He follows up now with, "One of the biggest problems in today's society is that too many people believe that all preferences are equal. They're not.

Imagine if we took orcs out of the picture and replaced them with some IRL culture. Yes, it's still fantasy pretend I'll give you that, but it starts to beg the question of "Who would find a game centered around the idea that this IRL culture needs to be killed to be fun?" If we can ask that question, then we can ask the same question of "If we put a rubber mask on these guys, is killing them for fun now okay?""

Quote from: Ratman_tf;1036133

this is the best

Whiner contrives a reason to whine, no matter how silly. Business as usual on the web.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;1036145I think orcs should try being less evil if they don't want to be killed.

This is a really solid point.

Quote from: S'mon;1036163That Christopher Helton is quite a piece of work.

We have worked together before, I've gamed with him in Las Vegas. He's a good chap who means well, but I feel like he's dove a little too deep end of the leftist (fanatic) pool. He got super pissed at me when I tried to post a rebuttal to one of his social media posts on ENWorld. I suggested that maybe we shouldn't punish the accused before we have all the facts. In good "Witch Burning" fashion, he thought I was a dick for suggesting such a thing and the thread was ABRUPTLY closed. Too bad, I would have liked to have that debate.

We already had this thread. It resulted in some awesome maggot-goblins, among other things.

Quote from: Mistwell;1036132From the Killing in the name of Advancement thread on EnWorld, which in itself has some whopper statements even in the opening post, we get this lovely sentiment from Shidaku;

I would like to kill Shidaku and take his stuff. But he's probably broke and living on unemployment benefits, and would have nothing to steal except his tentacle porn.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;1036136That this is nothing new. That the ethical considerations of designated bad-guy races does not line up well with real-world ethics. That the very concept of "always evil" creatures that somehow have enough agency to be responsible for their actions from a moral perspective is a paradox that invites people to spin their philosophical wheels on it indefinitely. That the person who posted it probably doesn't take this seriously either, and is just looking to shake a hornets nest ('real people' being a pretty good tell, to my eyes). And of course the overall thought that it's a game, and it has as much meaning as you assign it.

Funfact.

Orcs in O and BX D&D were never allways evil. Moreso because there was no "evil" alignment. In OD&D they could also be neutral as per rules listing. And in BX they just tended to the bad behavior.

This screed of "killing orcs is racist!" has been around a few years now and it was as retarded then as it is now.

Orcs are goblins (see e.g. the Hobbit). Goblins are evil-doing spirits that people used to believe in. Tolkien just chose to make such spirits more in the flesh so to speak. I don't see the problem here.

Even if they were people, I actually don't see the problem, because we're talking, you know, games. Games have gotten more and more popular, while people have gotten less violent. Perhaps partially because of the games, and various other forms of (often violent) entertainment.

OK enough with the italics for today.

So I guess he wouldn't care much for Recon?

Anyhow, I probably tell it every time this comes up, but as a kid my mom wouldn't let us play cops and robbers or war but cowboys and Indians was okay.  Again, racially motivated genocide was fine but heroically defending your country or the legitimate enforcement of the law weren't

Tried to read through that thread but I had stop, I was getting strain from all the eye rolling it was inducing.

Seems to me someone can't (or won't) separate their politics from their game of elf mans.

The way to combat this is to point out that orcs are essentially Neanderthals and thus white people, therefore according to SJWs, it's okay to kill them, as white people are the only evil in this world.

I find it strange that people can "have fun" in games that are about little more than killing as many other humanoids (of the wrong color of course) as possible.

Really? I don't: people have fun in a lot of ways that I wouldn't enjoy, so I don't do those things. I don't see the appeal of Overwatch so I don't play it. I have friends that play all sorts of games I don't enjoy (and watch movies I don't like and probably read books I  don't like), but there's some overlap so we just play those games together.

The fact that many fantasy races stem from stereotypes, exaggerations or mockeries of real people makes me raise eyebrows even further.

Wait, what? What are goblins a stereotype, exaggeration, or mockery of? I did a lot of research on goblins (and plenty of other monsters) for my own RPG and I don't recall anything like that. Same for orcs and kobolds, so I'm just going to call bullshit on his claim of "many fantasy races" (though it's possible he believes that and for some reason thinks that's how most if not all gamers think).

Whether these people realize it or not, they are "having fun" essentially killing real people who are wearing a funny rubber mask, a rubber mask, I might add, placed on that real person by someone with a decidedly poor or warped view of those real people."

Yeah fuck context or intention: you're racist if some random guy on the internet says so, whether or not you're actually racist. Orcs aren't orcs, they're black people or whatever, even if you were actually just thinking of them as imaginary fantasy monsters in an imaginary game where people don't really die and you aren't actually casting spells (you know, like a normal person playing a game).

Sounds like shidaku is the one with the "warped view".

Also my players aren't racist: they'll kill anything that tries to kill them.

Shidaku's statement made me laugh:). Partially because I used to think the same (I also happen to know a guy who is racist, and explicitly makes the non-human races into human races analogues - so I have proof that some people are doing it exactly as he suspects).

Then I removed orcs and only made the attacking hordes just as white as the characters (or just as Asian as the characters, for wuxia games).
There was no difference in the violence levels, over years of time...
So I concluded that I can be calm about the people I play with.

However, the OP of the ENWorld thread really made me laugh with that statement;).

QuoteI think that I would have less of a problem with the systems that build advancement upon violence and killing, if there were more of an exploration of how these acts can impact the psychology of the characters, rather than just giving them an additional to hit bonus. If you've been in a fight in real life, you know that even when you win a fight your mind still works you over. Violence is not fun.

First, I like exploring how violence changes the characters. FFS, why do you think I fucking LOVE Unknown Armies:D?
OTOH, I've been in a fight a couple months ago. My conscience only objected to one thing.
"You didn't drop the opponent with the first shot. Why the hell don't you train more?"
So yeah, I felt guilty, and might change because of that. But that's angst that wouldn't probably count for the OP:p!

Quote from: JeremyR;1036208orcs are essentially Neanderthals

I was recently wondering whether anyone else was noticing that;)!
(Not commenting on the rest of your post, that I cut away. But this is pretty spot-on, IMO!)

Quote from: AsenRG;1036213I also happen to know a guy who is racist, and explicitly makes the non-human races into human races analogues

Are you saying that it's wrong I make my orcs have German names and speak in a really bad German accent? I mean, Lawful Evil and all...

"Gott im himmel, zese Rohrim fight like zer madmen!" I learned all my German from WWII Commando comics as a kid.

Elves are French, of course. Ooh la la.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;1036147Everything in bold sounds about like how it went down between Europeans/Americans and the Northern tribes. Spanish conquests were different, but still hardly atypical, having as much in common with Alexander's or Xerxes' conquests as they may have with anything else.

Except that Alexander and Xerxes weren't aided by a massive die-off of their opposition, caused by disease which ran well ahead of their armies.