My point with the nazis is that the social justice culture as a whole has morality kinda backwards.

Fantasy evil creatures being evil based on immutable characteristics is wrong, and killing them on these characteristics is wrong, but fantasy creatures being irredeemably evil based on their opinions is alright.

Pretty sure everybody has seen that cringe inducing extra credits video right? Where the moral go-ahead to murder people without remorse is their identification with 'bad philosophies', and orcs, xenomorphs or even zombies are not OK to be just irredeemable evil?

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on October 08, 2021, 09:06:08 PM
My point with the nazis is that the social justice culture as a whole has morality kinda backwards.

Fantasy evil creatures being evil based on immutable characteristics is wrong, and killing them on these characteristics is wrong, but fantasy creatures being irredeemably evil based on their opinions is alright.

Pretty sure everybody has seen that cringe inducing extra credits video right? Where the moral go-ahead to murder people without remorse is their identification with 'bad philosophies', and orcs, xenomorphs or even zombies are not OK to be just irredeemable evil?

It's a cult dude, and anyone not in the cult is an infidel, you need to convert, submit or get terminated with extreme prejudice, worse if you dare speak against the cult, that's blasphemy!

Greetings!

Demons are EVIL. As others have eloquently noted, a Demon cannot, by their essential nature, "repent" or somehow be "redeemed." Of course, individual DM's can choose to construct some weird scenario where an unusual Demon somehow manages to become redeemed. I suppose that a fairly interesting and dramatic adventure can be put together pursuing or exploring such a scenario. That's all fine and good. However, as others have rightly mentioned, a Demon that somehow became "redeemed"--would necessitate the creature becoming something entirely different--in essence, returning to their original state of grace and perfection. Demons are, after all, FALLEN ANGELS. They rebelled against God's Will, and were cast down from Heaven, and in the process of that aspect of divine judgment, were forever and eternally transformed.

Demons are the ultimate expression of evil, wickedness, and rebellion. There isn't anything "redeemable" in them. The whole fascination with making Demons redeemable and this mushy, misunderstood, angst-filled drama queendom is just more bullshit. I think it ultimately forms bad storytelling, bad logic, and bad theology.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Quote from: GeekyBugle on October 08, 2021, 09:10:04 PM
It's a cult dude, and anyone not in the cult is an infidel, you need to convert, submit or get terminated with extreme prejudice, worse if you dare speak against the cult, that's blasphemy!

Sounds a lot like Nazis!

Quote from: jhkim on October 08, 2021, 08:13:34 PM
First of all, I disagree with kidkaos2's point here. Good Omens doesn't violate any inner moral sense for most decent people. It's non-Christian, but even as a Christian, I could appreciate its message . The same goes for Life of Brian and The Last Temptation of Christ. As a teenager, I went with a group from my church to watch The Last Temptation of Christ, and we discussed it afterwards.

Not the same thing, at least not with Good Omens.  Good Omens is the humanist version of Christian morality (or if you prefer, the kind of humanist version of Christian morality tied to a civil moral code, but that's starting to pick at nits in this case).  Yeah, it inverts the tropes somewhat, in order to make its point, and to go for the humor in the situation.  We could argue about it for days, but the underlying framework would end up being, "God had some good ideas.  More angels should have paid attention in class."

Whereas the usual version of "demons as good guys" is based on "there really is no morality at all, other than whatever we feel at the moment".  The SJWs tack onto that, "and what I feel is we should destroy anything that doesn't agree with our feels".  That is, Nihilism turned into a religion.  That's about as far as one can get from western humanism while staying in the western world.

Once again, Chesterton nailed it more than a century ago, paraphrasing:  "The humanists denied Original Sin, but believed that man was dirty in some way and thus needed washing.  Those that came after claimed that the dirt on the man wasn't dirt."   

Quote from: SHARK on October 08, 2021, 11:27:59 PM
Greetings!

