Quote from: tenbones;950078Heh after the session - we had this huge discussion about. It was fun (but probably not everyone's cup of tea). Even now years later - my group still laughs about the whole thing. I don't hold what people do in-game, usually, against them unless it becomes a true problem. I later did remove him from the group, he'd been gaming with me for over 20-years but because of his personal issues that partially created this gigantic ethical blindspot I had to give him the boot.

He was still an excellent player, he just happened to be a narcissistic asshole.

Yeah, if it was a long time ago, I'd probably have more patience, but at this point I've spent my tolerance for selfish, unethical, narcissistic assholes at the gaming table.

I think people overestimate the positive impacts of magic by ignoring the negative ones.  Sure you've got Create Food and Water but you've also got Bulletes and Anhegs tearing up the cropland and eating the peasants and livestock.  Never mind the village witch casting Blight Crops and the evil knight who's turned to black sorcery to avenge being embarrassed at the king's court last year.

Quote from: CRKrueger;950064If he persisted and didn't agree he was being ridiculous, yes, without hesitation.

- The PC hired an assassin to kill an NPC for political gain.
- That NPC disappeared.
- The player claimed the PC didn't know that his actions were the cause of their death.
- The player claimed the PC was still good.

If a Good PC hired an assassin to kill an Evil NPC and thereby saved a thousand lives, does that make the PC evil?

Quote from: soltakss;950231If a Good PC hired an assassin to kill an Evil NPC and thereby saved a thousand lives, does that make the PC evil?

Who cares?  That's not what happened nor the point of the player's problem.

Quote from: estar;950050Or those races have a range of behavior different enough from baseline human that make peaceful co-existence unlikely. Given enough generation of dealing with the problem and how our history unfolded, a kill on sight attitude is very plausible.

For example in the Majestic Wilderlands Orcs differ not only physically from humans but their base aggression levels were shoved far to the aggressive side of human personalities. The average orc will come off as an hyper aggressive bully in normal human society. The only reason the orcs have anything like a culture/civilization is the fact the demons that altered baked in a dominance reflex where they will submit to the strong more readily than the average human.

The point is that it about thinking things through. There nothing that is "wrong" about the D&D tropes that makes it any less easier or harder to think things through to come up with reason for why thing are what they are compared to Jorune, Tekumel, or Glorantha. The thing that set D&D apart is the fact it is THE most popular image of fantasy. The reason it was that for so long because the base tropes are that flexible and Arneson and Gygax did a good job on drawing out the best from our myths and legends.

This is exactly what I have been arguing. By giving the orcs biological differences which are stable in their own context, you have made them not evil but alien. Being unable to peacefully coexist does not make either side inherently evil.

First, hi. Been lurking a while.

Second, in response to the OP, it depends on what you mean by "evil." I don't think it means "you maximize the suffering of those around you." I think if you go with the AD&D definitions "Good" is pretty explicitly framed in terms of Declaration of Independence-style concepts of human rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. "Evil" disregards any such concept and prizes power and strength.

I think there are plenty of societies where the formative moral and cultural norms are "Evil" by the Gygaxian (really Jeffersonian) definition. If you dig into history, the morality of the Sparta, Rome, the Seljuks, etc, is pretty alien to our own and often disturbing in its brutality. I wouldn't look so much to 20th century examples, as the Nazis and Communists both had unsustainable, cartoon-bad-guy morality because they were basically a massive LARP by idiots with armies behind them.

The axis that is much harder to reconcile is Law vs Chaos. If you don't have the order and good of society as part of your moral system somewhere, I don't think you can really have an advanced society, where "advanced" means "has developed urban lifestyles and trade goods." It requires too much social cooperation and mutual trust to do that stuff.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;950267Being unable to peacefully coexist does not make either side inherently evil.

But if they're sentient beings who ostensibly have free will, in a setting with an objective morality, then being unable to peacefully coexist very likely -does- make them evil.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;950267This is exactly what I have been arguing. By giving the orcs biological differences which are stable in their own context, you have made them not evil but alien. Being unable to peacefully coexist does not make either side inherently evil.

