|
2 years ago ::
Jul 07, 2011 - 9:02PM
#81
|
Date Joined:
Dec 27, 2008
|
TO quote myself, "We're talking about people starving/losing livelyhood/similar over it, and even then if you had no knowledge/expectation of such a result, it's more unfortunate than evil."
I believe I took your caveat into consideration in the creation of my example. The All-Killer has a reasonable expectation that if he fails, he has made the world a better place by making the planes no longer anathema to each other.
I know that, in our real world, we have to rely on imperfect legal theories like the "reasonable man" standard. This is the standard that makes criminally negligent homicide a prosecutable offense. The jury is asked to determine whether a hypothetical, platonically ideal "reasonable" person would have had a reliable expectation that their actions would likely result in the death of another. We use this standard because we have no way of traveling back in time and inhabiting the body and mind of the accused, of knowing exactly how reasonable he or she was and exactly what his or her expectations were, and how reliable they seemed at the time.
In a role playing game, we have no such limitation, and nor do the cosmic forces that embody these ideals. We can simply ask the player what the hell his character was thinking.
"What the hell were you thinking providing WMDs to Usama bin Archlich?!" is an entirely reasonable question for a DM to ask his player. If the player's response is an unsatisfactory rationalization that he has clearly invented in order to justify taking the 1 bajillion gp he was offered for the zombie plague or whatever, then it would be entirely reasonable for the other players at the table to mock that player mercilessly.
But should the player, by some miracle, reveal some tangle of logic by which his character may have plausibly believed he was doing a good deed, then the fact that any court in the land without direct access to that character's thought process would readily convict him under the reasonable person standard is not relevant to the character's alignment.
Of course, in either case the rest of the party may well find it in the best interests of humanity to kill the moron as quickly as possible before he has a chance to do anything else that epically stupid.
|
|
|
|
2 years ago ::
Jul 07, 2011 - 11:00PM
#82
|
Date Joined:
Jun 24, 2009
|
If the player's response is an unsatisfactory rationalization that he has clearly invented in order to justify taking the 1 bajillion gp he was offered for the zombie plague or whatever, then it would be entirely reasonable for the other players at the table to mock that player mercilessly.
I can see it now: Haha, you're rich! Serves you right for doing something so stupid! Keep it up and you may end up being so moronic you have enough money to buy waterdeep! 
|
|
|
|
2 years ago ::
Jul 07, 2011 - 11:39PM
#83
|
|
|
TO quote myself, "We're talking about people starving/losing livelyhood/similar over it, and even then if you had no knowledge/expectation of such a result, it's more unfortunate than evil."
I believe I took your caveat into consideration in the creation of my example. The All-Killer has a reasonable expectation that if he fails, he has made the world a better place by making the planes no longer anathema to each other.
I know that, in our real world, we have to rely on imperfect legal theories like the "reasonable man" standard. This is the standard that makes criminally negligent homicide a prosecutable offense. The jury is asked to determine whether a hypothetical, platonically ideal "reasonable" person would have had a reliable expectation that their actions would likely result in the death of another. We use this standard because we have no way of traveling back in time and inhabiting the body and mind of the accused, of knowing exactly how reasonable he or she was and exactly what his or her expectations were, and how reliable they seemed at the time.
In a role playing game, we have no such limitation, and nor do the cosmic forces that embody these ideals. We can simply ask the player what the hell his character was thinking.
"What the hell were you thinking providing WMDs to Usama bin Archlich?!" is an entirely reasonable question for a DM to ask his player. If the player's response is an unsatisfactory rationalization that he has clearly invented in order to justify taking the 1 bajillion gp he was offered for the zombie plague or whatever, then it would be entirely reasonable for the other players at the table to mock that player mercilessly.
But should the player, by some miracle, reveal some tangle of logic by which his character may have plausibly believed he was doing a good deed, then the fact that any court in the land without direct access to that character's thought process would readily convict him under the reasonable person standard is not relevant to the character's alignment.
Of course, in either case the rest of the party may well find it in the best interests of humanity to kill the moron as quickly as possible before he has a chance to do anything else that epically stupid.
I find it exceedingly difficult to believe that a person could provide the means to wipe out a city to a Lich of well known shifty intent without a reasonable expectation of bad sh** happening as a direct result. In fact, a person would have to be insane, or mentally deficient. In which case they're not responsible for predicting the outcomes of their actions.