Demons are EVIL. As others have eloquently noted, a Demon cannot, by their essential nature, "repent" or somehow be "redeemed." Of course, individual DM's can choose to construct some weird scenario where an unusual Demon somehow manages to become redeemed. I suppose that a fairly interesting and dramatic adventure can be put together pursuing or exploring such a scenario. That's all fine and good. However, as others have rightly mentioned, a Demon that somehow became "redeemed"--would necessitate the creature becoming something entirely different--in essence, returning to their original state of grace and perfection. Demons are, after all, FALLEN ANGELS. They rebelled against God's Will, and were cast down from Heaven, and in the process of that aspect of divine judgment, were forever and eternally transformed.

Demons are the ultimate expression of evil, wickedness, and rebellion. There isn't anything "redeemable" in them. The whole fascination with making Demons redeemable and this mushy, misunderstood, angst-filled drama queendom is just more bullshit. I think it ultimately forms bad storytelling, bad logic, and bad theology.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

While my setting's demons are indeed irredeemable evil spirits, one does have acknowledge that the cosmology of default D&D is not based on Christian metaphysics (their afterlife is a horror show by Christian theological standards) and, the concept of atypically aligned beings from the outer planes dates back to at least Planescape.

The main difference between then and now in the default D&D settings using the Great Wheel is scale. In Planescape there might be ONE non-lawful evil Devil on the entire Wheel and they're probably in exile and it was also probably not a natural phenomenon (helms of opposite alignment were things back then). It was basically the exception to prove the rule.

"Evolved" 5e seems to be viewing good-aligned devils as some sort of minority group within Devil society, turning it from a virtually unique exception into a rule.

Quote from: SHARK on October 08, 2021, 11:27:59 PM
Greetings!

Demons are EVIL. As others have eloquently noted, a Demon cannot, by their essential nature, "repent" or somehow be "redeemed." Of course, individual DM's can choose to construct some weird scenario where an unusual Demon somehow manages to become redeemed. I suppose that a fairly interesting and dramatic adventure can be put together pursuing or exploring such a scenario. That's all fine and good. However, as others have rightly mentioned, a Demon that somehow became "redeemed"--would necessitate the creature becoming something entirely different--in essence, returning to their original state of grace and perfection. Demons are, after all, FALLEN ANGELS. They rebelled against God's Will, and were cast down from Heaven, and in the process of that aspect of divine judgment, were forever and eternally transformed.

Demons are the ultimate expression of evil, wickedness, and rebellion. There isn't anything "redeemable" in them. The whole fascination with making Demons redeemable and this mushy, misunderstood, angst-filled drama queendom is just more bullshit. I think it ultimately forms bad storytelling, bad logic, and bad theology.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

There's quite a difference between what demons are in games and what demons are in your religion. The same applies to angels (which in many games have no direct connection with demons). The two don't have to be the same, and neither has to be linked to a god, especially when a great many fantasy worlds have multiple gods and no singular supreme god (denoted by the addition of tomatoes and sour cream). Patterning fiends and celestials inflexibly after what your religion tells you is rather limited.

Quote from: Chris24601 on October 09, 2021, 08:50:50 AM

Quote from: SHARK on October 08, 2021, 11:27:59 PM
Greetings!

Demons are EVIL. As others have eloquently noted, a Demon cannot, by their essential nature, "repent" or somehow be "redeemed." Of course, individual DM's can choose to construct some weird scenario where an unusual Demon somehow manages to become redeemed. I suppose that a fairly interesting and dramatic adventure can be put together pursuing or exploring such a scenario. That's all fine and good. However, as others have rightly mentioned, a Demon that somehow became "redeemed"--would necessitate the creature becoming something entirely different--in essence, returning to their original state of grace and perfection. Demons are, after all, FALLEN ANGELS. They rebelled against God's Will, and were cast down from Heaven, and in the process of that aspect of divine judgment, were forever and eternally transformed.

Demons are the ultimate expression of evil, wickedness, and rebellion. There isn't anything "redeemable" in them. The whole fascination with making Demons redeemable and this mushy, misunderstood, angst-filled drama queendom is just more bullshit. I think it ultimately forms bad storytelling, bad logic, and bad theology.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

While my setting's demons are indeed irredeemable evil spirits, one does have acknowledge that the cosmology of default D&D is not based on Christian metaphysics (their afterlife is a horror show by Christian theological standards) and, the concept of atypically aligned beings from the outer planes dates back to at least Planescape.

