justice) really has no bearing on an objective assessment of whether the victims actions are Evil or not, does it? Is a person who has been personally wronged more justified in doing Evil things than a person who has not personally been wronged? I'm not asking if Inigo's actions were wrong or if he was justifying them to himself. I'm asking if they were Evil as an objective alignment assessment. And let's not forget that the audience was not a victim of the Count's Evil yet they generally cheer his death when it happens.

Further, I've pointed out several cases where helpless people are killed. Most government executions fall into this category and it's what Inigo does to the Count. Is the problem really the idea of killing a helpless villain or is the problem either (A) you didn't think the villain's were so bad that they deserved a death sentence, (B) that you didn't feel that the PCs had the moral authority to play judge, jury, and executioner on the spot, or (C) the brutality and cold efficiency of the act? If killing a helpless villain is always Evil, then all executions of prisoners, even with a trial and conviction, are not simply Neutral but Evil. Is that the perspective you want to enforce in your setting?

As for what a hero is, there are plenty of movies (including The Princess Bride) where the "heroes" do questionable things that are not always Good, from Inigo and James Bond to Dirty Harry and the Death Wish movies. I'm curious about how tightly you associate being a hero with being Good and if you can accept a more Neutral hero like Inigo who does things you think are wrong, can you accept PCs that do the same sorts of things? Do you enjoy action movies with gray heroes? If so, can you run games with gray hero PCs? If not, why not?

You could argue that the PC's were victims and were thus dealing out a victims justice, but the situation, after having defeated their attackers just didn't feel that way. Thats the best (read: most honest) answer I'd have for that argument.

Fair enough. I'm not trying to put you on trial. I'm trying to understand (and help you understand) your perspective. Like I said, I also have a selfish motive for this. I'm noticing some rough edges in the way I'm handling alignment in my game. I plan on revising the setting at some point and this thread has actually been quite helpful at sorting some of my problems out.

In the final analysis however, I'm a darn good GM and have had a lot of accolades over my career for it. Right now I have a lot of people who want to play in my games (many more than I can fit in my groups), and all of this is why I know its true. So mabye cut me a few feet of slack please?

Just to make it perfectly clear (I know this wasn't addressed to me), I don't think you are a bad GM. The fact that you sorted out the problem without anyone leaving but still want to make sure it doesn't happen again (it's still on your mind) suggests that you are a pretty good GM.

Runesong42 - If they were Orcs? I can't say if I would have reacted the same without going through the whole thing excatly as it happened without having gone through all the fallout I have since. I'd like to say yes, I can say that I would still consider it reprehensible and wrong. Would I have reacted the same way? How can I give you an honest answer?

I think it's an interesting question that comes back to the issue of empathizing with the bad guys. If you can't answer it, though, then you can't answer it.