Killing through D&D dungeons

[Lost_Wanderer]

The D&D setting, and the fact that they are orcs and goblins, becomes irrelevant.

Uh, from my 3.5 experience and what I’ve gathered from the new 5th ed materials, the term D&D setting is wholly subjective. One can create an entirely new world from just the core materials and a ton of imagination. (Dang Dungeon Master’s Guide! Why you no release sooner?! :crying

 

[AMFV]

Uh, from my 3.5 experience and what I’ve gathered from the new 5th ed materials, the term D&D setting is wholly subjective. One can create an entirely new world from just the core materials and a ton of imagination. (Dang Dungeon Master’s Guide! Why you no release sooner?! :crying

This is true, but there are assumed setting aspects. Orcs having souls, is in fact one of the assumed setting constraints. Now if somebody wants to create a world where Orcs have no souls, then that is a reasonable thing, but it’s a different question.

 

[Nixbits]

Lost Wanderer, I entirely agree with you. When I said “The D&D setting” I was referring to whatever D&D campaign world was being used by the DM and players. This is true even for those old gits (like me) who were playing D&D in the 1970s and 80s.

I don’t necessarily agree with AMFV that the core game makes the assumption that orcs have souls. I don’t think that it’s particularly important to most D&D games. But, as a matter of interest, can someone please direct me to the section of a rulebook that states that orcs have souls? Thanks.

 

[AMFV]

Lost Wanderer, I entirely agree with you. When I said “The D&D setting” I was referring to whatever D&D campaign world was being used by the DM and players. This is true even for those old gits (like me) who were playing D&D in the 1970s and 80s.

I don’t necessarily agree with AMFV that the core game makes the assumption that orcs have souls. I don’t think that it’s particularly important to most D&D games. But, as a matter of interest, can someone please direct me to the section of a rulebook that states that orcs have souls? Thanks.

Fiendish Codex 1 and 2 would be what you’re looking for. Furthermore the section the DMG and the Monster Manual on Type, if you look at Humanoid and Monstrous Humanoid, it briefly talks about what happens for them after death. Lastly, Orcs aren’t even Monstrous Humanoids they’re humanoids, the same type as Dwarves, Elves, and Humans.

There’s nothing wrong with changing the system and houseruling that orcs don’t have souls, as I said I wouldn’t like that kind of simplification, but I’ve had a lot of practice thinking about more complex moral issues of war, because I went to war. But it is clearly a houserule, and one needs to notify others of that fact.

 

[Gordon_Sims]

My Dungeons & Dragons group is in a heated discussion about the ethics of killing sentient creatures (assuming here they have souls), specifically orcs and goblins. My dad advised me to put forth that they should offer surrender, but they have brought up the issue of "if we capture and tie them up (eg), what if they escape and follow us and stab us in the back, or wait for us to head out of the dungeon? I know it’s a game, but we’re roleplaying.

I always held my characters to their alignment’s guidelines, just as I always made sure I stuck with my character’s alignment. This led to some good conversations and, occasionally, some pretty heated conflict. In one campaign (not D&D), I was given a character who was diabolic evil. Most of the rest of the players were some flavor of good. Everyone threw a fit when I played him as diabolic evil. They eventually subdued me, tied me up and tossed me in a cart for the bulk of the campaign, only untying me when they faced overwhelming odds (my character also just happened to be the most powerful in the group). After one battle I told them that if they tied me up again, I’d kill them the next time they set me free. Sure enough, we came across a group they couldn’t handle on their own, they untied me and I instantly killed the one guy capable of tying me up (he was some sort of magician; physically, I had them all outmatched). It didn’t get violent, but it took a lot of shouting to convince the guy whose character I killed that it wasn’t personal and it was completely and totally in character.

But I digress. When it came to the morality of killing non-human races, I always made sure we had that discussion before the campaign began. If the characters agreed they were all unenlightened, human-centric characters whose background didn’t allow for them to view goblins or whatever as sentient beings on par with them form a moral perspective, then I had no problem with them killing them in the heat of battle. However, if there were any non-human characters in the group, then I wouldn’t allow that. If they could see their Ogre companion as a moral equal, then it probably wasn’t in character for them to say they didn’t view that Ogre the same way. If they fought to slaughter and not drive away or subdue, they didn’t get any experience (or nothing more than a pittance) and any loot/treasure was likely destroyed in the battle. If they had a loose cannon in the group and they didn’t try to stop him from killing, murdering or torturing someone, they’d face some sort of karmic retribution for that as well. However, if they all stuck to their guns, from a character and alignment perspective, then they’d get bonus experience and occasionally loot for playing in character.