The main difference between then and now in the default D&D settings using the Great Wheel is scale. In Planescape there might be ONE non-lawful evil Devil on the entire Wheel and they're probably in exile and it was also probably not a natural phenomenon (helms of opposite alignment were things back then). It was basically the exception to prove the rule.

"Evolved" 5e seems to be viewing good-aligned devils as some sort of minority group within Devil society, turning it from a virtually unique exception into a rule.

Oh. I get it now.

Evil Devils/Demons = "Nazis"
"Good" Devils/Demons = the SJWs themselves

I remember running one game where the players came upon someone desiring their services but remained hidden behind a screen with strict instructions not to try and view him. They went ahead with the adventure and succeeded, whereupon they learned they had been working for a demon, stranded in the Prime Material Plane and needing help to return to his natural abode. Players were intrigued although wary of prying to deeply. The incident did not affect their normal attitude toward demons however.

One of the more interesting things Paizo (as bad as they are) did with PF2E was that all demons are inextricably linked with sin -- either one of the classic 'seven deadly' or an offshoot. They're so tangled up with that sin, in fact, that certain actions taken in opposition to it actually cause them damage.

(I find it hilarious that fucking Paizo seems to have their head bolted on straight in this regard.)

Quote from: Ghostmaker on October 09, 2021, 11:33:33 AM
One of the more interesting things Paizo (as bad as they are) did with PF2E was that all demons are inextricably linked with sin -- either one of the classic 'seven deadly' or an offshoot. They're so tangled up with that sin, in fact, that certain actions taken in opposition to it actually cause them damage.

(I find it hilarious that fucking Paizo seems to have their head bolted on straight in this regard.)

Very Faustian of them.

7 Deadly sins
7 Levels of hell

Demons of the level are tied to the sin.

Makes absolute sense to me.

Quote from: Ghostmaker on October 09, 2021, 11:33:33 AM(I find it hilarious that fucking Paizo seems to have their head bolted on straight in this regard.)

Paizo actually has done a LOT right with their changes to PF2 despite their nonstop virtue signal marketing and push to quite literally center minorities of every stripe as being normal and accepted as canon in their campaign setting. The lore, PR, marketing, and character direction is singularly focused on progressivism, inclusivity, and general wokeness but the underlying GAME itself.... it's remarkably solid and in some aspect, I might even say is quite BASED. Hell, they got all sorts of pressure to strip out anything that can be seen as racist such as the word Race  being replaced with Ancestry (A fair enough change IMO as it's actually more accurate in general) and Heritage but at the same time they KEPT the Ancestry specific ability score boosts ... and sure, they offered an optional rule that you can nerf one of your boosted scores to increase something else to have the ugly stumbling elf, but that's never the default assumption.

You see, they have a really REALLY good team of designers who actually, you know, have experience in building games and working/massaging things like the planar and existential aspects of the game (and to a lesser extent the main setting) into something that is cogent and makes sense. They didn't ditch alignment because they know it's important and the devs have even come out many times to push against the idea that things like Demons, Devils, and other types of creatures are usually quite irrevocably tied to the Alignment that basically defines and informs what they are, the lead creative James Jacobs has gone onto clarify in the face of pointed questioning on the topic that that is the way of things and anything that differs is BY DEFINITION an extreme and unique exception to those rules.

The sad thing is, while it's headed by real gamers with their heads on straight they fell into the trap of appealing not to the average gamer but instead to the most extreme left and in so doing became infiltrated and have for the last 5 or so years have had their arms twisted behind their back by their community, and in some cases current (or former in the case of Jessica Price and Crystal Fraiser) employees into almost exclusively centering the focus on inclusion, POC, diversity, and social activism.

Ironically enough, the best AP they've put out in nearly 10 year (in my opinion) was one that their most work crowd HATED and still rallies against to this day is one where the party are a bunch of town guards operating to protect the city/world. It was VERY well made and struck a good balance but it was released around the time that police brutality protests were happening across the nations so it became a target as if it were an adventure advocating for Blue Lives Matter or some shit.

