jmartkdr2
Hero
I'd go with "usually nation, sometimes other groups." So Tuatha'an aren't Andoran or Cairheinan. They're just Travelling People.That's what I was trying to get at when saying we need to define culture. In a game design sense.
I'd go with "usually nation, sometimes other groups." So Tuatha'an aren't Andoran or Cairheinan. They're just Travelling People.That's what I was trying to get at when saying we need to define culture. In a game design sense.
Community isn't well-defined either, and might be too small for a world-spanning game. Nation is probably better as a baseline.For the magnitude of a culture, I would pick "community".
An ethnicity would comprise different kinds of communities.
A "nation" is too large and vague, mechanically. To try assign specific mechanics to every member of an entire nation is the same thing as an ethnic stereotype. It would be begging for Visanti-like problematics.Community isn't well-defined either, and might be too small for a world-spanning game. Nation is probably better as a baseline.
Fair enough. How many of these cultures do you need then? How many pages are dedicated to them?A "nation" is too large and vague, mechanically. To try assign specific mechanics to every member of an entire nation is the same thing as an ethnic stereotype. It would be begging for Visanti-like problematics.
Dividing a nation up into diverse kinds of "communities" allows more fluidity and openness to adaptation and evolution. Plus it is more realistic and has better verisimilitude for game play.
The only mechanic I would be comfortable assigning to an entire "nation" is a language, or perhaps a dialect of a language. But D&D purposefully simplifies (and racializes) languages into a small number. So language as a culture-defining tool is less available in 5e.
A "community" is purposefully flexible. It can cover anything from a religious institution, to a governing body, to a military order, to an ethnic neighborhood, to an educational academy, to a nightclub scene, to any kind of human(oid) "culture".
Fair enough. How many of these cultures do you need then? How many pages are dedicated to them?
I dunno. I'm pretty sure executing lawful good priests without any sort of trial is evil. The amount of mental jujitsu required to try to work around that is pretty impressive.Isn't the whole point that things are never going to be as cut and dried as you want?
You're always going to have a situation where every decision/event is unique, because this isn't a video game, you don't have X morality points for Y action. Indeed, RPGs have tried that, like Vampire: The Masquerade, and I can assure you, it works extremely badly unless you have a Storyteller who is willing to ignore the system and use their brain instead. I mean, some (most?) versions of Humanity literally made it worse to take a golf club to some dude's BMW than to take the same golf club to owner of said BMW's face.
Demanding fixed morality stuff like that just really doesn't end well.
I don't think them being "Lawful Good" has much to do with anything. Are they innocent or guilty or what? It would be very easy to be LN and execute the hell out of LG people who ended up on the wrong side of the law.I dunno. I'm pretty sure executing lawful good priests without any sort of trial is evil. The amount of mental jujitsu required to try to work around that is pretty impressive.
Not being confrontational with my question. I am just really curious what people think. I will be more specific:Can you be more specific?
Do you mean that in a given campaign, the DM is only using Drow a small number of times and they all come from the same group? Fair enough. No problems.
Or, do you mean you are world building, where you have Drow states comprising of thousands, if not tens of thousands of individuals spread across multiple communities? In which case, the single faction idea gets a whole lot less interesting.
Well, true. Fair enough. Executing anyone without a trial is evil, full stop. A Lawful Neutral character would be acting very out of character to execute someone without due process. However, the point here is executing someone without due process is neither lawful nor good.I don't think them being "Lawful Good" has much to do with anything. Are they innocent or guilty or what? It would be very easy to be LN and execute the hell out of LG people who ended up on the wrong side of the law.
Executing Chaotic Evil people "without any sort of trial" is potentially just as Evil and it's takes mental ninjitsu to pretend it isn't, frankly.
The incident in question I believe, and I've quick clicked through this multiple times so it may be flawed.I don't think them being "Lawful Good" has much to do with anything. Are they innocent or guilty or what? It would be very easy to be LN and execute the hell out of LG people who ended up on the wrong side of the law.
Executing Chaotic Evil people "without any sort of trial" is potentially just as Evil and it's takes mental ninjitsu to pretend it isn't, frankly.