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2018-02-20, 02:17 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Jun 2006
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- Poland
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Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
I thought we were talking about Gobbotopia, anyway, which involves goblins and hobgoblins, not fiends or mind flayers.
My FFRP characters. Avatar by Ashen Lilies. Sigatars by Ashen Lilies, Gullara and Purple Eagle.
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2018-02-20, 02:29 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2007
- Location
- Oregon, USA
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
Which has no bearing here. Due to the nature of stat blocks defining creatures in-universe, there's a 100% correlation between the mind flayer's stat block saying the mind flayer is Good and the mind flayer being Good. To claim that as statistical insignificance is to claim there isn't a relationship between the mind flayer being listed as Good and the mind flayer being Good.
More importantly, only knowing of one Good mind flayer doesn't mean that there's only one mind flayer that is Good. Ignoring a data point because it doesn't conform to your hypothesis isn't science.FeytouchedBanana eldritch disciple avatar by...me!
The Index of the Giant's Comments VI―Making Dogma from Zapped Bananas
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2018-02-20, 02:39 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Feb 2007
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
Marut-2 Avatar by Serpentine
New Marut Avatar by Linkele
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2018-02-20, 02:41 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jan 2011
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2018-02-20, 03:11 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Aug 2010
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- The Primus Imperium
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Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
You don't necessarily need to be unlikable or harm the protagonist in order to be evil.
"Usually evil" is something I always took to mean that you're more likely to find an evil one if you pick one at random. Especially for creatures like Hobgoblins and Goblins which (by oots' rules) live impoverished and with a burning hatred for all becauseSpoiler: Start Of Darknessthey were created to be cannon fodder and their god ascended after being betrayed and murdered by the 'good' kingdoms. Even if you have a nation like Gobbotopia, which seeks to make itself a recognized nation, there's still anger and resentment for good-aligned beings because of what they did to the Dark One and have continued to do for centuries, even millennia since then.
This is even more true for a universe where Good and Evil are cosmic forces you can align yourself with, rather than morality descriptors. I'm reminded of one DND campaign where Pelor and Nerull were rewritten to be elder dieties of Good and Evil, respectively; Pelor's greatest paladin (implied to be Epic/Mythic) was reverent and respectful of Nerull, because their concerns were far beyond petty mortal notions of Good and Evil.
"Inherently evil" to me sounds like the creature in question has some necessary or important biological function that runs counter to the good of sapient life (vampires need to drink the blood of the living, mind flayers eat sentient brains, etc etc)
But above all: Individuals are always the exception to the rules. (not necessarily in every way, obviously, but you get the idea)Last edited by HalfTangible; 2018-02-20 at 03:13 PM.
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2018-02-20, 03:16 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Feb 2018
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
I need to find a better moral equivilent of goblintopia than "Somewhere between Nazi germany, the soviet union, and possibly a demented canada..."
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2018-02-20, 03:28 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Feb 2007
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
TV Tropes at least, said he was "LN with some good tendencies"
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.ph.../AscendedDemon
(tabletop games section)
It also mentions another LN one "Sangalor of the Secrets".Last edited by hamishspence; 2018-02-20 at 03:30 PM.
Marut-2 Avatar by Serpentine
New Marut Avatar by Linkele
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2018-02-20, 04:34 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Aug 2017
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- France
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Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
Forum Wisdom
Mage avatar by smutmulch & linklele.
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2018-02-20, 05:19 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Sep 2011
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- Calgary, AB
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Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
That's not how that works. Statistical analysis can disregard outliers as an error or aberration; Things not working how we think they should work is how progress gets made. They most definitely did not regard Mercury's orbit not behaving as Newton predicted as something to be ignored; it led to the development of Relativity.
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2018-02-20, 06:47 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Oct 2014
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
Yeah, but okay, let's imagine that 1% of Mind Flayers are noble self-sacrificing creatures that specifically restrict themselves to dining on the wicked whom they slew in just and proper combat. Let's say they save a hundred innocents every year for a hundred years before they eventually die in battle or commit ritual suicide when they can't find any more of the wicked to consume. The other 99% are regular Mind Flayers who need to eat at least one person a month, every year for 100 years. Let's say half of those are 'innocent'.
That's: 100 x 99 x 12 / 2 ~= 50,000 innocents slain, and 100 x 1 x 100 = 10,000 innocents saved, per 100 illithids per 100 years. From a brute mathematical standpoint, if you waved a magic wand and erased all illithids, you're... still saving a lot of lives.
I mean, in terms of life cycle they're pretty-much nextdoor to the Xenomorphs from the Aliens franchise. Nobody who'd seen their entire platoon, or most of their follow colonists, or their surrogate daughter, wiped out by chestbursting larvae is going to be especially sympathetic to the notion that a tiny minority of the creatures could be domesticated and harnessed for military purposes. They're going to start with the flamethrowers and work their way up to "Nuke 'em from orbit. It's the only way to be sure".Give directly to the extreme poor.
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2018-02-20, 07:05 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Aug 2017
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- France
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Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
Forum Wisdom
Mage avatar by smutmulch & linklele.
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2018-02-20, 07:11 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2007
- Location
- Oregon, USA
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
There's certainly a wide gulf between "Lots and lots and lots of illithids aren't good" and "All illithids can't be good", if that's what you're getting at.
Besides, if you instead don't murder the heroic illithids, you could save even more lives (up to 101 per illithid-year).Last edited by Jasdoif; 2018-02-20 at 07:21 PM.
FeytouchedBanana eldritch disciple avatar by...me!