In short, most of the Paizo staff are actually NOT worth nearly the hate they get from the center to right, worth of criticism sure it is the community culture and how they market it that's the REAL issue. PF2 itself, is pretty fucking good by itself IMO.

Quote from: DefNotAnInsiderNopeNoWay on October 09, 2021, 01:32:35 PM

Quote from: Ghostmaker on October 09, 2021, 11:33:33 AM(I find it hilarious that fucking Paizo seems to have their head bolted on straight in this regard.)

Paizo actually has done a LOT right with their changes to PF2 despite their nonstop virtue signal marketing and push to quite literally center minorities of every stripe as being normal and accepted as canon in their campaign setting. The lore, PR, marketing, and character direction is singularly focused on progressivism, inclusivity, and general wokeness but the underlying GAME itself.... it's remarkably solid and in some aspect, I might even say is quite BASED. Hell, they got all sorts of pressure to strip out anything that can be seen as racist such as the word Race  being replaced with Ancestry (A fair enough change IMO as it's actually more accurate in general) and Heritage but at the same time they KEPT the Ancestry specific ability score boosts ... and sure, they offered an optional rule that you can nerf one of your boosted scores to increase something else to have the ugly stumbling elf, but that's never the default assumption.

You see, they have a really REALLY good team of designers who actually, you know, have experience in building games and working/massaging things like the planar and existential aspects of the game (and to a lesser extent the main setting) into something that is cogent and makes sense. They didn't ditch alignment because they know it's important and the devs have even come out many times to push against the idea that things like Demons, Devils, and other types of creatures are usually quite irrevocably tied to the Alignment that basically defines and informs what they are, the lead creative James Jacobs has gone onto clarify in the face of pointed questioning on the topic that that is the way of things and anything that differs is BY DEFINITION an extreme and unique exception to those rules.

The sad thing is, while it's headed by real gamers with their heads on straight they fell into the trap of appealing not to the average gamer but instead to the most extreme left and in so doing became infiltrated and have for the last 5 or so years have had their arms twisted behind their back by their community, and in some cases current (or former in the case of Jessica Price and Crystal Fraiser) employees into almost exclusively centering the focus on inclusion, POC, diversity, and social activism.

Ironically enough, the best AP they've put out in nearly 10 year (in my opinion) was one that their most work crowd HATED and still rallies against to this day is one where the party are a bunch of town guards operating to protect the city/world. It was VERY well made and struck a good balance but it was released around the time that police brutality protests were happening across the nations so it became a target as if it were an adventure advocating for Blue Lives Matter or some shit.

In short, most of the Paizo staff are actually NOT worth nearly the hate they get from the center to right, worth of criticism sure it is the community culture and how they market it that's the REAL issue. PF2 itself, is pretty fucking good by itself IMO.

While their kneejerk ACAB reaction was cringe, the funny thing about that adventure path is that it does kind of force you to be bad cops if you think too much into it. It just to justify the standard D&D reward scheme, but if you think about it, you're basically being paid with bribes and civil asset forfeiture.

Quote from: Chris24601 on October 09, 2021, 08:50:50 AM

Quote from: SHARK on October 08, 2021, 11:27:59 PM
Greetings!

Demons are EVIL. As others have eloquently noted, a Demon cannot, by their essential nature, "repent" or somehow be "redeemed." Of course, individual DM's can choose to construct some weird scenario where an unusual Demon somehow manages to become redeemed. I suppose that a fairly interesting and dramatic adventure can be put together pursuing or exploring such a scenario. That's all fine and good. However, as others have rightly mentioned, a Demon that somehow became "redeemed"--would necessitate the creature becoming something entirely different--in essence, returning to their original state of grace and perfection. Demons are, after all, FALLEN ANGELS. They rebelled against God's Will, and were cast down from Heaven, and in the process of that aspect of divine judgment, were forever and eternally transformed.

Demons are the ultimate expression of evil, wickedness, and rebellion. There isn't anything "redeemable" in them. The whole fascination with making Demons redeemable and this mushy, misunderstood, angst-filled drama queendom is just more bullshit. I think it ultimately forms bad storytelling, bad logic, and bad theology.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

While my setting's demons are indeed irredeemable evil spirits, one does have acknowledge that the cosmology of default D&D is not based on Christian metaphysics (their afterlife is a horror show by Christian theological standards) and, the concept of atypically aligned beings from the outer planes dates back to at least Planescape.