The All-Killer example is interesting. The All-Killer is actively trying to bring about the end of all things. I don';t think that taking the risk that your plan will backfire invalidates or outweighs the intent of that plan. Most plans run that risk. Particularly considering that the All-Killer expects it's plan to work, or it wouldn't initiate it.
That's different from ignoring a serious and preventable risk of things going in the opposite direction of your intentions.
More sex and gender equality and racial equality shouldn't even be an argument--it should simply be an assumption for any RPG that wants to stay relevant in the 21st century.
I could say anything in D&D is silly though, because it's a silly game and we are silly people.
|
|
|
|
2 years ago ::
Jul 08, 2011 - 1:14AM
#84
|
Date Joined:
Dec 27, 2008
|
I can see it now: Haha, you're rich! Serves you right for doing something so stupid! Keep it up and you may end up being so moronic you have enough money to buy waterdeep!
I'm not quite sure how to respond to this.
OK, first of all nobody is rich except a fictional character. That fictional character has now been rendered inane by violating all rules of storytelling by behaving in a manner thoroughly inconsistent with his previous characterization. So now the player has a bunch of zeroes on his character sheet and a PC who's not worth playing since nobody at the table is going to take him seriously ever again.
Second, we are talking about a character so dumb he probably doesn't deserve to live. So most likely his partymates are going to be divvying up that gold, because letting somebody that stupid walk around is like sitting next to Christopher Walken in that scene in Deerhunter, and everytime he puts the gun to his temple you put your head up against his and take a picture of the two of you smiling on your disposal camera, except Christopher Walken's head is the planet Earth.
So yes, I would mock such a player.
I find it exceedingly difficult to believe that a person could provide the means to wipe out a city to a Lich of well known shifty intent without a reasonable expectation of bad sh** happening as a direct result. In fact, a person would have to be insane, or mentally deficient. In which case they're not responsible for predicting the outcomes of their actions.
I'm not saying that I disagree, I'm saying that, in the highly improbable hypothetical circumstance that a player could come up with a rationalization that wasn't obviously ridiculous, that character would not be evil, and that, therefore, actions do not determine alignment.
The All-Killer example is interesting. The All-Killer is actively trying to bring about the end of all things. I don';t think that taking the risk that your plan will backfire invalidates or outweighs the intent of that plan. Most plans run that risk. Particularly considering that the All-Killer expects it's plan to work, or it wouldn't initiate it.
That's different from ignoring a serious and preventable risk of things going in the opposite direction of your intentions.
I don't see why the same excuse couldn't work for the good character providing WMDs to an evil character. Just as the evil character risks accomplishing great good in furtherance of his plan and defiance of his expectations, the good character may do the same. Again, probably stupid and possibly insane. But that's not what makes a character evil in DnD.
|
|
|
|
2 years ago ::
Jul 08, 2011 - 4:03AM
#85
|
Date Joined:
Jun 24, 2009
|
I can see it now: Haha, you're rich! Serves you right for doing something so stupid! Keep it up and you may end up being so moronic you have enough money to buy waterdeep!
I'm not quite sure how to respond to this.
OK, first of all nobody is rich except a fictional character. That fictional character has now been rendered inane by violating all rules of storytelling by behaving in a manner thoroughly inconsistent with his previous characterization. So now the player has a bunch of zeroes on his character sheet and a PC who's not worth playing since nobody at the table is going to take him seriously ever again.
Second, we are talking about a character so dumb he probably doesn't deserve to live. So most likely his partymates are going to be divvying up that gold, because letting somebody that stupid walk around is like sitting next to Christopher Walken in that scene in Deerhunter, and everytime he puts the gun to his temple you put your head up against his and take a picture of the two of you smiling on your disposal camera, except Christopher Walken's head is the planet Earth.
So yes, I would mock such a player.
That almost sounds angry/insulted, I was just kidding
As for the providing a WMD to the lich example, I think a better example that still fits the bill would be perhaps reagents/components whose purpose is unknown. Or even a WMD to a lich, there could be an imminent invasion coming from another plane and the lich has plans to annihilate the coming army (the invasion would hurt him as much as it would everyone else), except what he didn't tell the player was that he knew how to make extra copies of whatever weapons he can get a hold of.
|
|
|
|
2 years ago ::
Jul 08, 2011 - 6:53PM
#86
|
|
|
The problem is that determining alignment based on results rather than intent requires good characters to be flawless.
