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Message: <blockquote data-quote="DM_Fiery_Fist" data-source="post: 5821783" data-attributes="member: 6052">In response to:  How do you adjudicate between medieval and modern ethics in your games?I handle this problem in my own games by allowing generous interpretations of alignment and ethics.  I am actually studying for a graduate degree in philosophy right now, with a sub-focus on moral psychology.  Almost all people have ethical emotions and intuitions that strongly color their perception of certain situations.  Knowing this, I usually avoid alignment arguments in my campaigns.  It's hard enough to make sure everyone is on the same page in an undergraduate ethics debate.  I've found it's even more difficult to pull it off in a DnD group.  Sometimes you even get people who think that morals should not be an issue of logic, but only an issue of emotion and intuition.  So here's my solution:  everyone signs up with an agreement to cooperate and compromise where necessary.  If you think killing an unarmed person is always evil--that's your belief.  But if a player in my game can make a compelling case for why a lawful good character would kill an unarmed person, then he gets away with it--end of story.  If your character wants to roleplay an outraged response, feel free, but keep in mind that it's a game.  The strictest simulation will fail if there's no one left to play it.   That being said, I tend to fall more on the gamist side of the debate, for two reasons.  These are more issues of personal preference than anything (not trying to insult anyone or say that there's only one way of doing things...) Number One:  Most DMs have a really impoverished idea of what medieval culture was actually like.  Their ideas have usually been filtered through years of video games and roleplaying.  I have several close friends pursuing postgraduate degrees in history and I find it almost impossible to talk to any of them about the subject--they rarely agree on anything!  So I like to say that my settings are strongly inspired by history, but never a simulation; I try to avoid justifying any in-game convention based on a historical one.  Maybe this is just wordplay, but it tends to keep people happy.  Historical arguments have no place at my gaming table.  Number Two (controversial):  It's easy to drop the ball when you include things like outrageous sexism in your games.  I once played with a DM who insisted that his completely made-up game world had to mimic medieval gender relations.  He warned people that female characters would be frequently threatened with rape, talked down to, groped, or ignored.  This same individual saw no problem with things like crazy anachronisms (Roman-era weapons alongside firearms, super-advanced sailing technology, etc.) and blatant plot inconsistencies.  The questions that I always ask:  How well are you getting your point across?  Is it working?  Are you having fun?  When I told him I wanted him to include rampant sickness to make it more realistic, he disagreed on the grounds that this wouldn't be fun and would make it harder to play his game.  Needless to say, the ONLY female player in the game dropped out after about two weeks. So while I agree with the OP on this, I admit that I normally encourage DMs to err on the side of player cohesion.  If you can run a strict simulation and keep a full group, more power to you.  If you have to choose between simulating medieval ethics and keeping your players in the game, I'd suggest the latter.  When it boils down to ethics, look to the players.</blockquote>

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