The Index of the Giant's Comments VI―Making Dogma from Zapped Bananas
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2018-02-20, 07:26 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Oct 2014
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
If you had some reliable method of screening the exceptions, sure. I mean sure, this is D&D, you can always employ Detect spells, but mind flayers are natural spellcasters with genius-level intellects. They can probably work around that problem.
It's not really about revenge so much as it's about risk analysis. I mean, let's say you bump into an illithid who appears to very conscientious about following the proper rules for whose brains they may consume, and is virtuous and upstanding in all his dealings, et cetera. Can you be 100% sure that's an illithid who's genuinely reformed, as opposed to an illithid who's very good at faking reform so they can infiltrate your city, enslave key officials and open the gates to their hungry cousins? Because there's bound to be at least a few of those for every reformed soul, and the cost for making a mistake in this matter is very, very high. I can see a certain level of constructive paranoia on this front being, well, Neutral at least.Give directly to the extreme poor.
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2018-02-20, 07:44 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2007
- Location
- Oregon, USA
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
As could spellcasters with genius-level intellects of other species; I don't really see species as a good point of distinction here. Especially as a practical matter: the low-level alter self could give an illithid (or other Small/Medium/Large aberration) the appearance of a human-looking elan, without restricting access to their psionics or mind blast; and such an approach would be sensible for any illithid worried about being targeted for their species.
FeytouchedBanana eldritch disciple avatar by...me!
The Index of the Giant's Comments VI―Making Dogma from Zapped Bananas
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2018-02-20, 07:44 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Aug 2017
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- France
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Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
Forum Wisdom
Mage avatar by smutmulch & linklele.
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2018-02-20, 07:47 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Aug 2007
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
Interested in MitD? Join us in MitD's thread.There is a world of imagination
Deep in the corners of your mind
Where reality is an intruder
And myth and legend thrive
Ceterum autem censeo Hilgya malefica est
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2018-02-20, 07:49 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2013
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Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
And see how well that worked out for the Order of the Stick?
I don't, as a rule of thumb, believe that evil creatures should be met with automatic violence, but there comes a point where your relative positions on the predator/prey chart necessitates that the burden of proof is on the superpredator to prove that theyre the exception, rather than on the prey proving theyre the norm.“Evil is evil. Lesser, greater, middling, it's all the same. Proportions are negotiated, boundaries blurred. I'm not a pious hermit, I haven't done only good in my life. But if I'm to choose between one evil and another, then I prefer not to choose at all.”
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2018-02-20, 07:50 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Aug 2017
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- France
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Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
Last edited by Fyraltari; 2018-02-20 at 07:52 PM.
Forum Wisdom
Mage avatar by smutmulch & linklele.
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2018-02-20, 07:57 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2007
- Location
- Oregon, USA
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
FeytouchedBanana eldritch disciple avatar by...me!
The Index of the Giant's Comments VI―Making Dogma from Zapped Bananas
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2018-02-20, 07:57 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Oct 2014
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
Yeah... that didn't actually work out so great for the team.
...Yeah, that's true. You can make an argument that an illithid that doesn't bother to conceal it's form is at least being straight with you.
The question of species isn't entirely irrelevant, though, at least when the species in question is biologically compelled to eat the brains of the living and reproduces parasitically at a potentially prolific rate.Give directly to the extreme poor.
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2018-02-20, 08:09 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Aug 2017
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- France
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Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
Last edited by Fyraltari; 2018-02-20 at 08:11 PM.
Forum Wisdom
Mage avatar by smutmulch & linklele.
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2018-02-20, 08:11 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2013
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Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
“Evil is evil. Lesser, greater, middling, it's all the same. Proportions are negotiated, boundaries blurred. I'm not a pious hermit, I haven't done only good in my life. But if I'm to choose between one evil and another, then I prefer not to choose at all.”
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2018-02-20, 08:12 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Aug 2017
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- France
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Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
Forum Wisdom
Mage avatar by smutmulch & linklele.
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2018-02-20, 08:16 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Nov 2004
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
Indeed, the comic's treatment of vampires is entirely thematically inconsistent with its treatment of goblins or black dragons.
Orth Plays: Currently Baldur's Gate II
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2018-02-20, 08:28 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Oct 2014
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
How so? I don't recall Durkula making any overtly hostile move toward the Order before the Godsmoot?
The V/familicide analogy isn't really apt, I think, because there's nothing about being a black dragon which intrinsically required pinning V's children to a tree. She was just a jerk. Same thing with goblins and beholders and so forth- a lot of them might be jerks in practice, but in theory they could go around being goblins and beholders and secure all the necessities of life and never hurt a soul.
That's not true in the same way for mind flayers. Some very nasty behaviours are baked into them biologically, such that the most you can hope for is that they do very nasty things only to people who well and truly deserve it. And they're wicked smart and can spread like wildfire and can turn your head inside out with a look, and even if they give every appearance of being harmless for extended periods you can never be entirely sure it's not part of a larger ruse.Give directly to the extreme poor.
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2018-02-20, 08:38 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2010
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- Lake Wobegon
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Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
Last edited by zimmerwald1915; 2018-02-20 at 08:38 PM.
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2018-02-20, 09:22 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jan 2011
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2018-02-20, 09:55 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Aug 2010
- Location
- The Primus Imperium
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Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?
We've only seen two free-willed vampires, Durkula and Malack. Both of them are worshippers of gods that represent cosmic evil, and are themselves beings whose hunger for blood drives them to make use of other sentient beings.
These are the kind of people you get when you make a "personification of their worst day."
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2018-02-21, 02:53 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Feb 2007
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- Manchester, UK
- Gender
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2018-02-21, 03:33 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Aug 2010
- Location
- The Primus Imperium
- Gender
Re: Gobbotopia: Subjective or Objective? Alignment or Morality?