No but it does make it tragic. The difference I created doesn't allow for peaceful co-existence. There are low aggression orcs capable of living in human civilizations but they are on the low end of the orc's bell curve and are few and far between.


The main reason that the major civilization haven't exterminated them is because while magic exists in the Wilderlands it amounted to a situation that I consider to be 20% better than what happened historically. So disease, low productivity means that labor is at a premium and it takes generations for a region to be colonized and exploited. There a lot of empty space remaining to be exploited before the major civilizations get around into expanding into the regions that the orcs occupy.

Of course the Orcs have their moments as well and are able to push back when circumstances are right. There was a major elven kingdom in the main campaign area that got wiped 400 years ago and it is only now that a effort to reclaim that territory by the surrounding states is underway. And for the most part it is focused on created marches just inside the old elven realm border to stop orc raids into the surrounding lands.

Note this is an example of what I mean that even if the premise of a setting leads to a specific conclusion, the campaign can be set in a earlier point in time before that it reached. In any case the Orcs are doomed in the long run. Technology for many major civilization is on the verge of the renaissance, gunpowder (called Dragon Powder) is being used to make siege cannons and within a century the first hand weapons will be probably be developed.  The effectiveness of pike over heavy cavalry is being developed, the horse collar is in use, water mills and windmills are in use as well.

The orcs don't have the social cohesion to compete with that unless they become part of something else. For example a black dragon named Pan Caulderax is major a supernatural power in the region that interferes with politics. The dragon does incorporate orcs into his plans.

But back to the OP all of this follows fro my premises for the Majestic Wilderlands. Another set of premises would lead to a different outcome and view of orcs. For example if one view orcs as being created from a spiritual corruption of a race. In that case they are inherently evil. Although I would argue in terms of what a person would see if they were actually there between that and what I did there is no difference. The end result the same, individual and cultures that by their nature are unable to co-exist and interactions are reduced to kill on sight.

Quote from: David Johansen;950103I think people overestimate the positive impacts of magic by ignoring the negative ones.  Sure you've got Create Food and Water but you've also got Bulletes and Anhegs tearing up the cropland and eating the peasants and livestock.  Never mind the village witch casting Blight Crops and the evil knight who's turned to black sorcery to avenge being embarrassed at the king's court last year.

Which is why in my opinion that for the average inhabitant the D&D style magic i use has amounted to condition 20% better over history. That the elites (and adventurers) enjoy a standard of living similar to the early 19th century. But we are talking 1% of the population if that.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;950268I think there are plenty of societies where the formative moral and cultural norms are "Evil" by the Gygaxian (really Jeffersonian) definition. If you dig into history, the morality of the Sparta, Rome, the Seljuks, etc, is pretty alien to our own and often disturbing in its brutality. I wouldn't look so much to 20th century examples, as the Nazis and Communists both had unsustainable, cartoon-bad-guy morality because they were basically a massive LARP by idiots with armies behind them.

You make some good point however I take the OP to mean societies that consider themselves to be evil. To the individual Spartan Greek, Roman, Turk, etc their culture was great and epitomize what was good and right in the world. The fact that their neighbors disagreed "vigorously" with that assertion was not relevant.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;950268The axis that is much harder to reconcile is Law vs Chaos. If you don't have the order and good of society as part of your moral system somewhere, I don't think you can really have an advanced society, where "advanced" means "has developed urban lifestyles and trade goods." It requires too much social cooperation and mutual trust to do that stuff.

In Blackmoor and Greyhawk, law and chaos were factions. The forces of laws were your typical medievealish cities and kingdoms, chaos were the bad guys and their monstrous allies trying to conquer them. And the neutral are the folks that both sides were trying to recruit.

If you try to stretch this faction system into a philosophy of life then there will be issues. Which is why I ditched alignment in favor of tenets, codes, and philosophies described in natural language.

