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Post by Altor "Al" Cloudscraper on Jun 12, 2008 19:55:20 GMT
Maerin : Mad scientist kind-of mage? I wonder how that looks like in LW? Kinda like a Nadziranim maybe? I said sage, not mage. You all may be rather fixiated on Evil with a capital "E", but humans are quite as capable of being immoral without explicit Naarish empowerment...and enslavement. Sort of like the Nazis or Communists who actually believed that they were the good guys?
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Post by Maerin on Jun 12, 2008 20:16:10 GMT
I said sage, not mage. You all may be rather fixiated on Evil with a capital "E", but humans are quite as capable of being immoral without explicit Naarish empowerment...and enslavement. Sort of like the Nazis or Communists who actually believed that they were the good guys? Only sort of. I don't see this character as being delusional or anything like that.
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Post by Slavemaster on Jun 12, 2008 20:35:25 GMT
Hmm, nasty likeness... But true. In real life, no one consider themself to be evil. Either you think that there is no good or evil and that every man is basically on his own - the "might is right" approach. Examples include everyone from the playground bully who makes everyone miserable simply because he can, up to the callous businessman who relocates a factory to a country with cheaper labour, thus making thousands unemployed and thousands exploited, just to make a few more bucks for himself. But a far more dangerous man is the one who believes what he is doing is right - if not now so at least in the long run, the "history will prove us right" types. And they are far worse. A historian I once read said that a man driven by naked greed can kill thousands. It requires a special kind of selflessness, idealism and twisted visions of a better world to kill millions. And that's where we find the Browns and the Reds who made the 20th century the most bloody in history. Good and Evil is always a bit tricky in a fantasy world compared to the real world. In the real world, they are just point of views that can change during the course of history. There are many cultures that consider us westerners "Evil" becuase we kill our unborn (abortion), stove away our elders in special institutions instead of venerating them and letting their children and grandchildren take care of them, and engage in all sorts of low debauchery (homosexuality, premarital sex and so on) and who can really say they are wrong, eh? But in fantasy, Good and Evil are actual cosmic forces that can take the form of energy in lightning bolts and imbued weapons and which can be detected by magical means. This requires an entirely different viewpoint and philosophy when dealing with them in the game. It is an age-old debate for sure, and one that I very much doubt can be resolved here. But it does require the powers that run the universe - that is to say, the Game Master - to clearly define good and evil to the best of his abilities, even to the point of making up an actual list of actions, thoughts and viewpoints that are objectively Good and Evil, and which makes the people who follow through on these actions really "charged" somehow with Good or Evil. I take the view that it is the actions and not the intentions that defines Good and Evil. In the case of a corrupted Sage, he must be consider Evil if he use Evil means to pursue a Good objective. In other words, even if he works on a potion that will eliminate all the diseases of the world, he would still be Evil if he kills innocents and torture people to attain it. Anyway, it's all a game, so let's not get too sidetracked
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Post by Maerin on Jun 12, 2008 22:01:16 GMT
*chuckles* Well, given that this is a fantasy setting as you indicate, there is a couple fundamental differences between Good and Evil, and good and evil, based on those actual cosmic forces you allude to. Good and Evil are most assuredly proper nouns in a setting like Lone Wolf, and quite aside from the more conventional (and oft argued) moral and ethical considerations that define good and evil based on actions, intentions, and/or some combination of the two.
That said, I have always been of the view (particularly as a GM) that, expressly because Good and Evil are "real" forces in a fantasy setting, that makes good and evil all that more interesting to explore in stories (roleplaying and otherwise).
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Hawk's Bane
Seasoned Player
Harbinger of Evil who's leaking like a drippy tap
Posts: 107
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Post by Hawk's Bane on Jun 13, 2008 4:17:29 GMT
OMG, what the heck are you guys talking about? Good and bad and the likes? Real life vs fantasy?!?! That is an obscene load of info. Can't you all just make it easy by saying good and bad always fight each other? I'm a bad guy out to kill the good guys and everything else that gets in my way. There! Plain and simple. No headaches.
