Piracy And Other Malfeasance

Reynard said:

Even the classic dungeon delver is essentially a tomb robber.

Click to expand...

No, they're not. Only a few D&D published dungeons are tombs. Most are habitations of intelligent beings. Most of whom are categorically defined as evil. Sure, a few are tombs... but that's the exception.

Likewise, Tomb raiding isn't standard fare for WFRP, not TFT, nor T&T. I can't think of any for Traveller, Space Opera, or Spacemaster. (I never bought the Rolemaster adventures)

If one considers monster races as having free will and bad upbringing, then the average dungeon crawler is a serial murder and robbery team event. Forcible entry into the home, slaughtering all within, and taking anything portable enough.

As for tomb robbing... unless one posits an afterlife where grave goods matter, Tomb Robbing isn't generally harming anyone.

As for squaring up? It varies. In D&D, I'm prone to treating Orcs and Goblins as inherently evil - limited to no free will, incapable of large scale cooperation.... Which makes them cheap kills morally. I also usually avoid the issues that goblinoid children present in such circumstances, tho' if lacking true free will, slaughtering the children is the sane thing to do.

...and nice knowing you all. Too bad, it was a nice thread.

aramis erak said:

As for squaring up? It varies. In D&D,

Click to expand...

Probably best not to go down that path for this discussion.

If nothing else, I am more interested in PCs in roles that are historically problematic but are softened for media, and how folks decide how much "grit" to keep when the PCs are pirates, thieves, mercenaries or treasure hunters.

Reynard said:

...

How do you -- if you do at all -- square protagonists who would be the villains in a different genre? What do you do with the crimes they commit? Are all your criminal heroes "thieves with hearts of gold" like Han Solo, or do you indulge in the grittier side of these stories? And if your "heroes" are rough, how do you make the villains stand out?

Just a reminder that we can talk about this without getting into the gory details. I also think we should take care not to make light of real world atrocities. Thanks.

Click to expand...

I don't think that I do 'square' it.

I think it's probably safe to say that my view of morality tends to include more nuance than the D&D alignment system. Many of the other games I play don't use such a system. Heck, all things considered, I may -myself- be categorized "evil," based upon the "modern" views of morality that I read on Enworld, given that my background includes some amount of warfare and being trained in combat arms. So

As far as playing a game, I think it depends upon what type of game the group I am with wants to play. If the desire is to play a Four-Colors Supers game (complete with tropes,) "evil" and how the heroes fight against it will likely be very different than a game in which PCs are mercenaries fighting in a war. In the latter, "good" and "evil" might be defined by who pays the most.

At any rate, a "villain" need not be evil. It may simply be someone who has needs/wants/desires that conflict with the Player Characters. PC pirates can just as easily find conflict with a "good" officer of the navy looking to apprehend the PCs; a rival pirate racing to get to a buried treasure first; or a sleazy governor playing both sides by selling them a map but also feeding information to the authorities.

A way to make "villains" standout, even if the PCs are not heroic is to take some inspiration from real life by thinking about how complicated some of your own relationships may be -and then just turn the volume up on dramatization of resulting conflict.

Complicated relationship with a relative, who you may genuinely love, but have a strong disagreement with about a particular issue? That could serve as the basis for an antagonist.

In that particular case, perhaps that antagonist is the sister of one of the PCs, and the conflict is a difference in how they feel the family name ought to be represented within a less-than-good organization.

Alternatively, maybe an antagonist NPC and point of contention for a campaign story could be the former mentor to the PC group; a difference in ideology or conflicting goals lead to a split. Now, the beloved father-figure to the PCs is also against whom they are competing/warring/trying to politically out-maneuver. Perhaps the challenge is trying to best them while still being respectful of who they were/are to you; defeating them without destroying them.

Rarely do interpersonal interactions and relationships fall into clear-cut alignment categories. Recognizing that can offer a lot more complexity to heroes and villains in a story than simply defining everything as "good" or "bad". That's one way that conflict might arise and make a character a "villain" for the PCs.

aramis erak said:

If one considers monster races as having free will and bad upbringing, then the average dungeon crawler is a serial murder and robbery team event. Forcible entry into the home, slaughtering all within, and taking anything portable enough.

Click to expand...

Define, "average dungeon crawler".

I'm pushing back a little here, because I don't expect that most published adventures ignore the morality of the situation anymore, nor have they for a very long time. The PCs aren't delving into a hole in the ground because they've been told there is treasure. Typically the PCs are in process of dealing with some clear and present danger to peaceful peoples. The adventure generally has a frame that allows the PCs to be heroes.

billd91 said:

To follow up this pointless nitpick with another one.
If theft is depriving someone of their property without their permission:
Piracy is robbery AS a method of theft. It IS theft.

Click to expand...

All robbery is theft, but not all theft is robbery.

Rabulias said:

All robbery is theft, but not all theft is robbery.

Click to expand...

Does pedantry count as an atrocity?

Reynard said:

Does pedantry count as an atrocity?

Click to expand...

Well, I am the Dread Pedant Roberts...

Reynard said:

If nothing else, I am more interested in PCs in roles that are historically problematic but are softened for media, and how folks decide how much "grit" to keep when the PCs are pirates, thieves, mercenaries or treasure hunters.

Click to expand...

In general, I'm not terribly interested in providing players the fantasy of being reprehensible people. I make this clear in my Session Zero - if you are seriously looking to play a "black hat", to be cruel, or harm those who don't deserve harm, you'll have to find another table.

If the players want to be be pirates, thieves, or the like, I'll set up the situation so there's moral justification for the action. My pirates will be privateers resisting a cruel empire on the open seas, the thieves will be Robin Hood or Leverage, the treasure hunters will be Librarians racing to beat a wicked power-hungry magnate to the artifact of power, and so on.

Umbran said:

Define, "average dungeon crawler".

I'm pushing back a little here, because I don't expect that most published adventures ignore the morality of the situation anymore, nor have they for a very long time. The PCs aren't delving into a hole in the ground because they've been told there is treasure. Typically the PCs are in process of dealing with some clear and present danger to peaceful peoples. The adventure generally has a frame that allows the PCs to be heroes.

Click to expand...

I'm not sure that's universally true across game systems.

Even if it were, that would only cover "published adventures." Further, assuming that as a baseline would mean such adventures would already address "squaring" things (in terms of the original post). Which is to say that, whatever concepts you have in mind as "published adventures" square the issue by not having the issue exist at all and making sure the PCs always have some way to label themselves "heroes."

What methods have you used when not assuming published adventures and d20 morality?

Edit: You addressed that question in a post that I didn't see while typing this.