Quote from: soltakss;950231If a Good PC hired an assassin to kill an Evil NPC and thereby saved a thousand lives, does that make the PC evil?

That's not really the question. What it does do is make the PC Not Good. I'm not playing the moral equivalency game that PC's can predict the future etcas some justification for their current actions. That's the realm of the Gods (and monsters!). Ethically speaking you can do what you want and weigh the action(s) accordingly. Intent matters too.

In all likelihood, you're probably right - the NPC would have likely killed many other people through his machinations. But the intent of the act at the moment was a "Good" PC actively hiring a known assassin to deal with his rival, and purposely word the agreement of the deal so that he'd have plausible deniability for the sole purpose of soothing his own ego. I *could* argue that's pretty evil (because it is - it's plotting cold-blooded murder against a cold-blooded murderer which was against the law of his OWN Duchy and the King he served).

All I did was just say he's not Good. Because he isn't. (he was subsequently stripped of his title and lands later.)

But I also maintained their kingdom was NG and their king exemplified that.

Quote from: estar;950330You make some good point however I take the OP to mean societies that consider themselves to be evil. To the individual Spartan Greek, Roman, Turk, etc their culture was great and epitomize what was good and right in the world. The fact that their neighbors disagreed "vigorously" with that assertion was not relevant.

Well, that's because in reality, societies defined good and evil based on their own norms, not an official handbook. In D&D world, Evil has an immutable definition, as does Good. Based on those definitions, sure you can have societies that think that Evil the "best" way to be.

In terms of the OP, societies where maximizing the suffering of other gains you the greatest gifts in the afterlife are indeed ridiculous, but if that is really a significant part of any setting I've played, I've certainly ignored it.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;950353Well, that's because in reality, societies defined good and evil based on their own norms, not an official handbook. In D&D world, Evil has an immutable definition, as does Good. Based on those definitions, sure you can have societies that think that Evil the "best" way to be.

And my original point remains, unless imposed no human culture is going to pick Evil as D&D defines. Otherwise they not acting like human beings. While it fantasy, fantasy still operates with the premise that people act like people. Otherwise it hard to relate too.

Another counterpoint as depicted in the various modules and supplement even the "evil cultures" have a norm that their members believe is right and just. As depicted in D3, the Drow are consider an "evil" culture but when you look at how they are depicted, the majority of evil is directed at other races. The Drow themselves form an elite with a hierarchy and they have specific ways they interact with each other. To me it obvious that the Drow view their setup as the right way to go for them.

Quote from: Voros;949139Would German fascism have built a sustainable society? What alignment were the Aztecs?

Exactly.  Evil societies and people supporting them rarely consider themselves evil, but rather consider themselves in the right and serving a higher purpose.  Sociopaths don't even get the concept but they are more CE.

I think a simple test for "evil" is if you believe it is acceptable to harm the innocent to get what you want.  Most evil societies tend to justify the harm by painting the victim as "guilty" of something or "owing" something to the superior culture, sometimes the "guilt" not being strong enough to protect themselves.  Also "evil" societies have no problem punishing someone's innocent children for the their acts, punishing the easy target for the crimes of others, or harming innocent loved ones to ensure their compliance.  I'm not talking about collateral harm, but intentional targeting of the innocent.

It's hard to have the discussion of "society" without talking about the scale of that society. There are requirements that, assuming we're talking about mere-mortals, that societies demand at different scales. Generally speaking the larger you go, the more rules you need (and the more "lawful" you have to be). You can probably get away with "Neutral" - but that's debatable.

Aztecs while not strictly an absolute "empire", but had most of the functions of one was actually very lawful in the sense their code of laws covered pretty much everything you saw in European empires. They had appeal processes etc. But they were also heavily influenced by their religion. With the Imperial cult being that of their war-god, yeah they had some bloody practices. That alone doesn't necessarily mean they were Chaotic Evil (which is how most people in the west perceive them), they were a very lawful in practice. But yeah, probably evil. heh