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Post by Altor "Al" Cloudscraper on Jun 13, 2008 6:11:14 GMT
But returning to the Nazi/Commie comparison - the west fought alongside the Commies against the Nazis - sided with one evil against the other (the one further away against the one amassing an army on our doorstep).
I am really interested to see how Mearin's character plays out.
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Post by Slavemaster on Jun 13, 2008 7:16:11 GMT
OMG, what the heck are you guys talking about? Good and bad and the likes? Real life vs fantasy?!?! That is an obscene load of info. Can't you all just make it easy by saying good and bad always fight each other? I'm a bad guy out to kill the good guys and everything else that gets in my way. There! Plain and simple. No headaches. Oh, don't worry, I'm not going to get the campaign bogged down in moral and ethical issues. I just wanted to point out that if we are in a world where Good and Evil are actual real things upon which some rules depend - weapon damage, spells, which magical items can be used by which people and so on - then some thought must go into it. There are rules for DM-enforced alignment changes for a reason, you know, and one of those reasons is that a player can't expect to be able to use his +5 Holy Paragon Cruader Blade of Infinite Virtue for long if he plunders churches or pries the gold teeth out of the bodies of his slain See this DM of the Ring strip for some of the peculiarities supposedly Lawful Good characters can get up to: www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=880Usually, this is mostly a problem when running ordinary campaigns with good guys (or at least, guys who have written "good" on their character sheet..."), because it is generally assumed that it is more difficult being good; the "narrow path" and so on. However, my own experience with "bad guys" campaigns - both as a DM and as a player - have shown that it can be difficult being evil too. True, you don't have to have any qualms about where the treasure you pick up originally came for or belonged to, and you can kill off NPC:s that gives you lip without thinking twice about it. But there are drawbacks too, and you guys should expect to run into all of them during the course of the campaign. For example, you can never trust your allies, and if you muck things up, you can't expect help - or, indeed, even mercy - from your superiors, and, well, sometimes you might actually miss the "good feeling" of doing good things, at least if the DM knows his business... Let me tell you a little story of a solo campaign I once played as an evil necromancer. It was a hoot, I got to command legions of undead, forge alliances with orcs and demons, keep scantily clad slaves, see the treasures roll in from the burning cities, and have NPC allies and servants in really cool black and spiky armour. However, at one point my character got cut off from his resources and had to get a horse in a hurry. The DM let me found this little farmstead with a peasant family. My character had the money to buy a horse, but he was evil, right? So they got killed, of course, but the DM described it in a way that made me feel, well... uncomfortable, pure and simple. The kid chewing on some candy as he opened the door and got blasted away, the mother screaming in shock... I even think there was a dog too. I know, it was just a game, but it was a good DM, who managed to pull off the "innocent family getting gruesomely killed" stunt without making it seem tacky or clichéd, and all of a sudden it didn't feel all that funny anymore... Don't get me wrong here, I am not trying to discourage you from playing the bad guys - the whole thing was my idea, after all - but I just want to remind you that there are drawbacks and advantages no matter which side you choose. Evil guys can plunder and kill without having to think of the morality behind it, and they get neater weapons and outfits and can indulge in really cool conversations and monologues ("Everything that has transpired has done so according to MY design! Oh, I am afraid that the weapon systems will be quite operational when your friends arrive..."). And you can give all those self-righteous and sickeningly virtuous paladins what's coming to them without getting in trouble for it from the people on your side But you miss out on quite a few things too; the cheering crowds lining the streets as you come back to town with the head of the slain dragon... the applauding nobles as you kneel before the king when he dubs you one of his knights... the peasant who unexpectedly free you from prison because you cured his child earlier... the scantily clad damsels in distress (well, allright, you get those, except that it was probably you that put them in distress in the first place ). Once again, don't get me wrong here; evil campaigns can be fun, whether you're in them for a change of pace, an opportunity to wield all those cool things previously only available to enemy NPC:s, or because you see it as an intellectual and philosophical exercise. That's the beauty of RPG:s. I just want you to remember that Good and Evil will decide a lot more things in the campaign than just the colour and number of spikes on your armour.