The main difference between then and now in the default D&D settings using the Great Wheel is scale. In Planescape there might be ONE non-lawful evil Devil on the entire Wheel and they're probably in exile and it was also probably not a natural phenomenon (helms of opposite alignment were things back then). It was basically the exception to prove the rule.

"Evolved" 5e seems to be viewing good-aligned devils as some sort of minority group within Devil society, turning it from a virtually unique exception into a rule.

The cosmology of D&D doesn't have to be based on Christian theology.  If you look at the demons the demons themselves are clearly based on Christian style demons even if the overall cosmology is radically different.  The idea that I and I think a few other people on this thread are upset about is making a roleplaying game where you take everything about demons and leave it the same and then just flip their alignment from evil to good, for no discernable reason other than to be edgy and cool.  I think this promotes an unhealthy kind of moral relativism that I would argue is bad enough in a book or movie from which you have degrees of separation, but worse in an RPG where you are attempting to inhabit a character in that world, in which you have fewer degrees of separation.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not engaging in moral panic and claiming this will corrupt the youth of tomorrow.  That's silly.  I'm just saying it plays a contributing part towards destabilizing peoples' moral compass and thus is something that D&D would be better without.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on October 09, 2021, 08:43:01 AM

Quote from: jhkim on October 08, 2021, 08:13:34 PM
First of all, I disagree with kidkaos2's point here. Good Omens doesn't violate any inner moral sense for most decent people. It's non-Christian, but even as a Christian, I could appreciate its message . The same goes for Life of Brian and The Last Temptation of Christ. As a teenager, I went with a group from my church to watch The Last Temptation of Christ, and we discussed it afterwards.

Not the same thing, at least not with Good Omens.  Good Omens is the humanist version of Christian morality (or if you prefer, the kind of humanist version of Christian morality tied to a civil moral code, but that's starting to pick at nits in this case).  Yeah, it inverts the tropes somewhat, in order to make its point, and to go for the humor in the situation.  We could argue about it for days, but the underlying framework would end up being, "God had some good ideas.  More angels should have paid attention in class."

Whereas the usual version of "demons as good guys" is based on "there really is no morality at all, other than whatever we feel at the moment".

By the usual version, I'd guess you're talking about stuff like the movie The Prophecy (1995) or the TV series Supernatural. In these, neither angels or demons care about humanity, and are just fighting an endless war with each other. Their theology is terrible and they can be poorly done, though there is still usually a sort of human morality, just not as well executed as in Good Omens.

However, the D&D 5.5 preview is explicitly not this. It says that angels will be marked as typically good and demons as typically evil. I also think this is arguing over something that will make almost no difference in actual D&D campaigns. It's not making D&D into an adaptation The Prophecy - it's a token word change in some Monster Manual entries.

Quote from: kidkaos2 on October 09, 2021, 05:29:06 PM
The idea that I and I think a few other people on this thread are upset about is making a roleplaying game where you take everything about demons and leave it the same and then just flip their alignment from evil to good, for no discernable reason other than to be edgy and cool.  I think this promotes an unhealthy kind of moral relativism that I would argue is bad enough in a book or movie from which you have degrees of separation, but worse in an RPG where you are attempting to inhabit a character in that world, in which you have fewer degrees of separation.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not engaging in moral panic and claiming this will corrupt the youth of tomorrow.  That's silly.  I'm just saying it plays a contributing part towards destabilizing peoples' moral compass and thus is something that D&D would be better without.

As I noted above, this isn't what it says. It's not reversing the morality of demons. It's allowing for exceptions of a demon seeking redemption or quitting the game -- or a disillusioned angel or fallen angel.

Also, you argue that RPG text has greater moral impact, but I think it's the opposite. An RPG lets players have impact on each other, but the game books are passive things. RPGs are do-it-yourself to a large degree. So if there's a rule that a group doesn't like, they'll ignore it. The same goes for material in modules. Based on this, I think that RPGs have less effect than books or movies.