While pure psychopathy of the malevolent form as personified by many serial murderers is perhaps demonstrated to be incompatible with cooperation, I think corporate behaviors of the last 100 years have well demonstrated that at least sociopathy can be evidenced on a grand scale while still producing productive and successful results.

It is perhaps debatable how sustainable it is in the very long term, but it's obvious that a mindset solely dominated by profit at all costs is possible and capable of producing a productive society, if not a moral one by many standards.

Quote from: CRKrueger;482418I'm not sure if you are specifically responding to me or not, but I made it pretty clear earlier that raping, torturing and enjoying the slaying of "irredeemable orc" children isn't good, but killing them would be.

Yes, but that part isn't exactly clear either. Is it permitted to steal from orc children? Is it permitted to lie to them?

If one has no moral obligation to orcs, then one has no moral obligation to them. Rape, torture, it's simply a matter of when your stomach starts turning, not logic. Sticking your dick in a tree is weird, but you have no moral obligation to the tree not to stick your dick in it.

QuoteThe "irredeemable orc" is no different from an incapacitated demon in this case.  It is not currently capable of harm, but if left alone it shall be capable of harm, and will do harm, for that's what it is, harm embodied.  Anyone it harms later results directly from you choosing not to let it live.  The choice does not rest with the "irredeemable orc" it cannot be other then what it was made to be.  The choice rests with you.  Choosing to let an inherent evil exist when you could end it's existence is inherently evil.  Choosing to end an inherent evil is an inherent good.

Not really. For example, in real life we usually lock up psychopaths and segregate them from others. In tales with demons they are usually banished, rather than slain, sent back to the prison of Hell.

That because, of course, as moral people we understand that we have moral obligations even to the worst people who are incapable of recognising their own moral obligations back to us.

QuoteAnd please stop going on about "need for justification", Stabby McChildRaper and all the other snide, smug bullshit.  The only one you're insulting is yourself.

Mythusmage is a real person (he used to post here), and he really does have a setting where adults fuck children, and it really is totally cool according to the metaphysics of the setting. He posted about it here a couple of times, and I find it an evocative comparison with orc child-murder on how moral permissiveness in games can work.

I'm not suggesting you find raping kids acceptable, but I am attempting to point out how once you've decided that morality is totally arbitrary for game purposes, it can lead you to some super-fucking-weirdo places.

Quote from: J Arcane;482449While pure psychopathy of the malevolent form as personified by many serial murderers is perhaps demonstrated to be incompatible with cooperation, I think corporate behaviors of the last 100 years have well demonstrated that at least sociopathy can be evidenced on a grand scale while still producing productive and successful results.

It is perhaps debatable how sustainable it is in the very long term, but it's obvious that a mindset solely dominated by profit at all costs is possible and capable of producing a productive society, if not a moral one by many standards.

Corporations do the same thing as the lone psychopath - chew up and consume the sociality of others. Corporate loyalty is a great example of psychopathic babble convincing people that a predator for whom they are the prey is "actually" their friend.

Quote from: TristramEvans;482428Torture and rape remain evil acts no matter who is doing them to whom. I couldn't imagine letting players indulge in either in an RPG. Certainly not one that I'd be a part of. But then, I play games about heroes, up to and including superheroes. I expect players to act like heroes.

I don't necessarily expect my PCs to be heroic, but I would prefer that they are not Al Qaida.

Quote from: Sigmund;482414Good question. One thing that has not been considered that I recall seeing is that perhaps their violent or psychopathic natures only extend to species other than their own. This would make perfect sense if they were being postulated in the context of the Gruumsh myth.

That would be essentially the same as the position I've outlined as having when I use orcs. That doesn't require all the cosmological cruft though. They could have a psychology essentially identical to humanity and act in this way.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;482422I don't doubt this would have heavy repurcussions in real life or in a fantasy setting where the effects of changing the metaphysics was fully examined. But my point is really that most players have a much lower threshold when it comes to metaphysics than physics. You can say "all orcs are evil, and the good comes from Jalai the sky god" and people will pretty much accept it. But if you tell your players rivers are running uphill or the world is zero G, they tend to ask a lot more questions about such changes.

Wait until Jalai asks them to crush the skulls of orc children, and you might get a few raised eyebrows.

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine;482445Sure, I would agree that fantasy worlds do not need to be consistent entirely with the real world. However, I don't think elements like magic and dragons are irrational, just fantastical. Magic in games is often organised, with clear conceptual boundaries on what it can do (usually provided by the rules on casting spells if not otherwise explicitly listed). It is not scientific, but it is rational.

One can say "There is magic in this game, and it works like this..." and expect any sensible person paying attention to understand how magic works, especially if there is a clear set of well-written rules detailing how one casts spells and what happens when one does.

