Quote Originally Posted by B. Dandelion View Post
In order to set the stage for this not impossible or illogical creature to exist, you've had to do away with the process of evolution and posit beings that are made out of magic. How can you be logically talking about a biological creature when you aren't even talking about biology? You're talking about magic. Magic can certainly posit the existence of an "evil" race, but you can't posit a "biologically evil" race without -- I want to say "redefining" biology, but really you've just done away with it entirely.

I think there are serious flaws with the idea of defining a creature by its biological limitations and then pronouncing it "evil". Ponder an alien mind, ponder a magical mind -- sure, but I don't think you're going to get many insights into pondering a magical mind we're pretending ISN'T magical. It seems to just turn into a process of demonizing biological behaviors we don't understand and/or find creepy.
Have you read any H P Lovecraft? He's big on creatures that are so old, so powerful, so far outside our world that they don't really notice humans, except when we go out of our way to attract their attention. And when they appear, they tend to eat a few people, send everyone else present gibbering insane, then go away, completely indifferent to what they've done.

They're not exactly malevolent, just indifferent. They simply treat us as something like we treat rabbits - sometimes cute, sometimes amusing, sometimes delicious, but most of the time, really not worth much thought.

In D&D, a similar example would be the illithid - a creature so mentally advanced that it doesn't believe lesser creatures have real feelings at all. You certainly can't attribute its lack of empathy to stupidity. Rather, it's more like how (non-vegetarian) humans think of farm animals.

Is that "evil"?

I say "yes". And I have no issue with the fact that I'm only saying that because my race is one of those that gets victimised. I firmly believe that, for all the undigested garbage that 3e goes into about "absolute morality", there is always a perspective. I'm a human, I see morality from a human perspective.

It's not that I find the brain-eating thing "creepy", it's that I find it dangerous. Would you hand over your kid to a daycare centre run by a mindflayer?