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Post by Altor "Al" Cloudscraper on Jun 13, 2008 10:57:06 GMT
I would like to make a point, though, which I think is in keeping with Mearin's point above. Just because someone is E(e)vil, does not make him a psychopath. Is there honour amongst theives? I think so. Would evil people wage a hearts and mind's campaign to win over the support of the local population? I think so. In some ways, evil can be tricky, because it can do good things as well in keeping with its intents
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Post by Michael of Eshnar on Jun 13, 2008 11:53:45 GMT
I famously played a Dwarven archmage on the Iron Realms text mud Achaea. Despite being a known high-ranking servant of the God of Evil and paragon of greed and arrogance, his goals included universal education, world peace, unified guilds working towards a better world and so on. In fact, while "good" people often agreed with his goals, it was the method of implementation that they always disagreed with!
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Post by Maerin on Jun 13, 2008 16:34:47 GMT
But returning to the Nazi/Commie comparison - the west fought alongside the Commies against the Nazis - sided with one evil against the other (the one further away against the one amassing an army on our doorstep). And further, once the Nazis were no longer a threat, certain western cultures recruited "former" Nazis (those that could be squirreled away before they could be brought up on war crimes) as "consultants" in the fight/not-fight subsequently taken to the Commies. Go figure.
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Post by Maerin on Jun 13, 2008 16:44:14 GMT
I would like to make a point, though, which I think is in keeping with Mearin's point above. Just because someone is E(e)vil, does not make him a psychopath. Is there honour amongst theives? I think so. Would evil people wage a hearts and mind's campaign to win over the support of the local population? I think so. In some ways, evil can be tricky, because it can do good things as well in keeping with its intents That merely demonstrates the confusion that can arise when either one tries to suggest that moral/ethical good or evil is defined exclusively by intent/motive, or another tries to suggest that moral/ethical is defined exclusively by action with intent/motive analyzed strictly in retrospect. Neither point of view is easily sustainable outside of a single point of view (good luck finding even two people who share a single point of view on this subject to the requisite degree). There is an element of truth supporting the cliche of "honor among thieves", for instance, but only if one does not delve into the somewhat rather different definition of "honor" that underlies that particular cliche. And that becomes even more complicated when one takes that particular discussion, and plants it in a fantasy setting where being spiritually "Good" (as well as its opposite) becomes an actual, measurable, definable quality, such as in the manners that Slavemaster suggested above. I, too do not want to get too much into this, at least not outside the context of what might actually unfold in Slavemaster's game. I merely want to make it clear that I am wanting and planning to play an evil character, whose immorality is defined entirely within his own self and choices; not necessarily an Evil character in the sense of a character that has a "true"/spiritual connection and commitment to Evil as a spiritual force (such as a Dark Cultist or a Cener Druid).
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Post by Dirac Sil on Jun 13, 2008 17:11:53 GMT
I just plan on playing a character who is 'not good'. Whether he is evil will depend on one's own moral compass, allowances for mistakes, and most importantly which situations he actually gets in and must act upon. He might be deluded, weak, sympathetic, amoral, or evil. That will dedpend on how you interptret his actions, which actions he does when the time comes for a choice, and whether you think his actions are inexcuseable Either that or I will just get lazy, phone it in and stab the NAK
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Soul Spawn
Gamer
Night Born Nad-Adez Konkor
Posts: 183
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Post by Soul Spawn on Jun 13, 2008 17:27:22 GMT
Either that or I will just get lazy, phone it in and stab the NAK Which one, there are two of us
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Post by Maerin on Jun 13, 2008 17:29:32 GMT
Either that or I will just get lazy, phone it in and stab the NAK Which one, there are two of us If you have to ask, you don't deserve to know the answer until the appropriate time comes. ;D
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Soul Spawn
Gamer
Night Born Nad-Adez Konkor
Posts: 183
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Post by Soul Spawn on Jun 13, 2008 17:34:12 GMT
*sighs*
right, Im gonna stop this now cause then we get into one-upmanship on each other. You know how it goes..."yea but my partner would just kill you", "not if I kill him first", "not if I kill YOU first", etc etc.
Unless we're all playing this Chaotic, then we dont have a chance and might as well roll new characters now!
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