The important thing there is consistency of outputs / actions, rather than necessarily understanding the internal thaumological principles of magic (which are really just the rules for casting spells etc.). So long as magic acts in a predictable way, it can incorporated into an otherwise consistent world without causing damage to the verisimilitude or consistency because the ability to transparently predict the outcome of one's actions is the goal that verisimilitude and consistency serve.

Morality isn't fantastical though. Morality already exists, and we know how it works, and we are all already reasonably well-trained in it. We don't even really require rules for it (a good, though not perfect, indicator, of whether something is fantastical or not) though we do have some in classic D&D.

Deviations from our ordinary understanding of morality do not serve to make the world easier to get along in, unless presented in a comprehensible, rational way that PCs can grasp (which is why they have to be rational on some level). If the codes cannot be understood or do not make sense but transgressions are punished (by losing Paladin status etc.), you create an attitude of learned helplessness, as the easiest attitude when one is not sure of how to avoid being punished for screwing up is simply to do nothing at all. This is directly contrary to encouraging player agency.

You can use bizarre moral systems if you wish, so long as you can explain to players how and why they work, since otherwise you're just going to confuse them and leave them wondering what the hell they're supposed to be doing.

Dragons and magic are irrational in the sense that they are not based on or subject to the physics of the real world and they couldn't possibly do the things they do. A real creature built just like dragons as presented in D&D would never be able to naturally fly. Various reasons can be postulated, not the least of which is, "they're magic". Most of the magic imagined by fantasy worlds is defined by it's ability to break the laws of the natural, rational world around us. Still, the laws of physics and the rational universe must be set aside to allow for flying dragons and magic.Yet despite this, physics seems to work the same as in our real world most of the rest of the time. This is because, while we can relate best to worlds that operate similar to ours, we seem to have little trouble selectively setting aside the laws of physics when imagining fantasy worlds. It also seems the less we actually understand about physics, the easier it is to not be bothered by imagining things that break the laws of physics. I see no reason why the same could not be said for morality. In fact, this would explain why you, someone who thinks about and understands real world morality more than most people has so much harder a time allowing for the breaking of these moral standards.

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine;482456Wait until Jalai asks them to crush the skulls of orc children, and you might get a few raised eyebrows.

Sure, but that is because people generally find that concept distasteful. That doesn't mean it is inconsistent in the setting though.

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine;482455That would be essentially the same as the position I've outlined as having when I use orcs. That doesn't require all the cosmological cruft though. They could have a psychology essentially identical to humanity and act in this way.

Indeed. And still be "irredeemable", at least in the eyes of their enemies.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;482459Sure, but that is because people generally find that concept distasteful. That doesn't mean it is inconsistent in the setting though.

Indeed. The whole point of including it might be exactly because the players find it distasteful.

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine;482447The problem actually becomes much easier to resolve if you give up the whole "absolute" and "irredeemable" elements, and just use "good" and "evil" in straightforward, ordinary ways to refer to individual orcs.

"These orcs are evil" is far less problematic than "All orcs are evil by nature".

Of course. Anytime you slap "all" before anything in a setting if forces you to maintain that consistently. It is definitely easier to allow for exceptions. No argument from me there. I just don't see why it is an issue if someone wants to take the alternate approach and go with all orcs are evil. Can lead to some interesting setting material.

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine;482453Corporations do the same thing as the lone psychopath - chew up and consume the sociality of others. Corporate loyalty is a great example of psychopathic babble convincing people that a predator for whom they are the prey is "actually" their friend.

Out of curiosity then, do you find Ferengi in Star Trek hard to swallow as a society?  They are, essentially, corporate sociopathy as cultural philosophy, and while later DS9 did undermine that and begin redeeming them, the basic idea was pretty regular.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;482464Of course. Anytime you slap "all" before anything in a setting if forces you to maintain that consistently. It is definitely easier to allow for exceptions. No argument from me there. I just don't see why it is an issue if someone wants to take the alternate approach and go with all orcs are evil. Can lead to some interesting setting material.

It certainly makes them feel more "alien", which IMO could be a very compelling reason to use them. Especially if the players have grown way too familiar with "standard" orcs.

Quote from: Sigmund;482461Indeed. And still be "irredeemable", at least in the eyes of their enemies.

Sure. But it's one thing to say someone is "irredeemable" or "evil", and another for them to have the E-gene or be full of E-energy. I'm fine with the former and consider the latter somewhat odd, to say the least.

Quote from: Pseudoephedrine;482468Sure. But it's one thing to say someone is "irredeemable" or "evil", and another for them to have the E-gene or be full of E-energy. I'm fine with the former and consider the latter somewhat odd, to say the least.

I might point out that, at least in 3rd edition, the existence of, essentially, "E-energy" is actually there more or less.  

Which is sort of odd if you think about it too hard, and is why I tended to lean more on the "personifying death and decay" aspect of "negative energy" rather than a direct association with evil.