D&D 5E Killing is bad: how to establish morality

[Xeviat]

There's a thing I notice in fiction that I feel falls away in rpgs sometimes. The heroes don't kill outside of the heat of battle, and even then, they still try to not kill. Countless times I've seen heroes put themselves in bad situations because they let someone go or they take them to prison instead of just snapping their neck early. From Luke Cage to Fin and Han to whoever.

Are inspiration points a good enough mechanic to reward players making in character decisions that aren't the best from a strict stand point? Taking a prisoner instead of just killing them, for instance.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[hawkeyefan]

If the character's background or bonds/traits/flaws indicate they would value life or practice mercy, then yeah, inspiration would be suitable.

Likewise, if their background indicated they'd not hesitate to kill, and there was some other compelling reason for them not to, that could also be a reason for inspiration.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Are inspiration points a good enough mechanic to reward players making in character decisions that aren't the best from a strict stand point? Taking a prisoner instead of just killing them, for instance.

No, it's not a good enough mechanic to create killing-averse behavior in players who otherwise would kill. Instead, you need to structure your game in different ways. If you want murder to be an emotionally-significant event you need to emphasize unintelligent/nonhumanoid opponents (undead work pretty well), make combat rare (definitely not 6+ fights per day--maybe more like 1 fight per story segment on average, just like a fantasy novel), make lots of plot happen in discovery/negotiation/exploration/riddling/investigation instead of combat mode, and/or provide external reasons (such as legal penalties for murder) to make "deleting enemies from existence" not a "win" button.

Think hard about the reasons you (as a group) are playing D&D in the first place. If you're playing it with people who specifically want to act out violent fantasies without repercussions (https://stirgessuck.wordpress.com/2014/09/25/the-promise-of-dd/), there's probably nothing that can stop them from rejoicing in simple violence without ruining their fun. If so, you can either grin and bear it (possibly using unintelligent/undead foes in a dungeoncrawl as described above) or bow out and find some other way to occupy yourself while they slaughter things.

Also, read this article: https://stirgessuck.wordpress.com/2014/09/26/violence-through-the-ages-of-dd/

 

[Rhenny]

This is an interesting topic.

I've never actually run a game where the players have agreed to play a low violence, moral game, but I have noticed some patterns that might make it more viable.

First, when the players/PCs know that any type of combat will be deadly, they tend to avoid combat and try to find other ways to solve problems. This is the entire impetus for games like Call of Cthulhu, in which, if you actually ever encounter a creature in that game, you need to run and try to escape or you are dead meat. In my D&D games, if I slap the PCs down big time in the beginning of the campaign and most of the time they get into a fight, they start playing more cautiously.

Also, as mentioned by [MENTION=6787650]Hemlock[/MENTION], using objectives that require other skills helps a lot too. Why kill when you can sneak, talk, disguise, cause diversions, use tricks, etc. If the objective is to gather information, explore, find missing items, retrieve items, broker deals with rivals or allies, then fighting becomes a last resort. In a campaign like that, I'd be tempted to throw out inspiration and advantage for lots of actions that the players decide to use if it bypasses combat.

Another way to make combat less attractive, especially in civilized areas, is to populate the area with peacekeeping forces that have real power. I remember when I first played the video game, Fallout. (Yes..this dates me). At a number of points, if the PC killed, a swarm of others would mob him and kill him. Pretty soon I realized that sometimes killing was not the answer.

I bet you could use a chit system like dark side points in Star Wars that would scare players into avoiding really unlawful or wholesale killing. I imagine you could tell them that each time they kill for no reason, or when killing can be avoided, they will attain a "stain". (like negative reputation). When they get to 3 "stain" (or whatever you decide), they will suffer (perhaps losing their souls, or gains disadvantage on charisma checks when interacting within lawful society, or some other punishment that would make it interesting). Of course, this type of game, should be agreed upon by all players because it sets up a number of limitations. You could even have the Gods they worship speak with them or take away some powers as they progress with more and more "stain."

 

[77IM]

It depends on the fiction genre, doesn't it? Superheroes tend towards "Batman morality," in which beating someone to a pulp is OK, but killing them is unthinkable. Fantasy, especially the darker or more scoundrelly kind, often presents killing a downed foe as a prudent action; cold-hearted, but necessary.

If I were you, I'd simply discuss your genre expectations with the players. Explain that if PCs with a Good alignment want to keep it, they'd better try to preserve life, even that of their enemies. Killing for convenience, or killing innocents, can turn you Evil. (I take a descriptive, rather than prescriptive, approach to alignment: the player plays their character however they see fit, and the DM decides their alignment based on observed actions.)