Not as much as when one tries to determine alignment based on intent. Intent is subjective, unknowable to the other party and impossible for you to prove to the other party. And our speaker is highly biased, making additional reason to doubt any claim of accuracy.
Results, by contrast, is a much more objective standard. It does not require mind reading or foiling liars. The evidence is right before you. And in the last analysis, you do not really care if the guy responsible for the disaster was stupid or evil. Either way, you want him fired.
alignment has no degrees.
D&D alignment has never bothered much with degrees of alignment, but this is largely a matter of pragmatics. We just need an excuse to kill the targets, not something that would pass muster with professors of moral philosphy. But D&D does routinely recognize there is greater and lesser evil, not to mention trivial, unforgivable, barely, and a variety of other categories.
|
|
|
|
2 years ago ::
Jul 08, 2011 - 11:56PM
#87
|
|
|
I find it exceedingly difficult to believe that a person could provide the means to wipe out a city to a Lich of well known shifty intent without a reasonable expectation of bad sh** happening as a direct result. In fact, a person would have to be insane, or mentally deficient. In which case they're not responsible for predicting the outcomes of their actions.
I'm not saying that I disagree, I'm saying that, in the highly improbable hypothetical circumstance that a player could come up with a rationalization that wasn't obviously ridiculous, that character would not be evil, and that, therefore, actions do not determine alignment.
The All-Killer example is interesting. The All-Killer is actively trying to bring about the end of all things. I don';t think that taking the risk that your plan will backfire invalidates or outweighs the intent of that plan. Most plans run that risk. Particularly considering that the All-Killer expects it's plan to work, or it wouldn't initiate it.
That's different from ignoring a serious and preventable risk of things going in the opposite direction of your intentions.
I don't see why the same excuse couldn't work for the good character providing WMDs to an evil character. Just as the evil character risks accomplishing great good in furtherance of his plan and defiance of his expectations, the good character may do the same. Again, probably stupid and possibly insane. But that's not what makes a character evil in DnD.
Ignoring a serious and preventable risk of things going in the opposite direction of your intentions (at least partly) invalidates your intentions. Taking a calculated, but controlled and rather small risk of the same does not. Ignoring said risk when the serious and preventable negative result is the death or serious harm of another person is generally going to be evil because it requires a person to be indifferent to whether that person lives or dies.
"I could run over and save that person's life right now. WOuldn't even have to risk my own. Wouldn't even have to risk harm to myself. Meh, it's over there."
later...
"Oh hey, news says that dude from that place died. Saw that coming. Sucks to his asmar."
The above is evil. THere is no real intent going on here. There's just indifference. That doesn't change that it's evil.
"Dammit, I can't save my fiance and save that guy over there. God forgive me, I'm saving the girl I love."
later...
Analysis paralysis will just end in both dying, so the person above chooses. An innocent person dies, but another life is saved. In such a situation, we must look at intent, because the outcome is too complex to use as a determining factor.
Going to war in order to stop a existential threat to your people isn't evil just because you run the risk of the other side losing innocent lives, by the very nature of war. It isn't even if the war spirals out of the control of the person who made the decision, causing horrifying bloodshed and ruin to both sides.
The act of choosing to go to war rather than allow the annihilation of your entire people is a good act.
More sex and gender equality and racial equality shouldn't even be an argument--it should simply be an assumption for any RPG that wants to stay relevant in the 21st century.
I could say anything in D&D is silly though, because it's a silly game and we are silly people.
|
|
|
|
2 years ago ::
Aug 18, 2011 - 3:24AM
#88
|
Date Joined:
Aug 18, 2011
|
Not as much as when one tries to determine alignment based on intent. Intent is subjective, unknowable to the other party and impossible for you to prove to the other party. And our speaker is highly biased, making additional reason to doubt any claim of accuracy.
Results, by contrast, is a much more objective standard. It does not require mind reading or foiling liars. The evidence is right before you. And in the last analysis, you do not really care if the guy responsible for the disaster was stupid or evil. Either way, you want him fired.
and here, you are talking about ethics and not morality.
That is all.
|
|
|