 

[Nixbits]

AMFV, thanks for the information. It looks like the core books you referred to are all 3rd Edition (3e) from 2000 or Revised 3rd Edition (3.5e) from 2003/2006. I don’t think that this sort of detail is in the original and 1st Edition core books from TSR (1970s).

It seems that the D&D scholars have revised the doctrine on orcs and goblins!

 

[AMFV]

AMFV, thanks for the information. It looks like the core books you referred to are all 3rd Edition (3e) from 2000 or Revised 3rd Edition (3.5e) from 2003/2006. I don’t think that this sort of detail is in the original and 1st Edition core books from TSR (1970s).

It seems that the D&D scholars have revised the doctrine on orcs and goblins!

Not really, if you’ll read the earlier editions there were mentions of this. You could play as a Half-Orc, and they certainly have souls, not a “half-soul”. Furthermore Orcs could be Clerics in even the earliest editions, which isn’t really possible without some kind of connection to the divine, it is certainly not outside the realm of possibility to assume that they had souls.

 

[Pat_Payne]

Actually, (and I wish I could remember where I read this), I’d seen something that said that Elves don’t have souls (instead they have some sort of animating spirit that works in a radically different manner to a soul), and so that was the rationale why spells like raise dead and the like didn’t work on them, and you needed higher-octane spells like resurrect to bring them back from the dead.

Since JRR Tolkein established that Orcs were debased elves, would it not stand to reason that the same deal applies to them?

 

[Kamaduck]

I’m an orc sympathizer. I have a tendency to pick the most monstrous possible race to play as, and then attempt to roleplay a really moral person (or sometimes an actual paladin). It’s fun.

I play Pathfinder (which I understand is just an altered version of the D&D 3.5 rules), and in that system, every race has the potential for good and the freedom to alter their alignment through concerted effort. Based on that, I’d say you should treat orcs the same way you’d treat evil humans- ie, preemptively killing them to avoid getting stabbed in the back later would be wrong. If you have the resources, you should contain them. Obviously it’s different if they insist on trying to kill you (that’d be self-defense). The hard part is if you don’t have the resources to contain them, and releasing them presents a potential danger to innocent people in the vicinity. At that point you’re dealing with the question of whether it’s morally acceptable to kill violent criminals (and how necessary it is to do so through the proper legal channels), which is a whole 'nother issue for your characters to have fun arguing about. Personally, I like such arguments. They’re a good chance to establish how cynical or idealistic the character you’re playing is.

Now, what your characters actually do is another matter. Adventurers are not known for their trusting natures, and I’m not going to say that it’s wrong to roleplay characters that don’t always make the right decisions. The above is just my take on what the right decision would actually be in that situation.

 

[Kamaduck]

Actually, (and I wish I could remember where I read this), I’d seen something that said that Elves don’t have souls (instead they have some sort of animating spirit that works in a radically different manner to a soul), and so that was the rationale why spells like raise dead and the like didn’t work on them, and you needed higher-octane spells like resurrect to bring them back from the dead.

Since JRR Tolkein established that Orcs were debased elves, would it not stand to reason that the same deal applies to them?

I’m pretty sure Tolkein’s elves have souls. I dunno what rules you’re using that elves can’t be revived by raise dead. That’s definitely not the case in the games I’ve played, and I have no idea if it holds true in the OP’s campaign setting.

But it doesn’t really matter, does it? Even if they don’t technically have souls, they have the capacity for moral reasoning, and presumably experience some kind of afterlife. I figure than makes killing them for no reason a textbook evil action.

 

[Nixbits]

I don’t think that there’s much debate about the ethics of killing orcs for no reason. The debate has been about the reasons that justify the killing of orcs and goblins. Killing them because it’s the only way to ensure your own survival in a life-threatening situation and in order to achieve a worthy overall goal might be a justifiable reason.

 

[AMFV]

I don’t think that there’s much debate about the ethics of killing orcs for no reason. The debate has been about the reasons that justify the killing of orcs and goblins. Killing them because it’s the only way to ensure your own survival in a life-threatening situation and in order to achieve a worthy overall goal might be a justifiable reason.

Certainly true, but the scenario the OP presented was not that, at all. In fact the scenario the OP presented involved Orcs who had surrendered, and simply killing them because it’s convenient is either morally ambiguous (if they have no souls), killing something unnecessarily is still pretty unpleasant, or downright heinous (if they have souls)