Be sure, too, that most enemies don't fight to the death, but flee when low on HP. And any who do drop to 0 HP should be dead. Enemies who are captured and at the mercy of the PCs should surrender and cooperate and beg for life, so that killing them becomes more obviously evil. Turning captives over to the authorities (the town guard, or an order of paladins, or the local druid circle, or whatever) should be a viable option, too. Basically, don't force people to choose between role-playing and roll-playing.

In a broader sense, if you want to encourage sub-optimal choices, Inspiration is a good place to start. XP bonuses have also been traditional. Or you may create some separate resource to track roleplaying sacrifices. Maybe they get a "Karma Track" that improves their odds of finding the magic items they want, or allows them to luckily escape bad situations, or something.

 

[Dausuul]

I dunno. Seems like in most fantasy fiction, the heroes wade through buckets of blood, hacking down faceless minions by the hundreds. Only when face to face with the BBEG do they start agonizing.

 

[discosoc]

With 5e, I noticed an interesting shift in player attitudes towards killing or not killing. Older editions penalized you for trying to keep someone alive (usually by making it harder to hit or something), but 5e just lets you choose to do nonlethal damage. What happened is that they'd keep someone alive to question them, but then find themselves having to figure out what to do with them afterwards. Letting go is certainly an option (even if potentially risky), but killing a prisoner is just straight up murder so the players often have few other choices.

As a GM, I don't mind having people come back to haunt the players for making the "good" decisions; it fits with the idea that doing the right thing is often the hardest option. But sometimes I reward it down the road -- maybe that goblin you let go and gave some food to get him started became a warchief later, or maybe the brigand was the prodigal son of a noble and his defeat (and release) shaped him up and earned you a contact in the city. That kind of thing.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Some people just want to do in a game what they could never do in real life. That can include killing/murdering, stealing, or just being an evil jerk. If you prefer to play with, or DM for, players that want to be the Hero and do good, but your current group does not want to play that way, you may need to try and find new players, because nothing you come up with will change the way they want to play without it making them feel forced to "behave" and having their fun ruined.

 

[Xeviat]

I want to clarify that this more of a thought exercise, a possibility for a future more story driven game. Yes, there are other systems that would suit it more, but my group likes D&D.

I dunno. Seems like in most fantasy fiction, the heroes wade through buckets of blood, hacking down faceless minions by the hundreds. Only when face to face with the BBEG do they start agonizing.

This is the kind of thing that actually has me desiring a setting utilizing taint and madness rules. Truly evil creatures are tainted, and people who fall to even are maddened. Killing tainted things is okay, and in fact necessary. Goblins and orcs and ogres spread taint where they go. They're not people. They're evil personified. When a person succumbs to evil, it drives them mad (and I'm talking about fantastic madness, not real madness). This creates a setting where the players don't want to do evil, as it will drive them mad. This kind of stark black and white morality could be the key.

Super deadly fights also does it. D&D would need to have a different recovery structure (long rests as a multiple day affair in a civilized location most likely). I know in L5R, we didn't want to fight very often because a good hit could take you out (and our combat skills were often used to keep people from attacking).

I also like World of Darkness's Virtues and Vices for encouraging roleplaying the "warm fuzzies" of doing good and the temptations of doing evil.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

It's strange to me that players need incentive to not have their characters murder people?

I'd say if you want to encourage them playing good people, inspiration for not murdering prisoners and the like is a good start.

I dont think you need to make combat rare or emphasize non intelligent enemies, either. There is nothing evil about fighting murder cultists, or taking down mafia enforcers. It's perfectly easy to run an urban campaign in DnD or any other game where the PCs are good people. Heck, even if the morality of the NPCs is ambiguous, the players can still be heroic/good enough to not kill unecessarily.

I mean, Not all superheroes that are willing to kill are like the punisher.

Definately talk to the group, though. If playing Shivy Darkknife the halfling kidney stabber is The Point for them, or The fun thing about DnD, inspiration isn't going to work for your goal.
If everyone intends to play good characters and are doing stuff like killing prisoners because it's expedient and not real life and who cares they just wanna get on with the story, then inspiration should be plenty, and the conversation will help remind them murder=evil.

If they disagree that killing the kobold prisoners and razing the whole cave system (kips and all. Yes, we call kobold young kips) so they "never bother the good villagers again" is an evil act...idk, Steal their best dice, eat the last slice of pizza, and run?

Ok. Maybe not that.

My players know that I won't gloss over murder, mind control, magical roofies, abusive behavior, etc, and that it's not just me. no one at the table wants to RP murder prisoners or burn down villages, but we did have to start remembering to react in character to other PC's behavior to get out of the "gloss over it bc expedience" habit.